What aDSL Wireless Router to buy?

Forums › LAN (ethernet/Wifi/routers/Bluetooth) › What aDSL Wireless Router to buy?

lyonrouge

1993 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#11708 7-Feb-2007 15:31

My NetGear has gone a bit mad a decided resetting to factory default will be funny. When I replace it I want to replace it with one that can automatically reconnect when Telecom randomly disconnects me, is there one available. An additional bonus is one that can connect back into its external address, but this is a nice to have, not a necessity.

grant_k

3539 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#60015 7-Feb-2007 15:57

I dunno about connecting back to its External Address (you would have to try it), but we installed one of these almost a year ago and it has performed faultlessly, definitely reconnects by itself after an outage:

Description
All-In-One ADSL Modem - Wireless Router with Firewall and 4-Port 10/100 Switch 802.11g 54Mbps Wireless - Stateful Packet Inspection Firewall

3COM Code		UPC
3CRWDR101A-75		662705500058
Product Information
This is an All-In-One unit with the following features: * Built-In ADSL * Stateful Packet Inspection Firewall with intrustion detection * 4 Port 10/100 Ethernet Switch * Router with advanced feature set * works with any broadband ADSL connections from any ISP * Built-In 802.11g wireless - Backward compatible with 802.11b devices * Wireless security features include 128-bit WEP and WPA 802.11g 54 Mbps wireless connectivity supports speeds almost five times faster than 802.11b 802.11b backward compatibility protects existing product investments Advanced 256-bit WPA encryption for 11g networks; 40/64- and 128-bit WEP encryption for legacy wireless clients help keep wireless transmissions private Support of WDS (wireless distribution system) makes setup of an extended or completely wireless network very simple (requires wireless access points that support WDS) Additional security features include URL or keyword filtering to control access to inappropriate web sites, allow/deny access control lists, SSID Broadcast Disable, and MAC filtering VPN pass-through permits secure connections to remote offices Four 10/100 Ethernet LAN ports with Auto MDI/MDIX provide wired LAN connect ivity to multiple users or another LAN
Warranty Details
3 Years Warranty Please call 0800 450 454
Vendors Web Address
ap.3com.com/

Price is $199 incl. GST retail but if you shop around, you may be able to get it cheaper than that.

lyonrouge

1993 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#60092 8-Feb-2007 09:01

Do you know if it supports port forwarding?

xlinknz

1130 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#60097 8-Feb-2007 09:55

Lyonrouge

Firstly make sure you get an adsl2+ ready modem. TCNZ will be deploying this starting March, then you don't have to get a new modem

In line with above my approach was to get a seperate modem to the wireless router, so as other technology offerings are made available [cable, vdsl etc] I just replace the modem and get to keep the wireless router and not through the whole lot out.

My adsl2+ modem is Dynalink rta1320 - got it for $20 off Trademe, has full firewall. Another adsl2+ choice is the dlink 502T which TCNZ bundle again these are available for. The little Dynalink is excellent [also has Firewall and QoS]

My wireless router [BR6216 RRP $150 from Ascent] is a Taiwanese brand called Edimax - I can't say enough about it it is pre N 802.11n [MIMO] but is of course backward compatable with 802.11g and 802.11b [I use a non pre n adapter] what I like about this router is it has excellent QoS ability which I will use when I start using VoIP when naked DSL arrives. You can go to their web site and check it supports port forwarding. It also has removeable aerials and supports WPA2 authetication and AES encryption if you are security concious. It also has excellent range.

photoman

217 posts

Master Geek

#60128 8-Feb-2007 12:37

lyonrouge - The 3com 3CRWDR101A-75 does do port forwarding. A handy site to use for this is www.portforward.com

xlinknz - What sort of range do you mean by 'excellent', or specifically the connection speed? I have a Netgear wireless modem/router at home. The specs says it has a range of 400m outside and up to 100m inside. On the couple of occasions that I actually used the wirelesss aspect, I was getting 1 Mbps connection when I was at the far end of the house, approximately 15m from the source, as opposed to the 54Mbps connection at all other times. Is this the sort of speed I should be getting at this range? If that is all I can expect, I think I will stick to hard wiring the laptop and the PC.

xlinknz

1130 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#60139 8-Feb-2007 14:16

Photoman

Like you I high expectations of wireless performance. My manufacturer also made similar claims...

I get a real 22Mbit transfering files between PCs, bear in mind that the 54Mbit of 802.11g is a combination of both directions which would be 27Mbit. I personally found the PC one was tranferring to and from made a big difference e.g. I could only get 8Mbit from an Ethernet connected 300Mhz AMD Win98 PC

My router is a 802.11 pre n 'MIMO' setup with 3 x 2dBi antenna, more importantly my 802.11b/g adapter [not pre N] has a 5dBi antenna. I get excellent coverage too, this weekend I had 86% signal strenght over 100m away outside and no issues surfing. Note that the AP was on the window shelf. I didn't get this coverage from the matching pre N pcmcia card I had so I returned it.

I have heard of many getting poor wifi performance. I suspect my 'good' performance is due to a three aerial pre N router and a hi gain adapter aerial. [802.11n is a lot better through walls etc]

What model router and adapter do you have ?

lyonrouge

1993 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#60266 9-Feb-2007 14:54

xlinknz: Lyonrouge

Firstly make sure you get an adsl2+ ready modem. TCNZ will be deploying this starting March, then you don't have to get a new modem

In line with above my approach was to get a seperate modem to the wireless router, so as other technology offerings are made available [cable, vdsl etc] I just replace the modem and get to keep the wireless router and not through the whole lot out.

My adsl2+ modem is Dynalink rta1320 - got it for $20 off Trademe, has full firewall. Another adsl2+ choice is the dlink 502T which TCNZ bundle again these are available for. The little Dynalink is excellent [also has Firewall and QoS]

My wireless router [BR6216 RRP $150 from Ascent] is a Taiwanese brand called Edimax - I can't say enough about it it is pre N 802.11n [MIMO] but is of course backward compatable with 802.11g and 802.11b [I use a non pre n adapter] what I like about this router is it has excellent QoS ability which I will use when I start using VoIP when naked DSL arrives. You can go to their web site and check it supports port forwarding. It also has removeable aerials and supports WPA2 authetication and AES encryption if you are security concious. It also has excellent range.

I've decided to go with the 3Com for convenience, although I do appreciate your point, this stuff is cheap enough to be replaced as a whole and reduce the complexiting of peripherals, i.e. I don't really want to make this much worse

LAN

lyonrouge

1993 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#60494 12-Feb-2007 09:17

xlinknz: Lyonrouge

Firstly make sure you get an adsl2+ ready modem. TCNZ will be deploying this starting March, then you don't have to get a new modem

In line with above my approach was to get a seperate modem to the wireless router, so as other technology offerings are made available [cable, vdsl etc] I just replace the modem and get to keep the wireless router and not through the whole lot out.

My adsl2+ modem is Dynalink rta1320 - got it for $20 off Trademe, has full firewall. Another adsl2+ choice is the dlink 502T which TCNZ bundle again these are available for. The little Dynalink is excellent [also has Firewall and QoS]

My wireless router [BR6216 RRP $150 from Ascent] is a Taiwanese brand called Edimax - I can't say enough about it it is pre N 802.11n [MIMO] but is of course backward compatable with 802.11g and 802.11b [I use a non pre n adapter] what I like about this router is it has excellent QoS ability which I will use when I start using VoIP when naked DSL arrives. You can go to their web site and check it supports port forwarding. It also has removeable aerials and supports WPA2 authetication and AES encryption if you are security concious. It also has excellent range.

Got the 3Com which has ADSL 2/2+.

Quic Broadband

Move to New Zealand's best fibre broadband service (affiliate link). Free setup code: R587125ERQ6VE. Note that to use Quic Broadband you must be comfortable with configuring your own router.

lyonrouge

1993 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#60573 12-Feb-2007 21:29

Thanks Grant17, the 3Com is a great fit. The setup is intuitive. The loopback works which is great for testing HTML content and the port forwarding allows for designation of target IP and Port (great for multiple RDP targets). Thanks for recommendation, a sweet piece of kit at a good price.

grant_k

3539 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#60600 12-Feb-2007 23:44

I'm pleased to hear you like the 3Com router, Lyonrouge

3Com product is usually of very good quality, but in the past has been seriously expensive. They seem to have got the price/performance just right with this router. Other brands such as D-Link are much more widely used but there seem to be a lot of reliability problems, whereas I've never had any bad experiences with anything I've bought from 3Com (mostly network cards until now).

richms

28198 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#60606 13-Feb-2007 00:23

Before splashing out on a new adsl2+ router, check that you will actually be able to use it. No point getting it if you are only seeing 2-3 meg linespeeds at the moment since it will not help.

I actually have things seperated into routers as wifi accesspoints, a linux machine as the firewall and an adsl router so that restarting one doesnt effect everything else. I used to use the switch in the routers as accesspoints, but they seem to restart periodically making everything connected lose its ethernet link for about 10 seconds. enough to kill all open connections etc.

Now that I am using openwrt on my linksyses it seems that they dont reboot for no good reason, but now they are all nicely mounted with power over the cat-5 cable to them I dont want to change anything.

Richard rich.ms