Customer Reviews

Cisco RV016 16-port 10/100 VPN Router - Multi WAN

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(9)

 

 

I use this router on our main network of about 40 permanent users and another 20 or so users (clients) that come and go. At any one time it is negotiating 50 to 65 users via DHCP through four 24 port managed switches about ten 4 to 8 port hubs and six WAP's. Clients come and go everyday, some with Mac's others with PC's and I never have to do anything to get them on the internet. In the two years it has been in service I think that I rebooted it once and I'm not positive that it was the problem since I will reboot the modem, switches and router together. Occasionally things do get turned off for maintenance, but looking at the router admin page right now it has been running 54 days straight. I have to say it is much more stable than other small routers that advertise delivering 99 DHCP address's but really can only deliver about 10 without having to use static IP's. It's powerful browser interface lets you manage port bandwidth, port function and port priority easily. Some departments need more or less speed or higher priority. Security notifications via email keep me on top of potential attacks. The effect on speed due to security features was negligible. The "Block WAN request" even keeps our own ISP from seeing us. All these things are simple to setup. As a basic router it is very powerful.
The only short coming that I see is with the load balancing. This seems to really slow the speed significantly. I think that it is just too much for the CPU to handle. My intention was to have two different ISP's for redundancy. As a fix I leave both providers connected but only activate one WAN port at a time. If one WAN goes down I can quickly activate the other WAN port without anyone really being affected. The other ISP is mainly used for FTP anyway.
On the problems with VPN's, we don't use them so I can't comment on that.
In closing, you could spend thousands to get some of the features that facilitate subnets and load balancing, for the price it works very well.
Update: I have since purchased a second RV016 (firmware 2.0.13) with the same solid performance. I've read about some of the problems that others are having and would say that compatibility with other vendors is an issue to consider. Also using switches versus hubs takes some of the load off the routers CPU.
Update 2: We now own three routers without problem. I know that some have complained about customer service and I have to agree it's lacking. But what I would tell less experienced users is that the Sitemap column on the right side of the browser interface has extensive explanations of all the settings. This combined with a little experimentation should get you where you need to be. The file sharing problems that another reviewer had has nothing to do with the router, it's all about the computer settings. Another reviewer commented on customer service asking about the color of the cables. In the early days of DSL and daisy chaining hubs, crossover cables were used and they were generally orange or yellow and will not work with most equipment.

 

I have had the RV016 for a few years.

Overall I am somewhat mixed.

My biggest disappointment is with Linksys support. I had trouble configuring the dual WAN capabilities, and never got any help from Linksys. In the end I am using a single WAN (see below). I would expect much better, or at least some, support for an expensive router like this one.

Some applications got confused when I was using two WANs. I had this problem with 2 or 3 applications, so I suspect correcting it would be straightforward, but after HOURS of fiddling and calling Linksys help, I got nowhere.

The other surprise was that there is no way to be notified if one of the WANs goes down. I have dual connectivity for redundancy, but if one fails, there is no way to have the RV016 notify you.

I now keep both WANs plugged in, but only one port active. Someone needs to switch the connectivity in the event the primary WAN goes down.

On the positive side, I really like many of the advanced features:
* One-to-one NAT works well. My servers are both part of my LAN while having an outside WAN address
* I often remotely manage the RV016, including turning one and off various physical ports
* I found setting up VPNs to other gateways fairly straightforward.

Conclusion:
On balance there are enough features that work, or at least that I understand, that I am happy with the RV016. I do wish some of the other advertised features worked or were better documented.

 

We purchased the router for its multiple Internet (WAN) inputs for redundancy. While on the surface that works, it will cause problems with remote login via RDP when using dynamic IP addresses since you cannot be sure which IP the system will provide when you login and it can change often so RDP fails a great deal of the time even when using a Dynamic DNS service in the units software. You have to disable one of the WAN sources to get 100% reliability for remote RDP access which then defeats the purpose of the multi WAN option. Of course, if you do not need to login remotely using RDP, this may not be an issue for you.

We also had multiple bugs with the unit and have had to reset many times until we finally gave up and switched to a Netgear VPN Router which has not failed once. So my experience has been that Netgear is a more reliable product overall but Linksys has a few neat features including multi WAN inputs. If the unit would not act up and if tech support were better, it would increase its rating.

I've been using this router for 8 months now and have had no problems with it. Unlike other Linksys products, I've never had to reset this one a single time because it had hung. Current uptime is 146 days. The last time I rebooted it was because a new UPS was being installed.

Load balancing works fine (I use 3 internet connections from 2 ISPs). P2PTP VPN works with from Windows & Macs with the built-in VPN client.

I wish there was a way to bind certain IP addresses to a specific WAN connections. Other than that I can't complain.

I'm using Firmware version 2.0.6. There is a newer version (2.10.0) which I will be installing over the weekend which promises even more features.

When it came down to it, I closed my eyes and ignored my gut to buy the Watchguard v100($4000), just because I could not ignore the $400 price tag for this firewall/router. After 2 months in the full production, I realize this guy was a steal. The biggest asset is the port forwarding feature. This gem of a feature lets me serve up web content from my server farm behind a single IP address. (I also use a proxy, to work some magic...poof) I have not had any lock up issues (like the previous author...) granted I could have a new version of firmware. Yes it is true you might have to hold your nose when your around linksys wireless routers, but for some reason they managed to get their act together when they put this package together...For the record: The documentation clearly states that a max of 7 wan ports can be used.(I usually read up before I make a purchase)

I see a lot of negative reviews and I think they are somewhat unfair. First off, you should always upgrade the firmware to the latest version before placing in a production environment. Perhaps in the early days the firmware was unstable and thus bugs resulted, but I've been using two of these acting as a gateway tunnel between remote offices and these things are rock solid. The gateway has been up for 257 days now without a hitch. The vpn aspect works great if you know what you are doing, and even then I think its easier to use than other relative products. One reviewer said the PPTP vpn feature (easier to setup than L2TP)just plain doesn't work and I can vouch that its absolutely not true. I have both Windows and Mac clients connecting to the vpn over PPTP and it works perfectly. You do NOT have to use the proprietary linksys vpn software if you do not want to. That piece of software is not perfect but does work and its totally optional.

I don't use all the feature sets on this thing but it has yet to crash on us. We are using all 13 ports in both offices and it handles the traffic just fine without any packet loss.

The ONLY two negatives I can find is that its not gigabit, but at this price point its expected. Secondly, you can't do aggregate linking to a server with dual ethernet ports. Not a big deal for most people. If you are looking for a solid performer with many features I highly recommend this model. You won't find a better product for the price. Just don't forget to upgrade the firmware, which at the time of this writing is 2.0.18

This is not the router for you. Although it does do a decent job at balancing two WAN's, everything else falls short.

* The 50 client VPN server it advertises needs a proprietary windows-only VPN client from Linksys. It also has a PPTP server -- that doesn't work. The PPTP option was added in a later firmware, and I have not been able to find a single person for whom it works, but plenty who are in the same situation of it disconnecting after authentication. (UPDATE: as of 2.0.13 this *finally* works)

* The manual advertises several features, like telnet access, which it doesn't have.

* It will reap idle connections before they need to be done; if you use ssh it will disconnect you within minutes if you aren't actively typing. I've reported this to tech support several times but have been told that this is how all routers behave (which is funny, because if I put a WRT54G in its place, everything works fine)

* Calling for support on any issues with your router is abysmal: thick accents which are hard to understand, and none of the support employees understand basic networking terms. I've been told by tech support several times that things I want to do with my router (like setting up 1 to 1 NAT / forwarding) is impossible not only with their model, but with *all* models. Usually when I'm told something is impossible to do with TCP I'll find a firmware update a few months later that fixes it.

* The 2.0.13 firmware has introduced a new great bug where SSH connections get a "Connection Reset by Peer" during the authentication phase for 80% of attempts.

* One day my T1 went out. This caused the Linksys router to stop forwarding *all* traffic across my other WANs until the router was physically reset to factory defaults and reconfigured from scratch.

* Any dialog in the web interface that has a large list of settings (such as IP forwards, VPN users, etc) apparently get completely and immediately wiped out clean if you hit the enter key instead of the "Save" link at the bottom of the page -- not so good if you have any production servers behind this router.


So, what are good alternatives?
* I've tried free routers, including pfSense, but even with years of Linux/BSD experience, it's still likely you won't get them running, and message board / mailing list support seldom resolves your qualms.
* In it's price class (and slightly higher), take a look at the PePLink Balancer series. If you just want 2-3 connections, it won't run you too much more.
* If you want to go one step up from there, you have to suck it up and get a Cisco router; a 1841 with modules will do what you need, but probably run in around $2,500 plus an annual support contract.

I work with infected computers on a regular basis--it's my business, I'm a computer repair shop.

The feature(s) that attracted me most was the vLAN feature. With each port able to be set as a separate LAN makes a world of difference when you are working with sick/infected computers.

Bugs can spread over a network and individual LAN's can mean an epidemic on your network or containment! With the RV016, I can safely connect a virus-filled computer to my network and not worry about the other devices as vLANs are virtual LANs--meaning, a separate LAN from the others.

I am so pleased with this unit I am looking to purchase another unit for a client of mine--a golf course resort! They have three to four LANs they want created and the RV016 is the perfect match; their public (free) wireless, the golf course's GPS and score tracking system, their kitchen and service computers, and finally their corporate offices.

Finally, I love that more ports can be created as WAN's, load balancing between them all, and more. This is a great unit for the small to medium business. The ease of setup allows for a novice user (one who understands some networking) to set this unit up. It doesn't take a networking degree or a high-end IT pro to get the basics of this unit up and running.

 

We purchased this on recommendation from Linksys sales support that it would accomodate 14 downlink ports. As supplied the RV016 is a 13 port router with 1 dedicated DMZ port and 2 WAN ports (5 of the other 13 ports can be reconfigured for additional WANs). Further discussion with Linksys technicial support indicates that this device has stability issues and does not work well with Linksys switchs. It locks up periodically and requires a systemwide reset. Do not expect any support if you buy this product. My calls were directed to India and the Philipines and I was asked questions including "what color are your cables?"

We used to have the RV082, which comes with 8 port PLUS one Internert and one DMZ. Bought this one thinking that it'll have 16 ports PLUS one internet and one DMZ. But look again... it has 16 ports including the Internet and DMZ. Lucky I only need 12 ports.