[Stevie]

That's new enough. It would need to be 6+ years old for my scenario. Something is certainly amiss.

[duboman]

Have any of you looked into using Power lines? My son is a huge gamer and we were having issues with WiFi and dead spots. We hooked up the latest technology of power lines and now each room has an available Ethernet port. His gaming speeds increased 3-fold and not one room has a dead spot. Some models allow you to then hook up a router to broadcast WiFi where you need it as well.

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[Stevie]

I used power lines ages ago. Sounds like the technology has come far as it was junk back then. Be sure to use the encryption settings that are offered as you could be broadcasting to the entire neighborhood.

[toby]

Runs and ducks for cover... 

Seriously though, what I said is not as technical as it reads.  Telnet and SSH are terminal protocols that are used to connect to Unix and Unix-like operating systems (they are also the names of commands on Unix and Unix-like systems that implement the protocols).  Protocols are sets of rules that are used to manage a communication dialog between two computers (e.g., HTTP stands for Hypertext Transfer Protocol and HTTPS stands for Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure).  Linux is a Unix-like operating that was started by Linus Torvalds.   There are many different incarnations of Linux (known as distros).  There are also many different flavors of Unix.  For example, Mac OS X is version of BSD Unix in disguise, and so is iOS.  Android and Chrome OS are versions of Linux in disguise.  A USB-based WiFi adapter is just a device that plugs into a USB port that allows a computer to connect to a WiFi network.  However, one cannot just go out and purchase just about any old USB-based WiFi adapter.  The operating system software has to have driver support available for the adapter.  That's where being able to connect to the PicoBew with Telnet or SSH comes into play.  We can verify what device drivers are currently installed as well as determine what driver support is available on the Internet.  We also want to purchase an adapter that has a screw-on antenna such as the Alfa AWUS036H or the Alfa AWUS036NEH, so that we can install a more powerful omnidirectional antenna (broadcasts in all directions) or an even more powerful directional antenna (broadcasts in a directional beam).  If the PicoBrew has an external WiFi antenna, then all we have to do is replace it with a better one.

I can vouch for the Alfa adapters.  They are excellent (especially for the price).  They're what I use with my Kali VM for Pen tests.  And everything you said made perfect sense to me.  lol  That being said, I don't consider most of the NAT/filtering devices that most people call 'routers' to be real routers either.

Have any of you looked into using Power lines? My son is a huge gamer and we were having issues with WiFi and dead spots. We hooked up the latest technology of power lines and now each room has an available Ethernet port. His gaming speeds increased 3-fold and not one room has a dead spot. Some models allow you to then hook up a router to broadcast WiFi where you need it as well.

I would probably go MoCA before I would go Powerline.  Much better bandwidth potential.

[Stevie]

MoCA is also easier to secure with a cheap low pass filter.

[Village Taphouse]

What I find surprising is that with my old router I might have had signal issues in a certain part of my basement... like I couldn't even send a text.  Yet one son is streaming The Walking Dead from Netflix in HD on a 55" flatscreen and the other one is playing an online Xbox 1 game... both of which are using the wifi.  I'm not sure I understand why that's happening unless my text won't go through because they're sucking all the bandwidth.    I ask anyone streaming shows or movies to a TV or laptop if everything is good and I get a thumbs-up from everyone.  The new router is definitely improving things.

[Slowbrew]

In general SOHO (Small Office Home Office) routers tend to lose signal strength over time.  The transmitter components wear out.  Normally it's caused by the cheap electrolytic capacitors the manufacturer used.  It's the same issue every amplifier and radio built in the last 30 years has had.  There are lots of articles on the web about people replacing all the caps to "fix" their router. 

Sometimes the flow solder systems do a bad job of affixing the chips so they start to fail with heat and dust over time.  You can maybe fix this by taking the board out of the router and baking it at 500 to 600 degrees but not always and you may destroy the board in the process.

The average lifespan of a SOHO router is only 2 years or so.

I have a Netgear wireless router (can't remember the model right now) that supports 802.11n and it does work well.  Not all devices support every 802.11n connection even if they say they do.  All 6 cell phones in my house say they support N but only half them work when connected the N network.  Sometimes laptops say they have a chip that supports N but the manufacturer chose to not install the chip and antenna that makes it work (I have two of these) from Acer and the label on the top stating it has 802.11n support.   

As for the Genie app?  Ya, it makes setting up the router easy but Netgear requires you sign in on an external site to configure the 802.11 network with a different user ID and Password than you use to login on the router locally.  That's kind of a PITA to me.  On top of that, when all the browsers disabled Adobe Flash for security reasons, you could no longer connect to the external site and configure the 802.11N connection.  Flash is a POS and full of security holes but to maintain your network, Netgear makes you use it.  Sorry, kind of a raw nerve.

Maybe all the routers I've had in the last 8 years were too cheap to be expected to work well and last but it's been a long time since that first Lynksys router lasted for 9 years with no issues.   

Oh well, I hope the NightHawk works well and for a long time for you.  Let us know if you start to see any issues creeping up.

Paul

[Joe Sr.]

The best router I ever had was pre-wireless.  An SMS Barracuda.  Totally ancient.  I was sad when it died on me.

As far as the Genie app, I don't even know what that is.  I've always logged in directly.

[toby]

The only app I use to manage my security appliance is PuTTY.

[kbenton00]

The only app I use to manage my security appliance is PuTTY.

Lols... always one in the crowd.

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[toby]

The only app I use to manage my security appliance is PuTTY.

Lols... always one in the crowd.

It's all about the Pentiums.