|
Linksys WRT160N Ultra RangePlus Wireless-N Broadband Router | 
 enlarge
| Brand: Linksys
Category: CE
Buy New: See price in cart
New (40) Used (1) from $88.44
Rating:  71 reviews
Sales Rank: 102
Media: Electronics
Autographed: No
Memorabilia: No
Batteries Included: No
Shipping Weight (lbs): 4
Dimensions (in): 11.4 x 9.6 x 2.9
nv:Device Type: Wireless Router
Form Factor: Desktop
Wireless Network Standards: IEEE 802.11g
Wireless Network Standards: IEEE 802.11b
Wireless Network Standards: IEEE 802.11n
Wireless Data Transfer Rates: 300 Mbps
Wireless Transmit Power: 17 dBm
Security Protocols: WPA
Security Protocols: 128-bit WEP
Security Protocols: 64-bit WEP
Security Protocols: WPA2
Networking Standards: IEEE 802.3ab Gigabit Ethernet
Networking Standards: IEEE 802.3 Ethernet 10Base-T
Warranty: 1 year warranty
MPN: WRT160N
Model: WRT160N
UPC: 745883582983
EAN: 0745883582983
ASIN: B000Z3U1P6
Shipping: Eligible for Super Saver Shipping
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
| |
| Features:
| • | Features | | • | - Internet-sharing Router and 4-port Switch, with a built in speed and range enhanced Wireless Access Point | | • | - MIMO technology uses multiple radios to create a robust signal that travels farther and reduces dead spots | | • | - Much faster than Wireless-G, but also works great with Wireless-G and -B devices | | • | - Wireless signals protected by wireless encryption, and your network protected from Internet attacks by a powerful SPI firewall |
|
| Accessories:
|
| Similar Items:
|
| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
The Ultra RangePlus Wireless-N Broadband Router is really three devices in one package. There's the Wireless Access Point, which lets you connect to the network without wires. There's also a built-in 4-port full-duplex 10/100 Switch to connect your wired-Ethernet devices together. The Router function ties it all together and lets your whole network share a high-speed cable or DSL Internet connection. The Access Point built into the Router uses the very latest wireless networking technology. By overlaying the signals of multiple radios, Wireless-N's Multiple In, Multiple Out (MIMO) technology multiplies the effective data rate. The robust signal travels farther, maintaining wireless connections much farther than standard Wireless-G. Wireless-N can dynamically enable double-speed mode for Wireless-N devices, while still connecting to other wireless devices at their respective fastest speeds. In congested areas, the Good Neighbor mode ensures that the Router checks for other wireless devices in the area before gobbling up the radio band. To help protect your data and privacy, the Router can encode all wireless transmissions with industrial-strength 256-bit encryption. It can serve as your network's DHCP Server, has a powerful SPI firewall to protect your PCs against intruders and most known Internet attacks, and supports VPN pass-through. Configuration is a snap with the web browser-based configuration utility. The incredible speed of Wireless-N makes it ideal for media-centric applications like streaming video, gaming, and Voice over IP telephony, and gives you plenty of headroom to run multiple media-intense data streams through the network at the same time, with no degradation in performance. With the Linksys Wireless-N Broadband Router at the center of your home or office network, you can share a high-speed Internet connection, files, printers, and multi-player games, and run media-intensive applications at incredi
|
| Customer Reviews: Read 66 more reviews...
 It's small in size, but the coverage range is real Ultra August 18, 2008
Our business building has 8 offices on 2 floors (metal-studs construction in all partition walls). Since we experienced some difficulties in receiving wireless phone (including cell phone) signal in some area inside the building, we were very concerned about using a wireless network. But amazingly, this small Ultra Range Plus can work nicely to transfer strong signals wirelessly across all offices..
 Awesome choice for Mac owners, speed issues aside August 12, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I have to start this review by admitting this router wasn't my first choice. After struggling with an old 802.11B router for a while, I decided it was time for an upgrade and went shopping. After a great deal of time and research, I settled on the Belkin F5D8233-4 N Wireless Router, an inexpensive Draft-N solution that got good reviews.
It worked well -- for about a month. Then, the router and my MacBook decided they were no longer going to play nice. My connection would drop every ten seconds, and sometimes it would fail to reconnect for hours on end. The Belkin, I decided, must be destroyed. I read the reviews on this Linksys model, and decided to go with it instead.
Thankfully, this solved the problem with my MacBook. Indeed, I have that laptop and another MacBook Pro hooked up to the Linksys, both without a single connection issue. Other items on the network are a desktop PC, a multi-function printer, a VOIP line, two iPhones, and a Tivo. All have behaved well. Better yet, the frequent power blinks we get here don't seem to phase the router -- after a brief power cycle, it gets back on its feet quickly.
The range appears to be quite good, but I have to admit that my duplex isn't exactly cavernous. Nonetheless, I've taken the MacBook and the iPhone well into the backyard, putting some distance and a couple of brick walls between the devices and the router, and have experienced no loss of coverage.
Speed, unfortunately, is the only spot where I've been less than enthused. Don't get me wrong -- it's pretty quick, especially if you're accustomed to an 802.11B connection. However, the Belkin I first tried put this Linksys to shame. Well, when it worked, at least. It was blazing fast, and I found myself a little disappointed at being slowed down. I haven't done any official tests for this, however. Moreover, the Linksys is plenty fast, and I'm a relatively high-demand user, much to my ISP's chagrin.
Setup is easy and, if it's important to you, this router is one of the most attractive on the market. Better yet, I didn't have any MAC address issues like I've had in the past with other routers (that is, Belkin). Within 10 minutes, I was up and running, cursing Belkin and praising Linksys the whole time.
All together, this router is a solid purchase. Reliability has been wonderful, and I can live with slightly decreased performance. If you're a highly wired weirdo like me, don't hesitate to buy!
Great wireless-N router for the money August 12, 2008
I have been looking for a wireless-N router to replace my old Linksys wireless-G router for a while, and I saw this one, decided to give it a try (was thinking switch to D-link). This router looks great and also works great, the wifi signal is reliable and stable and a lot faster than my old Linksys router, thanks to the Wireless-N, it also makes the LAN faster than before, so far I am very pleased with the router, and would recommend this product.
 won't work with intel 4965 n adapter August 11, 2008
I was really excited to get this product as I thought it would speed up my network overall for legacy G devices while allowing my new laptop with the N adapter to use. Sadly, I was extremely disappointed by the performance. My old laptop, with a G adapter, immediately dropped link speed to 36 Mbps from 48 Mbps. It doesn't bother me from an internet access point of view (as Comcast tops out at about 6 Mbps on average) but I have a network hard drive for which I would like to maximize the speed.
Even worse, after I had configured the Intel 4965 N adapter on my new laptop (btw you have to ensure the WRT160N is using WPA2 security with AES for the Intel Adapter to work in N mode!) , I found that the maximum bandwidth possible was 130 Mbps and invariably, it was less than that - more like 78 Mbps. The reason for that is apparently the N routers need to use both the 5.4 Ghz and 2.4 Ghz frequencies to provide speeds of 270 Mbps.
Yet even worse, for some reason the internet download speed through Comcast was far lesser - about 800 Kbps. If I disable the N mode on the laptop or the WRT160N, I got my original download speed of 6 Mbps but that was just not acceptable. I tried a variety of options but could never find a right combination. Others have stated that phones and other devices like microwaves might cause interference available but the funny thing is my phones are at 5.8 Ghz and the microwave is downstairs and far away and hardly in use.
The device does look good and fits with the furniture a lot better, but I think I will wait for a more solid device with compatibility issues ironed out and cheaper N adapters available for legacy laptops/devices.
 Really disappointed in Linksys August 11, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Well well. Never thought I'd actually say this about Linksys but I have to admit this router is absolute trash out of the box. I don't know what happened. Linksys used to be a very good company with quality products but, as everyone else has already pointed out, they can't program their new routers for the life of them. So here's what happened:
I recently went on a vacation to visit my dad for a few weeks. Knowing he didn't have wireless, I took my old router with me. After I returned home I realized I left my old router at my dad's place. No big deal I thought, I had been thinking about investing in a new router for quite some time and had been aching to see what kind of speeds I'd get with a Wireless-N connection. After much research I decided to get this. Even after reading all the reviews on Amazon I decided to trust Linksys since they'd never let me down before.
Got the router. Plugged it in. Was very surprised that it required no setup! It detected my internet connection right away and my LAN started working even before I was half-way done through the Linksys setup CD. I was liking it already. That's when the problems started. When I got to Step 4, the Linksys setup could NOT find their own router attached to my computer! I would always get the same message: "Please check all cables are connected correctly and try again." Since I was connected to the Internet I didn't pay it any more mind and cancelled the Linksys setup.
I decided to setup Wireless next and went into the Router config page. Linksys has a nifty button on the router itself to guide you through Wi-Fi Protected setup and I decided to give it a whiz just for the heck of it. Followed instructions and waited 5+ minutes and the Wi-Fi protected setup tells me it cannot find the Router! When I accessed it from the router CONFIG page that I went to after going through the ROUTER itself even though I can access the Internet fine...
Well, that aside, I setup the Wireless manually and sure enough it connects immediately. I get blazing fast speeds as though I'm connected directly through the ethernet.....for about 2 minutes. Then its all over. I check the connection: Sure enough, connected through Wireless-N at 130 Mbps and the speed test says I'm getting a measly 350 kbps downloads on a 6 Mbit connection. I try everything possible and finally give up after a week after consistently getting a fluctuating wireless connection jumping between 0.5 - 1 mbps with having to reset the router at least twice a day because of connection drops.
I decided to return the router. That's when I find DD-WRT thanks to a written review on Amazon. I am ecstatic now. Ever since I have installed DD-WRT this Router has been performing so brilliantly it's absolute bliss. I am now connected through Wireless-N and am consistently connected at 5.5 Mbps and have yet to do a Reset because of a connection drop.
I have decided to keep the router since it's given me the faster wireless Internet I could possibly want, after putting custom firmware on it of-course....
It just could be that I had a defective product but the number of bad reviews on Amazon leads me to believe otherwise. It's a shame that the hardware on this excellent product is so phenomenal yet the consistent bad programming at Linksys renders it absolutely useless...
I'm giving this product a One Star, because you shouldn't need to essentially "hack" a product to get it to perform what it is supposed to be doing "out of the box." You may have better luck with it, I didn't. I had to be frustrated out of my mind for a week and think "Linksys...this is a Linksys product!"
Closing Remarks: This Router has by far the greatest piece of hardware I have ever had. If it works that is. My advice is, buy it and then just put DD-WRT on it right away.
|
|
|
Copyright 2006 - CD Shopper | |
