Note to self: don't buy any more Linksys routers.

I bought a couple of the cisco/linksys routers after the merger. They were shiat. The wireless will randomly stop working, or the whole thing will simply hang. Never buying a cisco product again.

/the old linksys stuff was great.

//Cisco business class routers/firewall/switches are overpriced garbage too.

Dinki: I bought a couple of the cisco/linksys routers after the merger. They were shiat. The wireless will randomly stop working, or the whole thing will simply hang. Never buying a cisco product again.

/the old linksys stuff was great.

//Cisco business class routers/firewall/switches are overpriced garbage too.

I've had a Linksys WRT54GL running Tomato for 4 years now. Works great.

The OS that comes preloaded is crap.

the Connect Cloud service came with a supplemental privacy policy that explicitly allowed Cisco to peek at a user's "internet history," "traffic" and "other related information." If Cisco discovered you had used your router for "pornographic or offensive purposes" or to violate "intellectual property rights," it reserved the right to shut down your cloud account and effectively cut you off from your router.

If this is true, never buying Cisco for home or office again.

Dinki: I bought a couple of the cisco/linksys routers after the merger. They were shiat. The wireless will randomly stop working, or the whole thing will simply hang. Never buying a cisco product again.

/the old linksys stuff was great.

//Cisco business class routers/firewall/switches are overpriced garbage too.

Really?

Been managing Cisco devices for 15 years, also worked on HP, Linksys (pre and post Cisco), Juniper, and Avaya.

Cisco is the most reliable for LAN and enterprise I've ever seen, with the most features for administration, management and monitoring.

Overpriced? Agree.

Garbage? Do not agree.

Belkin is garbage. Never managed one that worked right.

This is my router. There are many like it, but this one is mine.


Cisco apparently never read Routergod. Or believes that a network at home is sort of like a privacy boundary.. a "demarcation" if you will .. and that crossing that is sort of like declaring war on users... to some.

Generation_D: the Connect Cloud service came with a supplemental privacy policy that explicitly allowed Cisco to peek at a user's "internet history," "traffic" and "other related information." If Cisco discovered you had used your router for "pornographic or offensive purposes" or to violate "intellectual property rights," it reserved the right to shut down your cloud account and effectively cut you off from your router.

If this is true, never buying Cisco for home or office again.

Cutting users off from porn? This does not bode well for Cisco.

Generation_D: Cisco apparently never read Routergod. Or believes that a network at home is sort of like a privacy boundary

I have a feeling that the article could be exaggerating. A router should be able to act as a standalone device, like hosting a private LAN. If Cisco decentralizes administrative access of the router onto the Internet, how would administrating a private network even be possible?

Lor M. Ipsum: Generation_D: Cisco apparently never read Routergod. Or believes that a network at home is sort of like a privacy boundary

I have a feeling that the article could be exaggerating. A router should be able to act as a standalone device, like hosting a private LAN. If Cisco decentralizes administrative access of the router onto the Internet, how would administrating a private network even be possible?

CIsco's official response:Link

Engadget article could be misleading. More to come I'm sure.

/slashies

I have an e3000. Generally, it works fine. The one problem I have, and it's a fairly big one, is that I can either log into the router directly, or use their desktop application to adjust the settings. Neither option gives you full control, though. You have to use the desktop app if you want to use their "guest" feature. It's a pretty nice feature; I could give people who visit my house an easy password, they log in as "guest", and all they have is internet access. However, using the desktop app drastically limits to control you have over the router, you have no ability to set up port forwarding, wifi blacklists or whitelists, etc.

If I log into the router directly, I cannot use the desktop app, and therefore not the "guest" feature. The "guest" SSID is still broadcast (with no way to turn it off), but I cannot set a password, because you'd have to use the desktop app to do that...and as soon as you open the app, it resets all the routers settings to default.

make me some tea: I've had a Linksys WRT54GL running Tomato for 4 years now. Works great.

The OS that comes preloaded is crap.

There's a few good alternatives if you have a Linksys WRT model. I haven't tried Tomato but I've been using DD-WRT.

This is why God made DD-WRT. I find it funny that companies like Cisco, with tons of money, total knowledge of the product, and expertise for this sort of thing, still crank out firmware that's absolute crap compared to what some guys put together in their spare time.

My WRT-320N has been running virtually flawlessly since I got it, and flashing it with DD-WRT was the first thing I did.

slayer199: There's a few good alternatives if you have a Linksys WRT model. I haven't tried Tomato but I've been using DD-WRT.

My only regret with DD-WRT is that I didn't flash it to my WRT router sooner. I freaking love DD-WRT.

(You mean I can finally do port forwarding and static IP based on MAC address from the router? yippee!)

nvmac: Been managing Cisco devices for 15 years, also worked on HP, Linksys (pre and post Cisco), Juniper, and Avaya.

Cisco is the most reliable for LAN and enterprise I've ever seen, with the most features for administration, management and monitoring.

Overpriced? Agree.

Garbage? Do not agree.

Belkin is garbage. Never managed one that worked right.

"Linksys by Cisco" ≠ "Cisco business-grade gear"

just like "iomega by EMC" ≠ "Symmetrix."

Well, now that I can't buy new Linksys routers, even though I used them for over a decade, any suggestions by the Fark community? Netgear?

Ahhhh it's Cisco not Crisco.

nvmac: Lor M. Ipsum: Generation_D: Cisco apparently never read Routergod. Or believes that a network at home is sort of like a privacy boundary

I have a feeling that the article could be exaggerating. A router should be able to act as a standalone device, like hosting a private LAN. If Cisco decentralizes administrative access of the router onto the Internet, how would administrating a private network even be possible?

CIsco's official response:Link

Engadget article could be misleading. More to come I'm sure.

/slashies

Or Cisco could be backpedaling fiercely.

make me some tea: Note to self: don't buy any more Linksys routers.


or better yet. do what i did and load Linux firmware into the Linksys instead of stock firmware. Tomato firmware (Linux) to be precise. have had zero issues and fast as hell. go ahead. google it. don't be afraid. ((:

make me some tea: Dinki: I bought a couple of the cisco/linksys routers after the merger. They were shiat. The wireless will randomly stop working, or the whole thing will simply hang. Never buying a cisco product again.

/the old linksys stuff was great.

//Cisco business class routers/firewall/switches are overpriced garbage too.

I've had a Linksys WRT54GL running Tomato for 4 years now. Works great.

The OS that comes preloaded is crap.


i second the Tomato Linux firmware. its sweet on my Linky.

nvmac: Dinki: I bought a couple of the cisco/linksys routers after the merger. They were shiat. The wireless will randomly stop working, or the whole thing will simply hang. Never buying a cisco product again.

/the old linksys stuff was great.

//Cisco business class routers/firewall/switches are overpriced garbage too.

Really?

Been managing Cisco devices for 15 years, also worked on HP, Linksys (pre and post Cisco), Juniper, and Avaya.

Cisco is the most reliable for LAN and enterprise I've ever seen, with the most features for administration, management and monitoring.

Overpriced? Agree.

Garbage? Do not agree.

Belkin is garbage. Never managed one that worked right.


Cisco is absolutely the best router in the world. sometimes, though, they could make better software decisions. the bought Linksys a few years ago. my linky running tomato linux firmware is rock solid and fast and full features for a 50 dollar router.

make me some tea: Note to self: don't buy any more Linksys routers.

Yeah, no kidding. Or Cisco hardware, where possible. Keep your snooping "morality" out of the hardware I purchased, kthx.

TwistedIvory: slayer199: There's a few good alternatives if you have a Linksys WRT model. I haven't tried Tomato but I've been using DD-WRT.

My only regret with DD-WRT is that I didn't flash it to my WRT router sooner. I freaking love DD-WRT.

(You mean I can finally do port forwarding and static IP based on MAC address from the router? yippee!)

I use DD-WRT to create a wireless bridge between my computer room -- where my cable modem is connected -- to my living room -- where I have three game consoles and a computer using "wired" network access. The router in the living room is a Linksys device.

The original Linksys firmware would drop an idle connection after ten minutes of inactivity. When using SSH for port forwarding, this caused lost connections. DD-WRT does not feature such "functionality".

Gig103: Well, now that I can't buy new Linksys routers, even though I used them for over a decade, any suggestions by the Fark community? Netgear?

Been years since I used one, but it was fine back in the day. Beware the netgear chipsets are not generally supported by the alternate router firmware like dd-wrt.

Gig103: Well, now that I can't buy new Linksys routers, even though I used them for over a decade, any suggestions by the Fark community? Netgear?

I use a D-Link DIR-615 in my computer room, but my wireless bridge (a Linksys router running DD-WRT) continually lost connection after approximately one hour of connectivity. This problem was resolved only by installing DD-WRT on the DIR-615 also.

Generation_D: This is my router. There are many like it, but this one is mine.


Cisco apparently never read Routergod. Or believes that a network at home is sort of like a privacy boundary.. a "demarcation" if you will .. and that crossing that is sort of like declaring war on users... to some.


without tomato linux, my linksys router is useless. without my router, i am useless. lol

this was on /. last week, there are workarounds to get back to older firmware but it's stupid, the entire situation is stupid. If Cisco is willing to do that stuff to already purchased goods, pray they don't alter the deal further.

/loves dd-wrt on my old wrt54g

Dimensio: I use DD-WRT to create a wireless bridge between my computer room -- where my cable modem is connected -- to my living room -- where I have three game consoles and a computer using "wired" network access. The router in the living room is a Linksys device.

I do the exact same thing, except with two consoles (down from three) and a tivo.

// Just got some directional antennas to make the connection even more stable (there are 15 other wifi networks in my area now and the directionals helps me blast through all of the noise by shooting most of the transmit power from one router to the other ... it's a straight shot down a hallway).

Dimensio: TwistedIvory: slayer199: There's a few good alternatives if you have a Linksys WRT model. I haven't tried Tomato but I've been using DD-WRT.

My only regret with DD-WRT is that I didn't flash it to my WRT router sooner. I freaking love DD-WRT.

(You mean I can finally do port forwarding and static IP based on MAC address from the router? yippee!)

I use DD-WRT to create a wireless bridge between my computer room -- where my cable modem is connected -- to my living room -- where I have three game consoles and a computer using "wired" network access. The router in the living room is a Linksys device.

The original Linksys firmware would drop an idle connection after ten minutes of inactivity. When using SSH for port forwarding, this caused lost connections. DD-WRT does not feature such "functionality".

Ooo, how's the wireless bridging work on DD-WRT? Fairly stable? Does it work with DHCP? I'm running Tomato with a wireless bridge from my living room (xbox/tv/media pc) to my FIOS router in the office. Works great, the only problem is it only seems to work with WEP, not WPA2. Not a huge deal, don't have many neighbors I'm worried about, but it would be nice to be a little bit more secure. I tried the same setup with DD-WRT a few years ago, and I could never get the wireless bridge to forward DHCP properly, so I'd have to manually set all my IP addresses. Not a big deal, but I just don't care that much to manually setup all my devices in the living room,

You BASTARD.

/thong tha tha tha thong.

Gig103: Well, now that I can't buy new Linksys routers, even though I used them for over a decade, any suggestions by the Fark community? Netgear?

I've been using various SMC stuff since the late '90s. They've been rock solid for me every time I've gotten one.

YodaBlues: Ooo, how's the wireless bridging work on DD-WRT? Fairly stable? Does it work with DHCP?

I'm running a pair of WRT54GLs (the ones with the full set of RAM/Flash), and it's stable enough (even more so after I slapped the directional antennas on them).

Works fine with DHCP (the bridge is just another DHCP client that forwards).

// you can boost the transmission power as needed, the default is quite low.

Gig103: Well, now that I can't buy new Linksys routers, even though I used them for over a decade, any suggestions by the Fark community? Netgear?

I use a Buffalo device (I'm not near it, so I don't know the model). Put DD-WRT on it. Very nice little unit.

Or you could go the whole-nine-yards and build a Free BSD box to act as a router.

YodaBlues: Dimensio: TwistedIvory: slayer199: There's a few good alternatives if you have a Linksys WRT model. I haven't tried Tomato but I've been using DD-WRT.

My only regret with DD-WRT is that I didn't flash it to my WRT router sooner. I freaking love DD-WRT.

(You mean I can finally do port forwarding and static IP based on MAC address from the router? yippee!)

I use DD-WRT to create a wireless bridge between my computer room -- where my cable modem is connected -- to my living room -- where I have three game consoles and a computer using "wired" network access. The router in the living room is a Linksys device.

The original Linksys firmware would drop an idle connection after ten minutes of inactivity. When using SSH for port forwarding, this caused lost connections. DD-WRT does not feature such "functionality".

Ooo, how's the wireless bridging work on DD-WRT? Fairly stable? Does it work with DHCP? I'm running Tomato with a wireless bridge from my living room (xbox/tv/media pc) to my FIOS router in the office. Works great, the only problem is it only seems to work with WEP, not WPA2. Not a huge deal, don't have many neighbors I'm worried about, but it would be nice to be a little bit more secure. I tried the same setup with DD-WRT a few years ago, and I could never get the wireless bridge to forward DHCP properly, so I'd have to manually set all my IP addresses. Not a big deal, but I just don't care that much to manually setup all my devices in the living room,

Using two routers that both run DD-WRT, wireless bridging is easy to set up and, thus far, has proven fast and stable. I am able to play online games without any router-based lag. I currently lack a wireless keyboard (though I do possess a wireless mouse), so I use a laptop (connected wirelessly) and a VNC connection to the television-connected computer for keyboard input; it has proven reliable and lag-free as an input device for games.

Connecting my Playstation 3 to the wireless bridge results in substantially faster transfer speeds than does connecting the Playstation 3 to the wireless network.

YodaBlues: Ooo, how's the wireless bridging work on DD-WRT? Fairly stable? Does it work with DHCP? I'm running Tomato with a wireless bridge from my living room (xbox/tv/media pc) to my FIOS router in the office. Works great, the only problem is it only seems to work with WEP, not WPA2. Not a huge deal, don't have many neighbors I'm worried about, but it would be nice to be a little bit more secure. I tried the same setup with DD-WRT a few years ago, and I could never get the wireless bridge to forward DHCP properly, so I'd have to manually set all my IP addresses. Not a big deal, but I just don't care that much to manually setup all my devices in the living room,

I've had it going for a few weeks between a linksys running dd-wrt and a morotola cable modem/wireless router combo running motorola firmware. WPA2/AES. No hitches, just works.

FWIW, the Motorola has been as solid as any consumer network device I've had with the default firmware. Pretty configurable (port forwarding, guest network, etc). interface is ugly as sin, but I log in like 3 times a year, and it's clear enough where to go. It's almost like motorola's focusing their development on things that matter.

Gig103: Well, now that I can't buy new Linksys routers, even though I used them for over a decade, any suggestions by the Fark community?

You can still buy WRT54GLs and flash them.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc t.aspx?Item=33-124-190

The price keeps creeping up though. Wait until they're on sale (I bought three over the years for between $50-$65). My oldest one is about 7 years old I think.

make me some tea: Note to self: don't buy any more Linksys routers.

.

Dimensio: TwistedIvory: slayer199: There's a few good alternatives if you have a Linksys WRT model. I haven't tried Tomato but I've been using DD-WRT.

My only regret with DD-WRT is that I didn't flash it to my WRT router sooner. I freaking love DD-WRT.

(You mean I can finally do port forwarding and static IP based on MAC address from the router? yippee!)

I use DD-WRT to create a wireless bridge between my computer room -- where my cable modem is connected -- to my living room -- where I have three game consoles and a computer using "wired" network access. The router in the living room is a Linksys device.

The original Linksys firmware would drop an idle connection after ten minutes of inactivity. When using SSH for port forwarding, this caused lost connections. DD-WRT does not feature such "functionality".

Have you tried setting a ServerAliveInterval? That will tell SSH to ping the server every N seconds, which should prevent a lousy router from thinking the connection is idle, and will let you find out sooner if a connection fails.

I use it at work because I often need to maintain several SSH tunnels, many of which run over unreliable networks that could go down without warning.

Ok, try not to be too judgemental, but I bought an Apple Airport Extreme and I absolutely love it. It's got 2 USB ports, one I've plugged a 2 TB hard drive into that I can access from any machine on my network and the other has a printer that is automatically networked. Setting up port forwarding is nice and easy.

That being said, I'm never buying an Apple product again, as I've had 2 of their laptops die within months of the 3 year Applecare Extended plan ending. Probably going Alienware next time out.

I'll second the third party firmwares.Flashed my Netgear WNR3500L with Toastman's Tomato and it gives me complete control over my network. PPTP server, QoS, traffic monitoring, and way more control of the wireless. One thing that seems common, however, is a lack of IPSEC VPN functionality. Though it may be due to licensing issues.

And for an anecdote, there is nothing quite as frustrating as putting a Cisco/Linksys RV042 "business" class router on your network at the insistance of one of your clients for VPN functionality only to have it cause a packet storm and knock your shiny new Exchange 2010 server (and several printers) off the network.

anfrind: Dimensio: TwistedIvory: slayer199: There's a few good alternatives if you have a Linksys WRT model. I haven't tried Tomato but I've been using DD-WRT.

My only regret with DD-WRT is that I didn't flash it to my WRT router sooner. I freaking love DD-WRT.

(You mean I can finally do port forwarding and static IP based on MAC address from the router? yippee!)

I use DD-WRT to create a wireless bridge between my computer room -- where my cable modem is connected -- to my living room -- where I have three game consoles and a computer using "wired" network access. The router in the living room is a Linksys device.

The original Linksys firmware would drop an idle connection after ten minutes of inactivity. When using SSH for port forwarding, this caused lost connections. DD-WRT does not feature such "functionality".

Have you tried setting a ServerAliveInterval? That will tell SSH to ping the server every N seconds, which should prevent a lousy router from thinking the connection is idle, and will let you find out sooner if a connection fails.

I use it at work because I often need to maintain several SSH tunnels, many of which run over unreliable networks that could go down without warning.

As installing replacement firmware has solved the problem, no further adjustment to compensate for poorly designed firmware is needed.

Durendal: This is why God made DD-WRT. I find it funny that companies like Cisco, with tons of money, total knowledge of the product, and expertise for this sort of thing, still crank out firmware that's absolute crap compared to what some guys put together in their spare time.

DD-WRT is completely shiat. The third time it crashed, it reset its settings back to its default which created an open wireless access point. I threw the whole thing out.

/using a netgear n600 now - not a single problem
//generally like cisco for anything but security
///juniper certified

make me some tea: Dinki: I bought a couple of the cisco/linksys routers after the merger. They were shiat. The wireless will randomly stop working, or the whole thing will simply hang. Never buying a cisco product again.

/the old linksys stuff was great.

//Cisco business class routers/firewall/switches are overpriced garbage too.

I've had a Linksys WRT54GL running Tomato for 4 years now. Works great.

The OS that comes preloaded is crap.

OpenWRT on the 54GL here. Nice to have a router that you can configure, add/remove software, etc pretty much like a "real" computer.

Thanks guys, I"ll give DD-WRT another shot. Used to run it years ago on my WRT54GL when it was plugged directly into the my cable modem. A few moves and different routers later, it stopped DHCP packets to any device, so I switched to Tomato and have been running it since. You really can't go wrong with either, but I do notice my signal isn't as strong with Tomato, might worth a shot.

I got sick of crappy routers a few years ago. I had various kinds, all seemed to drop connections or plain stop working periodically.

Then, about 6 years ago, I picked up a TRENDnet TEW-631BRP. Ugly as sin, but works like a champ.



NEVER had to restart it other than to unplug it when I moved.

I've had several over the years, and they've been unreliable pieces of carp. I switched to DLink (825 and a DAP 1522) and it works flawlessly. F*ck Cisco and their nanny state attitudes.

zarberg: Ok, try not to be too judgemental, but I bought an Apple Airport Extreme and I absolutely love it. It's got 2 USB ports, one I've plugged a 2 TB hard drive into that I can access from any machine on my network and the other has a printer that is automatically networked. Setting up port forwarding is nice and easy.

Airport Exterme's are consistently praised for being excellent home routers. They are spendy, but crazy reliable. I gave one to a friend of mine after I volunteered for the SamKnows broadband testing project (free Netgear WNR3500L) after he was struggling with Netgear,Llinksys, and D-Link home routers constantly needing to be power cycled or dropping wifi connections. He hasn't had an issue since.

gingerjet: Durendal: This is why God made DD-WRT. I find it funny that companies like Cisco, with tons of money, total knowledge of the product, and expertise for this sort of thing, still crank out firmware that's absolute crap compared to what some guys put together in their spare time.

DD-WRT is completely shiat. The third time it crashed, it reset its settings back to its default which created an open wireless access point. I threw the whole thing out.

/using a netgear n600 now - not a single problem
//generally like cisco for anything but security
///juniper certified

How difficult is configuring wireless bridge setup on a Netgear N600?

zarberg: Ok, try not to be too judgemental, but I bought an Apple Airport Extreme and I absolutely love it. It's got 2 USB ports, one I've plugged a 2 TB hard drive into that I can access from any machine on my network and the other has a printer that is automatically networked. Setting up port forwarding is nice and easy.

That being said, I'm never buying an Apple product again, as I've had 2 of their laptops die within months of the 3 year Applecare Extended plan ending. Probably going Alienware next time out.

I used to buy Airport Expresses. I have one for travel purposes for the odd hotel without Wireless service. But I don't really like them. They overheat like a biatch and you can't configure them with a web browser. I tried running two Expresses in bridge mode and I've come to the conclusion that I'd rather punch myself in the dick than do that again.

nvmac: Lor M. Ipsum: Generation_D: Cisco apparently never read Routergod. Or believes that a network at home is sort of like a privacy boundary

I have a feeling that the article could be exaggerating. A router should be able to act as a standalone device, like hosting a private LAN. If Cisco decentralizes administrative access of the router onto the Internet, how would administrating a private network even be possible?

CIsco's official response:Link

Engadget article could be misleading. More to come I'm sure.

/slashies

I have not read Engadget's article but this has been on Slashdot for a while. Taking away local access to a router is never a good move.

I would check the uptime on my current routers, but one was reset relatively recently due to cleaning and the other is currently offline as it has no use after the television used as a monitor for all connected devices exploded.