Selecting a wireless router, any tips?

The advantage of "a" is that it does not use the same frequency as cordless phones and microwave ovens (which b/g does), and also that fewer people have "a" capable routers, and thus there will be less potential conflict.

All that said, I am more than happy with a year and a half old Linksys "b" router--there are seven different wireless networks visible to me in my apartment building, and I don't have ANY conflict problems. (Not that I am recommending a "b" only router--I am not. I'm just saying . . . )

I have a Linksys and most of my friends have Netgear. They are both great and provide great signal. I've never tried d-link, but I would highly recomend Linksys or Netgear

You don't really need "a." If it is more expensive, especially much more expensive, I'd go with b/g.

The only need for "a" is if you have have an "a" enabled card/laptop and you live in area of high interference - some buildings in big cities like SF and NY with tons of residents with WiFi get this.. but even then it's probably not a HUGE problem.

You wont get the 108 with the netgear router unless you put a netgear wireless card in your Laptop it only works with its own brand some kind of secret hand shake they do with each other.

The netgear routers give the option of running 2 different firewalls NAT/SPI plus WEP at 64/128 bit. I have the netgear WGR614v5 and love it easy to setup and took me all of 2 seconds for setting my Mac filtering

http://kbserver.netgear.com/products/WGR614v5.asp

You don't need an a/b/g router to use your card. The card has the ABILITY to use a Wireless a, Wireless b, or Wireless g router. You do not need to have a router that also has the ability to use all three. Pick one of the letters.

Wireless A - FAST. 54Mbps (I believe). Short range (100ft -ish?). Expensive. Hardly used anymore.

Wireless B - Slower. 11Mbps. Longer range (300ft -ish). Less costly. VERY common.

Wireless G - Best of both worlds. Fast. 54Mbps. Long range (300ft -ish). A little more expensive than Wireless B. Getting more and more common.

A Wireless G router is also backwards compatible with Wireless B routers (a little more incentive for the G).

The Wireless Super G you've seen (108Mbps) is ONLY if the router and the network card are the same brand as said above.

If this router is only used for the internet, 11Mbps is plenty fast (it translates into about 1,300KB per second download/upload speeds (I've never seen a DSL, Cable modem, or satellite go this fast). If you plan on linking several computer together and sharing things across them, you might want to go for the Wireless G with up to 6,750KB per second.

The numbers used on routers and network cards are NOT the same as the upload/download rates you see when transferring a file (say downloading a picture or music file or installation file). Routers and network cards use MegaBITS. 54 Megabits, 11 Megabits, 108 Megabits. When transferring files, the numbers used are MegaBYTES. Different by a multiple of 8. 8 MegaBITs = 1 MegaBYTE These numbers are deceiving. So 54 Megabits = 6.75 Megabytes, 11 Megabits = 1.375 Megabytes, etc. Also, 1 megabyte = 1,000 kilobytes (KB) and 1 megabit = 1,000 kilobits (Kb).

Hope this helps out.

I don't have a speedbooster router, but was looking in to it a while back with the thoughts of upgrading. From everything I read, the real world speed increase is not much at all. There a couple things you also need to consider. Will you be doing a lot of file transfers between computers internally or just using the wireless for internet? If you are going to use it for just internet, 'b' will suffice. It will be running at speeds faster than your internet connection anyway. It will also save you a little cabbage. If you will be doing a lot of internal file tranfers over wireless between your home computers, you will benefit greatly by stepping up to 'g', or a 'g' with speedbooster. As said before, from everything I read, the benefit of speedbooster (and other 108/125Mbps technologies) is not a very large real world improvement over 54g. I do a good many internal tranfers, and some relatively large files, but decided after researching it wasn't worth it to me to change to one of the 108/125 cards and routers.

Try Linksys Wireless-G model: wrt564G. The signal range isn't as great, but that's the reason why I chosed it over others: if you live in an apartment/dorm, you dont need extreme signal coverage since every single one of you neighbors will try connect to your network.

Another reason, the router comes with installation wizard cd-rom, which will guide you step by step. It was very simple, and I was also able to create a mini home networking with my desktop PC. Right now my connection is at constant 54 mbps

u need to have a card that supports that feature, and most cards dont and i doubt that your does either. I would just go for a regular b/g router unless you really need and are transfering lots of files over the network. Just so you know, the way the protocol works you will actually get about half the throughput. So on a 11 mbps network, you will actually get roughly 5.5 mbps. On a 54 mbps network, you will get roughly 27 mbps.


edit: for more information about efficiency.

http://inst.eecs.berkeley.edu/~ee122...efficiency.pdf

I have a Minitar MN54G4R, its described as a wireless residential gateway, 802.11G, with 4 x 100mbit ports, and a print server (USB).

It is currently sharing ADSL amongst 2 desktops and 1 laptop at home. I can print wirelessly around the house, there have never been any drop outs and it only cost a cool AU$90

I have a motorola cable modem (SB5120), strongly recommended for long life by the cable company, so I matched it with a Motorola Wireless router, model WR850GP, which has been great.

Snaggly Pete, I wouldn't worry about the Mbps thing. For example, I just transferred about 1.5 GB (gigabytes) of data from my desktop to my laptop using a 100Mbps (wired connection, not wireless) connection. The speed stayed around 65Mbps (or about 8.1 Megabytes per second). Didn't even max out the connection.

Hard drives can only read and write so fast. The internet only goes so fast. A FAST DSL or cable modem connection is 3 - 8 Mbps (download). That doesn't even max out the slowest wireless connection.

If you plan on doing server activities I wouldn't recommend wireless anyways.

To use the "super" connection to get 108Mbps, you need to have the same brand network card as the router. That quote by Linksys meant that IF you have a Linksys card you can get 108Mbps otherwise you're stuck with 54Mbps. You need the same brand because there is no standard for the special handshake (the way the router talks to the computer). So, each company uses a proprietory method so you have to buy their equipment.

I don't believe the Intel or Dell wireless cards support the "super" connection anyways. If they did, you'd need to get an Intel or Dell router that also supported the "super" connection.

One of the greatest things about the WRT54G is that you can flash its firmware with open source firmware. Since the device runs a stripped-down version of Linux, it's possible to build a kernel and a system and flash it to the router. Fortunately, you don't have to build it yourself, as there are many other people and companies that have already made some.

Google "WRT54G firmware" and you'll get a veritable cornucopia of firmware. I personally will be flashing the Sveasoft firmware within the next few weeks.

i use a dlink. It does pretty good and has very good range (dlink di-614+). My dad once bought a netgear and he returned it immediately. he said it got wayyy too hot, and the range wasnt as good.

I use a Belkin. The guts are the same as the Linksys WRT54G, but the firmware is completely different and it will not accept the third party firmwares. Yhe reason I bought it instead of the Linksys was it was cheaper at the time (not sure of current prices). That is all about to change with the soon to be released Talisman firmware from sveasoft.