Rating: Summary: Excellent router -- unless you have a 2.4GHz cordless phone Review: Great router. I'm tech savvy, but had it up and running without problem in about 10 mins! Excellent performance too. Until I got a phone call!! Aparently my 2.4GHz DSS cordless Uniden phone takes out the wireless connection completely. I have not been able to find any workaround. I'll update this if I do.
Rating: Summary: Poor Instructions, no software, and the help is even worse Review: I bought the USR 8054 Wireless Router on a Sunday afternoon. After following the instructions, I was left with my lan connected computer able to reach the router, but unable to locate my modem. The instructions never mention when to insert the CDs, so I tried to do so at this point. The only software on the CD was for Norton antivirus.
I called the help desk phone number only to discover that the line only operates from 9-5 M-F Central time. (I am in Hawaii, but I imagine that these hours are pretty inconvenient for anyone with a job that does not involve installing U.S. Robotic devices.) I followed up with an email to their website's technical help section. I got a response Wednesday morning simply telling me how to reset my modem (which oddly is not anywhere in the pictograph instructions.) While this was good information to have, it didn't really answer my question. I returned the router and have ordered one from LinkSys. I gave the USROBOTICS a two-star rating, because I couldn't get past setup. For all I know, it may be the finest router in the world, if you can get it working.
Rating: Summary: Non-existant phone support Review: I couldn't get this thing to work either as a router or an access point with any degree of success. It couldn't connect up to my cable modem, so I plugged it into my SMC 7004VBR and tried to use it as an access point, that didn't work too well. The documentation that comes with this product is minimal, and in order to capitalize on the warranty you must call customer service.The fact that their customer service is not a toll-free call is slightly annoying. The experience of waiting on hold for literally thirty minutes at a time, three times in a row, without ever speaking to a person is one way to ensure that I never buy a US Robotics product again.
Rating: Summary: Disappointed. Review: I decided on this router due to its reasonable price combined with a brand name which, in my mind, has always been associated with reliability. Unfortunately, since my purchase over 6 months ago, the router has been rebooting several times a day, everyday. My laptop and other wireless devices have no such problem with other routers, so I had to think it was the router. I upgraded to the latest firmware to no effect. US Robotics support replied (after some delay) telling me to try all eleven channels in case there is some interference on the default channel. After going through this exercise over the course of a couple weeks, it was clear that this was not the problem. I contacted US Robotics support again and am still waiting for a reply. I would like to think this is just a case of a single defective product, but there are accounts strewn throughout the web of sporadic reboots. Even though the functionality of the product is satisfactory when it is working, obviously it is impossible for me to recommend this product.
Rating: Summary: Poor product Review: I do not recommend this product. I have had mine since March and although the basic functions work, they still do not have reliable WPA-PSK. It will work until my portables wake from deep sleep an d tehen the router must be reset for them to recognize it. There are many functions lacking such as DDNS support. Tech support keeps placing the blame on the cards used in my portables even though they are two different brands of cards. I highly recommend the D-Link DI-624 and DI-524 products
Rating: Summary: Works great Review: I have had this router for 3 weeks now and have had no rebooting issues at all. When I got it I went and got the latest firmware and have had no issue. The range is great awsome. I can go accross the street to the park with my laptop if I want! Great product!
Rating: Summary: US Robotics usr8054 has shotty firmware Review: I purchased the USR wireless turbo pc card(great card)and thought I would purchase this router to bump up ny wireless network speed to 100Mbps. Here's the sequence of events that lead to my returning the device: 1. Because of my network settings, I had to change the IP address of the router. 2. After this change, the settings screen was unreliable. I would wait endlessly for the settings page to refresh. It regressed to an unresponsive state -- this is while hooked via wire directly to a single laptop. 3. I pushed the reset switch in the back, and it only got worse. the device prompted for the path to upgrade the firmware. 4. I downloaded and installed the firmware -- the device continued to prompt for firmware. 5. I exchanged it for another one at the retailer. 6. Repeat steps 1 through 5 above! 7. I exchanged it for a netgear and am very satisfied with 54mbps. The hardware is probably great, and the rebated price makes it a top competitor, but without working firmware, it's a brick. USR, what's up with this?? two in a row is either a bad batch or a bad design.
Rating: Summary: Beware if you use VPN Review: I purchased this product and it worked great until I tried to use my company's VPN. It says it supports VPN which it does as far as allowing access to the required ports for VPN use. BUT!!! I does not support any type of header packet (encrypted or encapsulated)and I am not aware of a VPN that does not need this support. I spoke with USR Level 2 hardware support and they do not intend to allow these headers so if you are going to need access to a VPN do not buy this Router. I suggest the Siemens SMC Barricade SMC2804WBR. Truly Plug-N-Play device.
Rating: Summary: Would be great...if if WORKED! Review: I wish I'd read the reviews on Amazon and PriceGrabber before purchasing the U.S. Robotics 8054. I bought mine off through TigerDirect (one of Amazon's sellers for this product), and all twenty-something reviews there were favorable, so I took a chance, despite the fact that I have no experience with U.S. Robotics products. (Stupid to only go off of twenty reviews on one site.)
Three weeks later, I'm so frustrated that I could throw the thing off the third-story balcony. Set-up was easy, and configuring a network key wasn't that hard at all, but I've no end of problems with the router ever since. The network gets dropped several times a day, sometimes several times an hour, which makes it incredibly hard to get any work done, especially since, as a web designer, I often do large uploads and downloads to FTP sites. I can't count how many times I've had to run up and down the stairs resetting the thing. I tried upgrading the firmware on my wireless adapter, tried changing the wireless channel the router uses, tried enabling and disabling WEP, tried setting it to only use an 802.11g signal...tried everything. The thing still reboots itself constantly.
As of this morning, the thing won't work at all. I've got two computer hard-wired to the thing with cat5 cables, and suddenly now they're not able to connect to the network or even the router itself (using the router utility). I've tried changing the cables, resetting the thing to factory defaults, even unplugging the thing a half dozen times, but with no luck.
Since their call center is only open Mon.-Fri., I've written to U.S. Robotics tech support to resolve the issue, and am waiting to deal with that nightmare (if the other reviews here on USR tech support are to be believed).
Rating: Summary: No problems Review: I've been running with this router for several months now and I've had absolutely no problems with it. After reading the previous reviews, I don't know if I would have bought it, but after working with it, I'd recommend it to people who I would have to support later.
It worked right out of the box, having no problem communicating in a mixed network. It replaced a LynkSys hub - I wanted to add a another computer without messing with running a drop to another room. Later, I enabled some of the security features on it through the built-in web interface; everything works fine unless I forget to add the MAC address of any new machine that wants to talk to it. As for a VPN connection, the company I work for has a Cisco VPN host running, and I have had no problems with establishing a link with our host and doing what I need to do from my laptop across wireless.
I'd love to take credit for getting the thing to work, being as I'm a professional tech, but I can't. Truth is, I've done few things to it apart from rebooting it a couple of times. It's worked like a charm ever since I got it.
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