Wireless Router For Pandora!

[luke v2]

My first wireless router (back in 2003) has put me off using them due to it dropping connection every 20minutes, and if by some mirical it did stay on long enough to do anything, the instance anyone did anything on another computor i would get disconnected.

Anyway, to the point of this post; I need a new wireless router! (due to the pandora )

Requirements:
-Simple to set up for a noob like me!
-Be able to connect 360, PS3, PC (wired), PSP and pandora (wireless) easily.
-Fast. Fast. Fast! (or at least fast enough to support a 20MB connection fully).
-Cheap .
-And most importantly, reliable! I dont want to lose connection everytime someone else clicks a webpage or downloads something!

What routers do you use? Do you think they would be suitable for me?

PS. I know NOTHING about routers, or wireless internet.

Thanks for your help

 

[lulzfish]

I have a Linksys [not Belkin.. What was I thinking] WRT54G that does all the standard router things:
* has wireless
* works
* forwards ports

It will probably go to 20 MB/s on LAN, but I've never needed to do that, so nobody knows.

For setup, you pretty much just plug it in, throw the horrible documentation away, and it works.
You can do all the administration through a web interface which is user-friendly to some extent.

 

[PoisonedV]

Linksys WRT54GL. Install tomato, or DD-WRT/Open-WRT if you're a grumpy old unix user who hates nice gui's

 

[gruso]

Definitely avoid brands like D-Link and Belkin. They're just consumer crap. All the cool kids in my corner are using Billion. The 7300G is pretty much the staple, it's under $100 (AUD). If you want rock solid gaming via wifi though (I'm thinking of your 360 and PS3), you should consider something with the new(ish) Wireless N. The Billion 7300N is more expensive than the G, but reports are good.

 

[lingenfr]

I agree with Gruso as to 802.11n. I have a Linksys WRT610N. I don't recommend it. It is the worst router I have owned in terms of stability. When it is running, performance is very good, but reliability/availability is unsatisfactory at best. I am not familiar with Billion. Bottom line is do your homework. You tend to get some good information on those boards where custom firmware is discussed like dd-wrt for example.

 

[nickspoon]

Linksys WRT54GL. Install tomato, or DD-WRT/Open-WRT if you're a grumpy old unix user who hates nice gui's

I don't know what you're talking about, DD-WRT's GUI is one of the best there is. OpenWRT doesn't really have one, I concede, but it's supposed to be as minimal yet functional as possible.

 

[atomicthumbs]

Get a WRT54GL, install DD-WRT, and stay far the fuck away from Belkin. This thing crashes and drops connections when I start up a Bittorrent client.

 

[PoisonedV]

Linksys WRT54GL. Install tomato, or DD-WRT/Open-WRT if you're a grumpy old unix user who hates nice gui's

I don't know what you're talking about, DD-WRT's GUI is one of the best there is. OpenWRT doesn't really have one, I concede, but it's supposed to be as minimal yet functional as possible.

Yeah, my bad, I remember using one of them and hating it and switching to tomato, but I couldn't recall which one it was so I lumped them in together. either way, whether you use the default software or any custom ones, its probably one of the best and cheapest consumer routers you can get

 

[Javacat]

If you've already got a working router then it might be worth just getting a wireless access point. I've got a Netgear WG602 and it's an awesome piece of kit. At the minute I'm using it to bridge and extend the wifi provided by a BT Homehub (another excellent piece of kit) and it works great.

IMO the best setup is a Draytek 2820 router with a the WG602 providing wireless connectivity, although the Draytek is rather expensive for a home user but it pwns Billion

 

[iprice]

I use a Netgear to connect my Wii, DS, XBox360 and of course my pcs - all at the same time if necessary without any dropping out and all with excellent speed.

 

[Vorporeal]

I use a D-Link gaming router, and it hasn't had any problems. I replaced my old Linksys with it, as the Linksys would just drop connections when I was torrenting or playing games because the connection count was too high.

 

[PoisonedV]

I use a D-Link gaming router, and it hasn't had any problems. I replaced my old Linksys with it, as the Linksys would just drop connections when I was torrenting or playing games because the connection count was too high.

You can increase that limit... I really don't recommend getting pretty much anything but a D-link

 

[palmertech]

Just adding to the noise, but I love my DDWRT flashed Linksys WRT54G. Works awesome.

 

[Titcher]

Just adding to the noise, but I love my DDWRT flashed Linksys WRT54G. Works awesome.

Same here.

 

[DavidBowman]

I have an inexpensive Buffalo WHR-G54S with DD-WRT and I LOVE it. I've seen these sell for as little as $25 after rebates.

 

[lippy]

I had 2 routers: a super cheap dynamode & thinking I could do better, I replaced it with a more expensive netgear.... big mistake: Performance is crap compared to dynamode, as well as limited amount of features. GUI is nicer, but very dumbed down for "consumers".

So yeah: expensive + nice looking != good.

 

[Milamber777]

I think ecost had a Linksys wireless N for like $38.