WRT120n - negative reviews

guess the newer Linksys (cisco) stuff is trashed -

I've had bad experiences with Linksys 802-11 N wireless adapters that refused to stay up more than a minute (if you were lucky) and wouldn't buy their gear again.

I read through the latest 4 pages of reviews. About half were complaining about either Linksys support or warranty policies in dealing with failures or oddities. Some were experiencing a rather wide and inconsistent list of symptoms (failure, disconnects, performance, jitter, etc) that I'm having a difficult time believing that one product could have all those symtoms. However, a few users mentioned that they updated to the latest firmware so I don't think they were clueless. Dunno.

SmallNetBuilder also doesn't like the WRT120N

as reviews 1 year ago.

I haven't played with one so I can't offer any anecdotes or experience.

yeah - I was gonna grab one for my son's dorm room - but didn't -

It could be anything.... even something as weird as the actual RJ45 connector to the WAN... With so many tinker toys to line up and all be working together, I hate troubleshooting devices that have random probs...

I have a Linksys WAP54G sitting 6ft away - and the signal icon on my laptop sometimes goes from 54 to 48 to 36 !

It's a PoS. I speak from painful experience. Finally gave up and replaced it with a WRT54GL. Client is now delighted.

wonder if any of the newer Linksys / cisco flat profile units are any good ? WRT120, WRT160, E1000, E2000, E3000

Some are; some aren't, notably the WRT120n.

Meanwhile, at the alt.internet.wireless Job Justification Hearings, ps56k chose the tried and tested strategy of:

It depends what that signal icon represents. If it takes account of the noise as well, it's entirely possible that something else in the vicinity is broadcasting enough 'noise' to cause the signal quality perceived by your wireless adaptor to fluctuate even if you're not doing anything.

That reported speed is largely meaningless. You have to put the network under heavy load and then measure throughput to have meaningful data. See the wiki below.

Meanwhile, at the alt.internet.wireless Job Justification Hearings, alexd chose the tried and tested strategy of:

ZOMG I can't believe I didn't recognise that as being Mbps. Right. Anyway, the speed is dependant upon the quality of the link, so the point stands.

So, why aren't the steps in speed a little more granular as with other rate adaptive systems [eg ADSL]?

Well, read the reviews under

Be careful of assumptions. I've played with a few WRT54G2 boxes and found them adequate. They're in the same box at the others listed, but the electronics inside appear quite different. Don't judge the router by its plastic case.

Because the modulation method and FEC (forward error correction protocol) changes with each speed. These incrimental changes are not very linear.

See Table 1.

It gets really messy with 802.11n, which has 32 assorted modulation types, in two bandwidths, with two more delays for a total of 128 possible speeds.

The benefit of having small changes in speed is really apparent when dealing with streaming media and marginal signals. Small changes in speed are not very visible or audible. Larger changes are ugly and irritating. If the steps were really granular or abrupt, you would see and hear dropouts.