We were quite surprised at how
well this router shared the @home Internet connection. We had all 4 ports hooked
up and was downloading stuff on one PC, had a Quake 3 Arena server running on
another with about 4 players fraggin away, Surfing and doing some ICQ’ing on yet
another, and playing Q3A on the server with another computer. Running the
Network Benchmark using SiSoft Sandra Professional shows the 10/100 Switch did
very well. The results were better than we though they would be. Transfer rate
of over 10000kB/sec while a 100 base NIC is rated at 9100kB/sec.
We did have our share of problem
too. One, we couldn’t run an Internet Quake 3 Arena game server, but once we
looked into it a bit more we were able to add the required port #’s and specify
what IP we wanted to use. We had no problems with the Game Server after that.
Then of course we had file transfer problems with ICQ but to eliminate that
problem (well the quick fix for now) we added the said PC’s IP to the Default
field in the
NAT/SUA, that seems to overcome the problem of file transfers for now.
Overall, we really like the Netgear RT314 as it
allows for Great Internet Shareing and with the built-in 4-port 10/100 switch,
hooking up to four PCs is not a problem and as your network grows, adding more
switches won’t be a problem. The RT314 can handle as many as 253 clients. You
just need to add a lot more hubs/switches into the mix.
Although we had some minor problems, with ICQ
File transfers, and the Game server, we were able to get them working just
fine. One other problem we had, which had nothing to do with the Router itself,
was with our ISP’s DNS Servers, so all we did was go in and add an alterative
Primary and Secondary DNS IP’s manually using Telnet and we haven’t had a
problem since.
With an internet vendors selling this router as
low as $150, the Netgear RT314 represent an amazing value. Most 10/100 hubs cost
this much! The cost of the RT314 will be recovery very quickly once you add up
the saving of not having to buy extra IPs for your computers from your cable
providers. Around here, an extra IP for @home cost $10 per month. Multiply that
by three extra computers and the router will pay for itself in just five
months.
The
Goods:
-
Easy
set up
-
Built-in 4-port switch
-
Not too
expensive
The Bads:
Rating: 9/10
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