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- Aug 20, 2007
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Most routers on Amazon, at least the popular ones, have tons of reviews and far too many 1-star reviews for my peace of mind. I realize a lot of those reviews are from people who should be blaming themselves or their ISP for poor performance issues, especially wireless. But it's still hard to feel comfortable with a device that out of 500 reviews has 125 1-star reviews, even IF it ends up with a 3.5-4 average.
Suggestions? I'm looking for something reasonably configurable, not necessarily point-and-shoot but I also don't want to spend two weeks learning and configuring it. That leaves out Cisco!
Yeah, maybe that's wanting to have my cake and eat it too, but you get my drift.
Here are some "requirements" which I have found missing in some of the routers I've checked out so far:
1. An actual manual, either coming on paper with the router (unlikely, I realize), on CD or easily downloaded from the Internet.
2. Evidence that the manufacturer offers updates for the firmware, at least a reasonable time after a router vulnerability is announced
3. Some minimum configuration options, which not all routers have, incredibly, such as:
a. push-button reset of dynamic IP address
b. somewhat in-depth firewall configuration (it's nice to be able to actually pick and choose ports to close/stealth rather than just pick "High", "Medium", or "Low" firewall settings)
c. Nice to be able to change the username from "admin." This is lacking, amazingly, in a lot of routers
d. I'd be impressed by INTELLIGENT and CONSERVATIVE default settings such as disabling wireless, disabling WPS, disabling remote management, etc., i.e. requiring "risky" settings to be actively enabled by the user, something not even Microsoft usually does with its O/S
e. Coherent intelligent customer support, preferably not based in the Third World
f. more stuff like the above.
I realize I won't be able to "have it all" but is anybody really happy with their router and would just love to recommend it?
I'm all ears!
Suggestions? I'm looking for something reasonably configurable, not necessarily point-and-shoot but I also don't want to spend two weeks learning and configuring it. That leaves out Cisco!
Yeah, maybe that's wanting to have my cake and eat it too, but you get my drift.Here are some "requirements" which I have found missing in some of the routers I've checked out so far:
1. An actual manual, either coming on paper with the router (unlikely, I realize), on CD or easily downloaded from the Internet.
2. Evidence that the manufacturer offers updates for the firmware, at least a reasonable time after a router vulnerability is announced
3. Some minimum configuration options, which not all routers have, incredibly, such as:
a. push-button reset of dynamic IP address
b. somewhat in-depth firewall configuration (it's nice to be able to actually pick and choose ports to close/stealth rather than just pick "High", "Medium", or "Low" firewall settings)
c. Nice to be able to change the username from "admin." This is lacking, amazingly, in a lot of routers
d. I'd be impressed by INTELLIGENT and CONSERVATIVE default settings such as disabling wireless, disabling WPS, disabling remote management, etc., i.e. requiring "risky" settings to be actively enabled by the user, something not even Microsoft usually does with its O/S
e. Coherent intelligent customer support, preferably not based in the Third World
f. more stuff like the above.
I realize I won't be able to "have it all" but is anybody really happy with their router and would just love to recommend it?
I'm all ears!
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