Cisco and a group of other vendors are releasing mesh network products based on the 802.11 wireless LAN standard. The products are aimed mainly
at creating outdoor wireless networks, such as for municipalities, or as extensions to enterprise WLANs. In a mesh, wireless devices connect to a nearby node, which passes the packets to one or more companion nodes.

Cisco is expected to announce its two-radio Aironet 1500 Outdoor Mesh Access Point. Users will connect via 802.11g/b to the 1500,which will then use a separate 802.11a radio to connect with neighboring nodes.The product is based on work done by Airespace, a company Cisco acquired earlier this year.

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OpenDNS says its free address lookup service makes Web sites load faster and blocks malicious, data-thieving phishing schemes and other threats. The service also corrects obvious typos in URLs, sending people to the site they intended to visit.

Domain Name System (DNS) service functions as the “phonebook” of the Internet, mapping text-based domain names such as www.google.com to the numerical IP addresses used by computers. Internet users typically use the DNS service run by their service provider. OpenDNS offers an alternative phonebook, with extras.

“We are adding an element of choice, which does not exist for DNS today,” said David Ulevitch, chief executive of OpenDNS. “People don’t know that there are different DNS servers available. The benefit is a faster, safer, and smarter DNS.”

OpenDNS says its service outpaces rivals because of its speedy Web connections and intelligent caching. It claims to be safer because it blocks access to known phishing sites and known channels that hackers use to control compromised computers. The smarts come from correcting typos, turning craigslist.og into craigslist.org, for example.

Given the relatively mediocre performance and the interoperability problems found with many draft-n products, it’s worth asking why vendors have rushed them to market.

Two wireless companies that have chosen to stay out of the draft-n fray (at least for now) is Wi-Fi chip maker Airgo Networks and network equipment vendor USRobotics, say they don’t want to ship products that may not be upgradable to the final standard, a guarantee none of the current crop can make. Instead, Airgo says it will have chips ready for 802.11n compliance testing as soon as the specification is ratified.

The rest of the wireless universe, however, doesn’t seem to be waiting and customers aren’t either. “Our Wireless-N family offers customers technology they can immediately take advantage of to get the most out of their networks,” Linksys said in a statement, noting that in June its Wireless-N router came in third on the best-seller list for all home networking products.

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Among the draft-n routers, only the RangeMax Next, based on Broadcom’s Intensifi draft-n technology (as opposed to the newer but identically named
WNR834M model based on Marvell’s TopDog chip), came close to the Asus and Netgear RangeMax 240 models in short and midrange performance. However, it faltered in long-range tests, indicating a smaller coverage area than that of its top-rated RangeMax 240 sibling.

In other respects the RangeMax Next is much like the RangeMax 240, offering the same straightforward setup and advanced client-card connection utility, although its cost is a little higher.

Only a few settings differ significantly, mostly those having to do with draft-n. For example, the RangeMax Next is the only draft-n router in this group that does not support WEP encryption when in high-speed 40-MHz channel-bonding mode, since that would result in poor performance for draft-n adapters.

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Netgear’ s airgo-based RangeMax 240 topped in medium-range performance tests and came a close second in the long-range shootout. The RangeMax 240 also sports excellent router features and has the best Web-based configuration tool of the bunch, thanks in no small part to the ever-present and very thorough context-sensitive help.

Installation using the included CD and the Web-based SmartWizard was straightforward and without incident. The process leads you through the cable connections that vendors generally recommend for setup, basic configuration, and then security. We had an equally good experience with the adapter card, as the setup wizard off ered to help configure the first connection after installing the drivers and Wireless Assistant connection utility.

While the utility could confuse a first time user, it provides lots of practical information about your connection, such as traffic graphs and statistics.

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The linksys wireless-n is a very good all-rounder in design and features; like the Belkin N1, it seriously stumbles only in performance, although not as badly. It has QoS, WPA/WPA2 Enterprise encryption, Radius server support, and truly comprehensive routing capabilities, making it our features champ.

The installation experience was very good. A CD setup utility led us through the physical connections and then took us to the router’s Web-based Smart Wizard for Internet setup. The 90-page PDF manual was nearly as good as Belkin’s, but the context-sensitive help within the Web configuration tool was not. It offered no information on the 802.11n features of the router and looked like it was simply copied from another Linksys model. Even a firmware update did not address this shortcoming in the router setup software.

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The buffalo airstation Nfiniti has some unique features, such as an external switch that toggles between router and access-point modes; Buffalo’s AOSS one-touch encryption setup for easy Buffalo client-card connections; and an upright-oriented antenna cluster. But it also lacks important specs in a high-end router, such as WPA2 encryption support (though Buffalo said it planned to make this available via a firmware update that to be release soon).

In addition, the AirStation is the only router of the group that is missing Dynamic DNS support, which allows cable and DSL customers who don’t have fixed IP addresses to host Web sites or mail servers. Also absent are WPA Enterprise or Radius support, putting the AirStation at the bottom of the features heap in this group.

Designwise, the antenna cluster means you can use the Nfiniti only in an upright position, and you get no wall-mount option. This model had the same problem as with the Netgear RangeMax Next, as many ethernet cables toppled the router (although this happened less frequently with the Buffalo product since it weighs more than the Netgear).

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