Router questions

[jonf]

I am moving to NTL in the near future and want to install a router. I currently have 3 PC's that are hard wired around the house but I will also need a wireless connection to my daughters room. (forgot to install a lan point when I extended DOH!)

Whilst I can read all the reviews in the world can anybody provide a personal recommendation as to the piece of kit I should invest my hard earned in?

Thanks in advance.

[Plexman]

Netgear RP114 or the Linksys BEFSR41, both can be had for around £60-65 and they are both very easy to setup.

[Pegasus]

I did the wireless trip a little while ago because I did'nt fancy drilling holes/clipping cables to get a feed up to my son's bedroom.
I tried both the D-Link and the Netgear wireless offerings and both were a waste of time.


D-Link DWL-900AP+ Wireless Access Point & DWL-520+ Wireless PCI card
Did'nt even get this to setup as the wireless card simply caused my son's PC to keep rebooting itself. There is already a known issue with this card in that it won't work with MSI motherboards and after my experience, it would appear that it does'nt like ASUS boards either.


Netgear ME102 Wireless Access Point, Netgear MA401 Wireless PCMCIA card & Netgear MA301 PCMCIA to PCI adaptor (Netgear do not make a "proper" wireless PCI card)
This lot was incredibly simple to setup (a semi-trained lab rat could do it) and was up, running & encrypted in 5 minutes.
Everything appeared to be working really well until I took my son's PC back up to his room, at this point the signal degraded to a point where it was unusable (the cheaper offerings obviously seem to have a problem getting the signal through walls, etc).
It was at this point that I gave serious consideration to getting the drill & hammer out and running a length of CAT 5 up to his room when I remembered that we had a Cisco Wireless Access Point & Wireless Network card at work. I duly "requisitioned" the Cisco kit the next day, set it all up and it worked a treat.
The only drawback to this of course is the cost for the average user, both the D-Link & Netgear offerings cost approx £175 whereas the Cisco costs around £550 (but it definately works).

Conclusion
Don't waste your time with the cheap stuff. If you've got a few quid to spare then buy the Cisco kit, if you have'nt then run a bit of cable to your daughters room (it will save you a lot of headaches & a return trip to your retailer to ask for a refund).

[jonf]

Thanks for the advice guys, I think I will re look at the feasibility of getting a cable into the room as the distance isn't too far but there are a lot of walls in the way and £550 is a bit on the steep side.

[fais]

yup... go for the cabling... it is worth it in the end. The wirless is unreliable not to mention slow. wireless is great for using the laptop round the house... but pc's in other rooms is asking for unnecessary hassle. i went for the smc range a while back... it is doing the job, but not a great job. Cabling is a piece of cake at you'll have the benefit of a 10/100 connection... not a lousy 10mb (actually 1mb )