Belkin N1 Wireless Router Review

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(More customer reviews)I had this router for a while now (longer than I could return it for a refund). Very often I cannot connect to web sites that I frequently use. Eventually I did some research and found that this router has a fatal defect - its DNS cache will get corrupted over time. The latest firmware from Belkin does not fix it.
When I initially had problem accessing web sites, I naturally assumed that the web sites could be down or my ISP could have problems. One day when I tried to VPN into my office the VPN could not be connected. I tried to ping my office VPN server and the IP address returned was different from the actual IP. My VPN server was on xx.xx.xx.84 but the PING request indicated xx.xx.xx.4. I then used NSLOOKUP to check various DNS servers, and pin-pionted the error to the Belkin router's DNS cache.
The DHCP server in the Belkin router automatically sets the DNS server address to be those provided by my ISP plus the Belkin's own IP address 192.168.2.1. There is no way to get rid of it. If there is a way to only use my ISP's DNS server the problem could be worked around. Belkin does not provide this option.
The DNS cache corruption problem will cause a lot of mysterious connection problems. If you are not familar with TCP/IP networking technology there is no way to find out what goes wrong. Shame on Belkin to release a product with such a critical defect.

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Connecting the Belkin N1 Wireless Router to your cable or DSL modem lets you share your broadband Internet account with all your networked computers. Now you can exchange documents, share resources, and distribute large video and music files throughout your network within a greater range, at faster speeds. N1 offers the easiest setup ever, and our built-in Network Status Display lets you see your connections working.

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Belkin N1 Vision Wireless Router (F5D8232-4) Review

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(More customer reviews)I suspect most of the people with issues or complaints have version 1000 and / or old firmware.
Additionally one needs to use this in conjunction with 802.11n wireless adapters (preferably Draft 2.0 for future upgradeability / compatibility) in order to obtain the maximum benefit out of the router, at least from a wireless performance perspective.
I recently purchased version 2000 of the N1 Vision (check the sticker on the bottom of the box). I have it mated with two PC's with 802.11n Draft 2.0 (2T2R - 2 Transmit 2 Receive) wireless USB adapters (each with just an internal, but high quality, antenna).
I was up and running in no time.
I also had no problems using VPN to connect to my office network.
I am using WPA2 with AES encryption.
For extra security I have it set up with (broadcast SSID set to 'off' and have specifically only allowed my two wireless adapters by entering their MAC addresses in the 'MAC address control' of the router's setup utility).
Upstairs (one room away from the N1 Vision I get 95 - 100% signal quality and 90+ signal strength with a pretty consistent connection speed of 270 Mbps! (not the full 300 maximum but certainly close enough for me). :)
Downstairs (one floor down and all the way on the other side of the house relative to the router), I get something like 45 - 75% signal strength depending where I am in the room. The speed varies between 45 Mbps, at worst (will have to verify this tonight as I only used it one night and believe this minimum can be improved upon), to a more typical 170 or 210 Mbps (wide range, I know, but I only tested it one night and haven't tweaked settings or placement yet via the flexible silver mini extension cable).
The display is useful in that you can see who connected to your network in the past 24 hours (if an unexpected visitor enters your wireless network, at least you will have a way of knowing it).
I am pleased with the Vision N1's speed, range and overall performance, other than the disconnect issue for which there is an easy enough workaround until they fix it permanently, hopefully, via a firmware upgrade for the 2000 model).
Keep in mind my testing was done using Draft 2.0 802.11n wireless USB adapters. Wireless G adapters won't have the same performance or even close to it.The one thing to note is that there is a known issue where the N1 Vision disconnects every two hours (wireless or all around). This occurs when the router software connects to the time server to get the time (check the router setup page's security log and you can see the entries every two hours).
There is a firmware fix for this for version 1000 but ironically NOT for the newer version 2000.
The N1 Vision 1000 hardware has other issues (reported overheating etc.) though, so I still much prefer version 2000.
For version 2000 there is a workaround to stop it from disconnecting every 2 hours (search the net for it as it requires accessing a "hidden" page).
The workaround works very well and is only required to be performed once after a reboot of the router.
I haven't had to do so in a long time.
I gave it 4 stars due to the issue with it disconnecting every 2 hours and the fact that version 2000 does NOT have a firmware fix for this, even though the older version does.
This should have been caught during pre-release testing. If not, at worst, a firmware fix should have been created for version 2000 very early on.

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N1 vision Wireless router

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