Rating: 
Summary: Solid Product
Review: I bought this router after having months of trouble with a Linksys BEFW11P1, which died one night with the fatal red diagnostic light refusing to go off.It is everything it advertises. It gets excellent range thanks to it's detachable antenna, and I might add that it's WiFi Certified. I get 11Mb reception in places where I previously got 2. That's quite a jump. It's firewall is tough, and solid as well. SPI is a great feature to have these days. It comes with plenty of aided setup material to get someone with no experience with home networking up and running. The print server is pretty zippy, just like the one in the Linksys, but more reliable. New firmware is constantly coming out, and features are being introduced all the time. Features in the beta firmware (free download) currently not advertised for this product include UPnP support, traceroute support, improved device table, logging of sites visited, SSID broadcast can be disabled, as well as compatibility fixes. Soon this firmware will become stable and available to everyone. It's a great product. I highly recommend it. It's good now, and Netgear seems dedicated to making it better.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent and reliable wireless performance!
Review: I purchased the FM114P router and the MA-410 PCMCIA wireless card (see separate review) from Amazon. The FM114P worked right out of the box without any installation or configuration. I took the internet cable out of my computer, plugged it into the FM114P and the ran an internet cable (provided) from my cable modem to the FM114P. It worked flawlessly. I would recommend pulling the plug on the cable modem and then plugging it in again after about 5-10 seconds. Some cable modems require this reset action after a configuration change. The MA-401 was installed in 5 minutes, so in less then 10 minutes after opening the boxes I had a wireless network. In addditon to the laptop running in wireless mode I had another computer hardwired to the router. No other action is REQUIRED for basic wired and wireless operation, but if you want encrytion, and other privacy features enabled you will have to configure the router. Configuration is relatively straight forward. After bringing up Internet Explorer or Netscape you type in the router address (192.168.0.1). The router then displays a login window (defaults are admin/password). Once logged onto the router, three columns are displayed. Left=setup function selections (e.g.wireless, password, logs, etc.); middle=parameters to change for each function; right=help info for each parameter. There is a separate procedure for setting up the printer port; a little tricky, but once setup worked fine. The wireless capabilities of the FM114P coupled with the MA-401 were great for my house (2500 sq ft plus basement). The MA-401 received a good signal from every room in the house including the basement, and worked upto about 40-50 feet outside. The FM114P is located on the first floor. I do not have any 2.4GHZ phones so I cannot tell if there would be a problem (D-Link does have a problem with this but otherwise seems fine; Linksys seems to have serious problems for wireless use). The download speed using wireless seemed to be the same as using the wired connection to the router. From professional reviews the firewall seems to be state of the art for this price range of routers, and allows a log to be emailed to you from hourly to weekly if you want ot puruse security actions. With the new firmware (see below) you can have all traffic logged if you so wish (I don't!). The router came with firmware version 1.1 release 0; Netgear's web site now has version 1.3 release 5 (released in Sept 2002) ready for download. I downloaded the latest firmware using the instructions on their web site. It took a couple of minutes and worked fine. I did not notice any improvement or degradation, but it is always good to have the latest version, especially if you ever need to call tech support for help. I highly recommend the FM114P and MA-401 combination.
Rating: 
Summary: 2 routers = 2 failures
Review: I have had two of these routers both of which have failed shortly after the warranty expired. I kept the router on 24/7 but for some reason if the router gets unplugged from the power outlet it is difficult and finally impossible to get the router to come back up after plugging back in (after the warranty expired no less). The test light stays on continously now on both routers. No amount of resetting/unplugging has brought them out of the test mode. I'm guessing that they are using poor quality components to keep the price so cheap. I also use a very expensive line conditioner that it is/was plugged into to no avail. Will be looking at a SonicWall device for a replacement.
Rating:
Summary: It simply works!
Review: I have a dual-boot Win98/Win2000 PC, an Apple Titanium PowerBook G4 and an Xbox. I also wanted a high-end wireless network in my home. I recently got new cable internet access and their enrollment CD crashed my PC. The "fix" and the work-around access setup took a long time. Once that was done, I stared at my new router in it's shrink-wrapped package and wondered what was waiting for me. To make a long story short, the NetGear hook up was a breeze! I plugged it in, connected the ethernet cable to the WAN port on my cable modem, launched a web browser, went to the NetGear site and logged in... done! ...as for my Mac, all I did was turn on my PowerBook, launched a web browser and I was online! ...to carry my PB around the entire house and have the whole internet in the palm of my hands is a wonderful feeling. The signal is strong from the basement to upstairs bedroom. I couldn't have purchased a better product and recommend the NetGear FM114P to anyone who wants an inexpensive, easy to install wireless experience in there home or office.
Rating:
Summary: A truly great product!
Review: After much research, I finally found this little jewel. It has a SPI firewall, 802.11b wireless, 4 switch wired router, and print server - everything I need in one box. I got it up and running, updated to latest firmware, all features working in about 45 minutes (without calling Netgear, so can't comment on support). Yes, I am computer proficient, but I would not classify myself as a network expert. This is really about as idiot-proof as you can get. I am still learning about how to set up a more secure firewall, and the FM114P seems to have more than what I need. The logging, port-forwarding, e-mail alerts, are all there. You can even block your kids from using Instant Messenger based on a schedule. On the wireless end, I recommend anyone setting up a wireless access point to change the SSID and password, and enable MAC address filtering as soon as you one up. The latest firmware update allows you to turn off the SSID broadcast. Turning on the 128 bit WEP will further frustrate the casual wardriver. My Compaq notebook and Orinoco Gold card gets a good signal throughout my house, and is connected using 128 bit WEP. I can get to my office VPN, and my Compaq MC-1 music server can connect without problems. The print server is seamless - all my PCs (Win XP Pro) can print to my laser printer, and the print server will queue the jobs. My compliments to Netgear - this is truly a great product for a great price.
Rating:
Summary: Requires Frequent Rebooting - Not acceptable
Review: I had one of the first home Wi-Fi systems using an Intel 802.11b access point that cost about $1000. (Yup, this is how much they cost for early adopters. Of course, it was worth every penny as Wi-Fi changes your life.) The Intel access point was incredibly difficult to configure, requiring several calls to tech support, but the range was excellent and the unit functioned continously until it finally died after a couple of years. I decided to replace the Intel access point with the Netgear FM114P, assuming it was at the top of the Netgear line and I thought Netgear was a reliable manufacturer. How wrong I was. This unit is simply unacceptable. It will stop working every day or two for no apparent reason and require rebooting. Obviously, this is an irritation if you happen to be in another part of the house. Also, I have the impression that the range isn't as good as my previous Intel unit since I have more dead zones in my house. (The Intel access point had two antennas -- I don't know if this is significant.) Overall, I am really disappointed. I suggest you stay away from Netgear until they improve their engineering.
Rating:
Summary: Solid and Fast
Review: I've got quite a lot of experience using the Linksys BEFSR series, Netgear MR314 and now the FM114P broadband routers. Of these, the FM114P wins on just about every front. In general I liked the Linksys line as they had some useful features, including port mapping and UPnP support, which the Netgear products do not have. On the down side, they also have occasional hang ups and don't do stateful-packet-inspection (SPI). SPI is becoming ever more important with the rise of denial-of-service attacks and port scanning bots. After a particlarly frustrating week with the Linksys router needing to be reset twice as often as usual, I decided to try the Netgear MR314 (note: the same routing hardware is in all the xx31x models). At first, I was a bit disapppointed at the loss of port forwarding and UPnP support but at least the router was solid (no resets) and the wireless range was excellent. After downloading the latest firmware from Netgear's site I took a look at what else they offer and saw the FM114P model, which I hadn't seen at any local stores. The next morning I took back the 314 and bought the 114 at CDW for the SPI firewall features alone. I was pleasantly suprised that I got a whole lot more for the extra [money] it cost me. The first thing I noticed is that the 114 is faster, and not just a tiny bit faster but a LOT faster. This suprised me as I didn't think that any router added a significant delay to the packet stream but I immediately noticed the pages loading faster. I can't say that there is a bandwidth increase, but latency is definitely reduced (the lag between clicking on a link and the page starting to load). I assume this is due to the 114's 75mhz processor performing its logging, security checks, and routing processes in significantly less time than the other brands/models's unspecified embedded hardware. In my opinion, using a true onboard processor is the way routing hardware should, and will, be headed in the future. The 114 also improves on the 314 with a detachable antenna, stateful firewall, built-in print server, better service customization (still no UPnP though) and more security options. This unit is practically perfect for connecting and securing a "broadband attached home network"; with wires or without.
Rating:
Summary: awful product, awful tech support
Review: I bought one of these when I got a laptop because I thought it seemed like a great idea to have a firewall, print server, and wireless router all in one unit. I still think it's a great idea, but I with I hadn't bought this router. I use the router with two laptops, and the wireless connection drops pretty regularly. I have to reset the router at least two or three times a week (sometimes two to three times a day). When I call Netgear's off-shore tech support, I rarely get a helpful response. They did replace my router for me after I called enough times, but the new one has the same problems the old one had, so I think the firmware is just buggy. I wouldn't recommend this product. I've owned good Netgear products in the past, but I don't think I'll buy another Netgear product after this experience.
Rating:
Summary: Good till it last
Review: For the private/small office this unit has good features but defenitely lacks on RELIABILITY. It would be the third unit I get replaced in over a year. If you need something that's reliable this is NOT the firewall / router you want to buy. Unless you like calling Netgear tech support, and getting frustrated over and over. Let me give you an advise. When reding reviews, check for how long the person has been using the unit. Good luck to anyone out there who still wants to try it or go with Netgear.
Rating: 
Summary: Overheats
Review: I had this product for almost a year with no problems, except that it was hot to the touch. But then came one major problem. Somewhere between 8-9 pm, different time every night, the internet would slow down to a impossible crawl. It would start working correctly after 1 am. I tried everything to stop the problem. Nothing worked. So I gave up, bought a new router and the problem disappeared. The odd thing was that when it was not working correctly it was not hot. So my guess is that it was over heating. Seems that it is a problem with this model. By the way I bought the Netgear MR814v2 and so far it works great.
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