Rating: Summary: Very Short Range Review: My friends and I purchased this wireless router for use in our dorm, and we were sorely disappointed with the range. Our dorm is 100'x75' and we were not able to find a place anywhere in the dorm that allowed this router to reach the whole floor. We would get about 50% signal strength about 4ft from the router. From there it would drop to 0% only 50ft away. The software that came with it was very good, and did not require you to install anything like the linksys routers do, but limited range trumped out all of the positive features that it had. I have owned/purchased for others multiple standard SMC routers that were excellent, but if you are going to be going wireless stay away from SMC.
Rating: Summary: A great Router for the price Review: Great RouterGood Customer Service
Rating: Summary: No problems at all Review: I don't know what all of these people's problems are. This router has run 24/7 for about 6 months with absolutely NO disconnects or other problems after updating the firmware (I also have it plugged into my UPS as along with my cable modem so even when my power goes out I can still use my internet connection). It's as solid as a rock as far as I'm concerned. The only thing I would like to see improved is the range. I can't get it to work from one corner of my house to the other. Of course, my house has really thick walls and the connection would have to go through a thick, tiled floor.
Rating: Summary: Stay away Review: STAY AWAY!!!! This is the worst product I've ever bought in my life. The 3-click software never worked. I always had to used the advanced method. I haven't tried the 802.11b part, because I'm barely able to get the wired router part to work. When the wired router part does work, it slows down my computer and crashes it periodically. Within a 4 hour period, it crashed about 6 times. The tech support is horrible...
Rating: Summary: A problem pack ! Review: [A] Needs a mandatory restart every 16 hours as a) The router hangs responding quite often. b) Internet connectivity speed drops by this time. [B]My wireless card detects all other wireless routers in my neighbourhood, while this Router takes atleast 10 minutes to reciprocate. [C]Horrible Manual. Mentions all about installation, which any lamer could get along with. But no section on trouble-shooting. [D]Pathetic Customer support. I got so sick of this router that I did away with the cover and decided to follow the circuit myself ! Horrible router.
Rating: Summary: Don't waste your money Review: I purchased this wireless router to allow me to access the web on my laptop throughout my home. As it turns out, I can only obtain a signal within 20 feet of the router. I changed out the router unit as well as the wireless adaptor and it didn't help. Finally after spending two days on the phone with their tech support, the concluded that I was unable to use the device because I had a cordless phone. (The also listed the presence of a fireplace or chimney as potential causes for connection failure.)
Rating: Summary: Don't buy it at any price Review: After spending what must be 200 hours with firmware, software, the DSL modem, the wireless ports etc. etc. I'm buying another router. Most of the time I use the ethernet ports, but they lock up from 1 to 20 times a day. As I run with a lot of passworded windows open, it may take 5-10 minutes for me to be up and running and signed in again. How long till the next lock up? Who knows, but you can imagine the frustration of spending 200 minutes on a bad day getting going again. Last Monday, it took from 9:00am to 12:00am to reset before I could limp along at a low throughput for the rest of the afternoon. Other days it may go all day without issue. How can you get any work done like that? My cheap Netgear router has NONE of these issues. The Tech service was terrible, all they could suggest was to repower it. It took 15 minutes for them to even understand the part number of the unit, and normally the techs have simply ended up hanging up on me in the end. And no, I'm not that hard to get along with. The manual might be glossy and look slick but it is poorly written and is inconsistant. If the router won't run for you right off the bat, there is not much that the manual or that a tech can help you with. The wireless was very difficult to get running. The setup is simple, but it just wouldn't start communicating. Only with the downloaded new software off the Web would it start communicating, and even then it was not clear what change was made to get it going. I'm an electrical engineer and have been involved with computers for a long time. This is the worst product I've bought in 20 years.
Rating: Summary: I hated it Review: Had to reset (power cycle) the router several times when throughput dropped to next to nothing. Setup was pretty easy, though I had problems with wireless encryption. Still, I finally gave up and bought the SMC 2624 instead (and got a built-in printserver as an extra bonus).
Rating: Summary: Worthless Review: I bought this wireless router without reading the reviews... a big mistake. This router's wireless features failed consistently. Usually within 12 hours of setting it up (or resetting it up on the subsequent attempts) the wireless connection would suddenly be lost as would the wired connections. Tech Support was not terribly helpful, all they could suggest was "resetting" the router. In fact, they recommended I return the router to the store. I see this as a reflection of their lack of confidence in the product. I have used other SMC routers (including setting up a different, older model as a wireless access point) so I consider this a glitch in an otherwise fine company's products, but the SMC7004VWBR should be avoided at all costs.
Rating: Summary: simply great!! Review: simply great pretty much sums it up! The customer service was awesome (if you don't mind a little accent). I did not even read the manual. I just called them and they walked me through the installation.. I am even using it for VPN and it works great!
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