Netgear WGR614 Wireless-G Router
by Netgear
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List Price: Our Price: $33.99 You Save: $25.00 (42%) Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours Buy Used: from $15.95 (click here) Category: CE See more product details |
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Netgear WGR614 Wireless-G Router
Customer Review: Finally Stablized the Connection!
Summary: 4 Stars
ok... I have spent many hours trying to figure out how to stabilize the connection. After being connected, the connection would drop after x minutes and not return unless I reset the wireless settings by clicking "Apply" using the Netgear html interface. I checked out all the forums and did not find anything that would help. I was ready to give up and return the item. But Thank God I finally found the solution.Originally, I thought it was interference with my 2.4 ghz Panasonic phone but that wasn't it... Here's the solution and I hope this helps those who seem to be experiencing the same thing:
1. Update the firmware (not sure if this is really necessary but I did this after reading this on some forums)
2. Change channels. You have options 1 to 11. Mine works great on Channel 7 and it doesn't seem to interfere with my 2.4 ghz Panasonic cordless phone. Experiment and see which channel gives you the best signal and stable connection.
3. Place the router (if possible) in the center of the area that you will be working in to maximize the signal. I currently have the router at the end of my house and want to move it somewhere to the center to improve signal strength.
4. In the advanced settings for LAN IP set-up (and this is the one that solved the majority of my connection problems), you must reserve a dedicated ip address for each computer on the wireless LAN by using the "Address Reservation" option. Before I did this, I would sometimes get the message "IP address conflict with xx.xx.xx.xx" on each PC that I had connected to the router with the WG311 wireless PCI card. Basically, both computers were fighting for the same IP address and causing the connection to crash. So the problem was eliminated when I assigned dedicated IP addresses for each computer.
I give this router only 4 stars because this stuff should have been clearly stated in the manual. Now everything works fine and I get very few disconnects (notice how I didn't state zero disconnects). Anyway, ta da! Netgear should pay me for this. Seriously. p.s. There's been many price drops on this router recently so shop around.
Customer Review: Simple, safe, fast enough ....
Summary: 5 Stars
This router definitely isn't lead edge or sexy (in a geeky way). But that is what is great about it. Our home use of the router is almostly exclusively for web surfing and file/print sharing. A typical "G" standard router like this one is more than adequate for those purposes. The performance is rock solid working with Vista as well as XP. I tried some of the "N" routers and wireless cards and had far more problems than benefits. Sometime the "N" bandwidth wireless tools will be as reliable as the "G" products. But until then routers like this provide excellent performance and reliability for a low price.
This was a freebie when I bought an networkable HP printer. I took the opportunity to replace my Linksys G router, which is 2 years old and was not pleased with the Vista laptop I recently bought. Everytime I start my Vista laptop, it knocks all the other laptops off the network. They boot back up and work fine, but my wife is not amused. This router works fine with the mix of Vista, XP and the HP printer.
One of the features I like about the Netgear router over the Linksys router is the Netgear router allows you let the router permanently reserve an IP (network) address. I use the remote attach feature of XP and Vista to go between the computers and it is a pain if the addresses are constently changing. I've also set the dynamic address parameters so it only has enough numbers to support the addresses I have reserved. One more security link to add to the other recommendations about not broadcasting the SSID, using security, locking down to specific MAC ids, etc.
I didn't think I would ever get another Netgear product. I am zero for three the last three times I have submitted rebates to them. All sorts of excuses, no money. I'd decided I will not get another Netgear product unless the purchase price without rebate is reasonable. Since this was a freebie, the price was right.
I strongly suggest if you a buying one of these, check to make sure it is version 7. The version is stated on the outside of the box.
Customer Review: It gets the job done, great firewall and traffic filter, not much more.
Summary: 3 Stars
This router did a fair job. I frequently used it for Xbox Live/Playstation Network/online multiplayer games. I also frequently streamed extremely large media files across network as I have a collection of movies and tv shows on my HD/iTunes libraries that all share across the network to all the computers. I also used software to stream movies from my desktop's HD to the Playstation 3. Heavy network traffic with media files, and the router seemed to do decently but it wasn't spectacular by any means.
To the router's credit it never choked or reset under heavy load. When I had multiple computers (sometimes 4 clients) all aggressively pulling data down from visiting high bandwidth websites it seemed to handle the 16mbps internet connection ok. It kept things straight except when you were doing things like browsing large collections of pictures online (like say a Myspace photos page). In this instance it ground traffic to a halt until it internally reconfigured the routing tables. It did this quite often and all the clients in the house were just left with a connection hitch.
The firewall however was very useful and was more robust than most routers. You could specify keywords to a domain and easily block entire domains for the whole network. You could route ports and services to specific clients and reserve an IP but leave DHCP on for certain systems. For example all the Xbox Live services ports I could just leave open and reserve an IP address for the Xbox 360, and leave the 360 configured via DHCP. This would give you an "open" confirmation on your Xbox Live NAT status, which is the best way to go. It's more difficult on any other router to configure this, even more intuitive than the Apple Airport Extreme router.
I gave it a 3, however, because of the stability and hitching issues. If it weren't for those two problems I'd have given this a 5. Those two issues are just such a headache I was able to switch to a different router. If you want a cheap router that gets the job done though, this was a competent one for me.
Customer Review: Bad wireless router that replaced worse wireless router
Summary: 1 Stars
This replaced a Netgear BEFW11S4 router, which was hideously inept at keeping its wireless signal up or doing port-forwarding. After buying the Netgear, which I thought was a better brand, I'm not sure I'm much better off.
As I work, I can see the wireless signal drop from full strength to nothing for a few seconds, then come back. At other times, I've turned on a computer to find the signal gone and unwilling to come back - this can be fixed by plugging into an ethernet port, visiting the configuration page and simply "OK"ing the wireless settings, without changing anything. Of course, if ethernet were convenient to me, I wouldn't need the wireless. As it is, a device that fails every few days and needs to be reset is wholly unacceptable. It is better than the Linksys only because resetting the Linksys didn't always work, and on the Netgear, resetting does always work.
Nevertheless, home users shouldn't have to baby their network devices, particularly if you need wireless because your computer is physically nowhere near your DSL terminal or cable modem. This class of devices cannot fail, and even with the latest firmware this one does, a lot. One star.
Update: 8/04. The internet port, which connects the router to the DSL modem, died this week. I put in a report on the tech support page, detailing what had happened and what I'd done to isolate the problem, and I got a response three days later (24 hours, my butt). The response was a typically patronizing walkthrough of the most basic setup and testing that you can get to the configuration page. Well, of course, I can get to the configuration page - it's getting from the router to the internet (specifically, to the DSL modem) that's busted. Oh, and the e-mail was barely in English - more offshored support from a company that sees customers as nothing more than expense. Thank goodness these things are getting reasonably inexpensive, because you have to assume at this point that once a router dies, it's dead forever, and the warranty is worthless if you can't get an RMA.
Customer Review: AVOID THIS PIECE OF CRAP
Summary: 1 Stars
I give this product a big fat zero, but the minimum rating is 1 star.
I'm not a network expert, but I'm tech savvy enough. I've used Netgear hubs and switches in the past when they were blue boxes, and those have always been reliable, but since I bought the WGR614v5, I will NEVER trust Netgear again. If you value your hard earned money, then buy a more reliable brand.
My WGR614v5 only functioned "correctly" for one thing, which is vanilla broadband routing. It did not port forward correctly nor some of the other advertised higher functionalities. Also, it would not close ports consistently; I play online games, and the router did not close the port correctly about 25% of the time, which requires power cycling to undo. This drove me up the wall because closing a port is such a basic operation.
Firmware upgrade was a terrible experience. My WGR614v5 came with the initial release 1.03 firmware. I checked out their website, and there are firmware files for 1.07 and 1.09 that fixes the port forwarding editing, etc. I proceed to upgrade to fw 1.09, but the router would say that the upgrade was unsuccessful; the router still routed but now would disconnect every 10 to 30 minutes. I'm not talking about the wireless disconnecting because I'm using a hard wire instead of wireless during the upgrade. After many attempts and hardware resets, there was no resolution except reverting back to 1.03. Same thing with 1.07.
Netgear support responded several times to my inquiry without solving anything; they stopped responding after a while, then I got a reply about 3 weeks after their last reply asking if I still have the problem. I told them that I resolved the problem by replacing that piece of crap WGR614v5 with one of their competitors' products. My new wireless router (Linksys WRT54GC) port forwarded right out of the box and has been running without any problems whatsoever. It has not left any ports opened after my online gaming sessions. I feel so less stressed by my router now.