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sonorabill

What router works better other than D-Link or Linksys?

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I'm starting a new thread for suggestions on buying a new router.

 

My remote self ping problem seems to be caused by my Linksys router, since I can make an old intermittent D-Link DI-524 router do it. But my experience in the past makes me reluctant to buy another D-Link. Three bad ones in a year or so. The new Linksys WRT54G Ver8 seems to not handle the video porting or something. Tried two of them.

 

So ruling out D-Link as unreliable and Linksys as non-functional, what router should I be looking to buy and install. One that is both reliable & functional?

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Contacted Linksys tech support about the problem I was having. Walked me through the router settings and changed the following:

 

1. disable port forwarding on port 80

2. enable DMZ and set my DVR 192 dot 168 dot one dot ten

3. Slow down the MTU manual 1300

 

Reset modem, router, computer

 

Went to my dyndns web page domain name and found the login. Logged in and video was clicking away as I watched.

 

Thanks Rory for all the help. And hope this helps anyone else with a similar problem.

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One thing we didnt look at, it could have just been a bad router. I use those routers all the time without any problems. Mine is a little older so the firmware is not the same, but just used a couple new ones the other day which worked fine. No idea what firmware they had though.

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did linksys basically admit via setting DVR IP into "DMZ" settings that the router was not working properly?

 

MTU also?

 

Kinda a pain installing and then finding out you can't get it to work eh?

 

I have a linksys right now that stops inbound on port 80 & 8080 every now and then. I have to physically cycle the power to get it to work again? maybe I should lower the mtu OR get a new router?

 

Oh, to answer the question.I personally use the gaming giga dlink.......

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Hi. I use DD-WRT v23 Firmware for wireless Linksys routers or Broadcom chipset based routers. Works VERY stable like Cisco routers

Read careful all instructions or u can brick ur router.

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I use Netgear myself, its the best IMHO,

 

But have used

Dlink- (not preferred brand)

Linksys (made by cisco)

Belkin - great gear

 

I have some motorola AP's work ok,

Its like everything really, the more you pay, the better the gear (linksys,cisco)

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One thing I should note though, I never use port 80 for anything.

 

Agree- 80 is the web iface on most devices.

 

Use 88 or anything but-

Something in the high range even 8080, or the likes,

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I have started to use the Draytek Vigor 2800 ADSL and the 2900 Ethernet Routers, they have Inbuilt LAN - LAN VPN like most routers but also offer Single users to dial in using Drayteks free VPN configuration software for WIndows XP and Vista.

 

Support for VLANs DDNS also have a USB port for either a printer or a 3G USB Card as a backup for critical systems.

 

Have a few setup examples on my website using the Intellex and a VPN setup

 

www.cctv4all.com

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Oh yeah alot of my customers sites where existing network and we just install cctv and config remote view, have Netcom 1400 and 1400 +

Some have NB5's, the newwer model models generally have a preconfig rule for most services, just select one and use that port, just cause it says "xboxlive" doesnt mean it has to be for that,

 

Its not that hard checkout portforward.com

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For a good, low-cost router, take a look at Belkin. I got a half-dozen wired broadband routers at a computer-superstore sale once for $10 each, and another store had some wireless ones for $15 each at a sale a couple years ago. They work well and are easy to configure.

 

Everyone's high on LinkSys and I don't understand it - every client site I've ever run into that has one, I've ended up having to give their DVRs static IPs if they want remote access, because the router's DHCP server is constantly changing the DVR's IP (even if the DVR is never restarted), and it buggers up port-forwarding.

 

I've always been a fan of D-Link and I've only ever had one bad one over the years - a DI-524 which even the store clerk admitted (when I brought it back) that that was a really poor model. Even my old DI-604+ is still running strong at a friend's place.

 

As far as broadband routers go, Netgear's configuration pages drive me nuts. Very poorly organized, and unless you deal with them enough to find your way around blindfolded, many of the links to other sections are far from obvious.

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Of course the answer depends on your budget and needs, this is assuming you're talking about a small network and consumer-quality gear you can pick up at a big box store.

 

Hi. I use DD-WRT v23 Firmware for wireless Linksys routers or Broadcom chipset based routers. Works VERY stable like Cisco routers

Read careful all instructions or u can brick ur router.

 

I was going to mention this, I have had a lot of luck with (and prefer to use) Linksys WRT54Gxx for small networks although my experiences with Netgear have been almost as good. But a lot of the shortcomings of any device like this come from the firmware, and the dd-wrt firmware (as well as some other third party firmware packages) is a way to take a $50 linksys (or buffalo, d-link, or many other brands) box and give it capabilities of hardware that costs much more. for advanced networking needs or just better stability it is a great piece of free software.

 

Speaking of great free software in this department, with a spare 486 class or better PC and two NICs you can run m0n0wall and have a bulletproof router that will run circles around anything you can buy for a couple hundred bucks at a big box store as well. It's the best thing you can do with old hardware since doorstops.

 

Both those packages are well worth your time if you like to play with any kind of networking stuff -- though I well understand in our world most times you just want to be able to buy something, turn it on, and let it do its job so you can do yours.

 

If that's the kind of solution you need then you're looking for out of the box stuff - and if you've ruled out the biggest two options you're probably best off to try a belkin or buffalo (though buffalo is apparently experiencing some licensing issues in the US right now) unit, they are about the best respected of the other names out there but I don't know that either one stands out above the rest. I think with consumer level stuff it's equal parts design quality and luck.

 

 

P.S. I just read your old thread on self-ping problem and rather than resurrect it I figured I'd tack on here. Ping doesn't have a lot to do with it - ping is only a response on one port (the ping service) which a lot of routers disable by default, even if you disable all security. I think Linksys has a specific checkbox in the advanced section to respond to pings on the WAN interface.

 

Many consumer level routers also don't handle the concept of accessing outside ports from inside the local network and sometimes freak out about that - when testing remote web access I always use something like the *hide network (a free web proxy) to come back and hit it from the outside, and use shieldsup from Steve Gibson at GRC's website to test whether specific ports are open. These tips may be handy for you whichever router you choose to go with.

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Guys this link is old, but i want to but in my 2 cents in. I also use DD-WRT on my WRT54G routers (have 8 of them) Latest Micro version because i use V 8 routers had to kill the VXWorks OS. Folks the main problem with the WRT54G routers is simply the ram buffer on these routers is only 8 Megabytes, 200 MHZ or more processor. I'm a network technician and i have diagnosed this issue many times with clients attempting to stream video through the Web with the WRT54G Routers. Avoid the Linksys WRT54G and go with a Linksys WRT54G /GS these routers have 16 MB of memory that does not get overwhelmed by streaming video ,assign port 8000 instead of port 80 allow remote management of router, in gaming and applications route the appropriate ports. These routers are very reliable keep them hooked up to a good UPS with stable clean power and cool and they should last for years without a video feed issue.The WRT54G /GS is only about 15 dollars more than the WRT54G they do not need to be reflashed with a linux OS.

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For a good, low-cost router, take a look at Belkin. I got a half-dozen wired broadband routers at a computer-superstore sale once for $10 each, and another store had some wireless ones for $15 each at a sale a couple years ago. They work well and are easy to configure.

 

I use belkins also, Never had ANY problems with them. I normaly use port 8000 for the port instead of 80.. Seems to work better, since some isps block port 80 (outgoing)

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