Netgear, the WLAN speed demon

With Netgear WNR854T RangeMax NEXT wireless Router Gigabit Edition, Netgear has removed the need to tinker with antenna placement to obtain optimal performance and instead has embedded the antenna inside the boxy white access point chassis. And what performance it provides. Based on Marvell’s TopDog draft 802.11n chip set, this gigabit-enabled home router provided the best speeds. When partnered with the WN511T RangeMax Next Wireless Notebook Adapter (Gigabit Edition), the router topped out at about 130M bps at close range. However, this performance doesn’t extend to longer distances.

The WNR854T provides the least-complicated wireless configuration options among the draft 802.11n products. However, the router does not automatically find the clearest channel. There is no option to set the narrow channel within the wide channel. Otherwise, users can select to support 802.11n plus legacy 802.11b/g or solely 802.11b/g networks.

There is no trouble getting AES (Advanced Encryption Standard) to work with Netgear’s router and notebook adapter. In fact, Netgear’s AES implementation worked without a hitch when paired with every product. Unfortunately, the router does not support the enterprise versions of WPA (Wi-Fi protected Access) or WPA2.