Customer Reviews

NETGEAR RangeMax 150 Wireless Router

5 star:		(30)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(19)

 

 

While it seemed to work well at first, the router persistently gets into a state where it won't give out DHCP addresses. Any devices I have that use static addresses seem to work fine and it maintains its wireless network and WAN connection, but anything that gets its address via DHCP is off the network.

This can happen any time from a few hours to a few days after it's been powered up. Every time this happens I have to reset the router to get it to work again for my DHCP devices. And yes, I have the latest firmware for this router (as of January 23, 2010).

I'd return the router whence it came, but I ignored my own good habits and threw the box away right after I bought it. It's now sitting on my basement shelf waiting for salvation, but at this point I'm not too confident about it. A little Google work will find similar complaints by other users, and this has been going on for a while.

I had no experience with routers at all, and wanted a wireless router to do gaming through xbox live. With no previous experience, you put in the install CD, and it walks you through the steps easily, and it is up and running flawlessly in less than 20 minutes. A few months later, I also hooked up a printer and notebook, each in seconds. Anyone can set this up and attach devices to it. Works well with good range throughout the whole house. Great product. Highly recommended.

The setup wizard does not work on Mac or Linux, so be prepared to conduct a manual setup. The setup URL is inaccurate, so be prepared to do a search to figure out how to get to the setup screen. Once you get there, setup is really straightforward, but getting there is more of a pain than it should be. I've had the router for a day now, and it works just great.

I bought this router a week ago and it is running great. It seems to be in the middle of g and n routers as far as speed goes. I had to manually set this up because the included software only supported 32 bit Vista and I have 64. I had to log into the router itself to change settings and setup the security, it wasn't that difficult. My house is 60 feet long and the signal covers that with no problem, upstairs and down. My daughter thinks her friends router is a little faster but it was double the price. So far I've had no problems and the price was reasonable.

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I bought this modem to replace the horrid Cisco-Linksys WRT54G2 Wireless-G Broadband Router Cisco-Linksys WRT54G2 Wireless-G Broadband Router I bought and returned, I made a review about that horrible router as well with video showing some problems.

This modem is very small but big on reliability! I was worried about its performance because I never used a Netgear before, but I'm glad it didn't disappoint me!

This router is so simple to setup and has plenty of guides to help you plug things in for the novice and it also has the admin information right on the router along with username and password in case you ever forget what it is if you ever reset router, just be sure to change the username and password for security reasons! I also got the router working with my connection straight out of the box with no configuration! Truly plug and play! You can view that in my video review.

I use it wired to my desktops and wirelessly to my laptop and my cellphone which is a Nokia E63-2 Nokia E63-2 Unlocked Phone with 2 MP Camera, 3G, Wi-Fi, Media Player, and MicroSD Slot--U.S. Version with Warranty (Ultramarine Blue) and it works flawlessly.

Now this router has the word "range max" in it for good reason! To give you an example of the range of this router, I went 310 feet and my cellphone still picked up the signal and I was browsing the web! When I reached 312 feet the signal cut off. If that's not range I don't know what is! Also if your wondering how I know the exact range, I used google maps to measure distance from my house to how far I walked, yes I can be that detailed at times, LMAO.

It has a nice simple admin section to configure the router.

If your wondering about security features, you can set the security of your router to these:

WEP
WPA-PSK [TKIP]
WPA2-PSK [AES]
WPA-PSK [TKIP] + WPA2-PSK [AES]

You can also block websites easily in the admin section too!

The admin section has these categories to enter and configure:

Setup Wizard
Add WPS Client

Setup
Basic Settings
Wireless Settings

Content Filtering
Logs
Block Sites
Block Services
Schedule
E-mail

Maintenance
Router Status
Attached Devices
Backup Settings
Set Password
Router Upgrade

Advanced
Wireless Settings
Port Forwarding / Port Triggering
WAN Setup
LAN Setup
Dynamic DNS
Static Routes
Remote Management
UPnP

Web Support
Knowledge Base
Documentation

All in all it is a fantastic reliable router which did not disappoint me!

I got this router as part of my subscription to Comcast. If I had a simple setup, it would be fine, but I have a home network with 2 computers, a printer, a PS3, a wireless extender and laptops that stretch from one end of the house to the other. When I hooked this router up to my network, the computers would randomly drop on and off of the internet. After endless internet searches and phone calls I finally found a tech at Comcast who told me that this router is not compatible with other routers/extenders. In other words, you can't expand your network to a far end of the house with a switch or extender. Once I disconnected my extender, it worked fine. Problem is, half the house is now in a dead zone. I will probably end up getting the WNR3500 which is compatible with multiple routers/extenders.

Manual setup was easy after downloading the manual as the disc does not work with 64 Bit (XP or Vista). However, speeds were very slow (250kbs) so talk to customer service at Netgear, upgrade firmware, send back to Amazon. Amazon's customer service is always great so start the process on the next morning by 10:30 with a new router. Same results, talk to customer service who escalated to senior level after mentioning difficulties with Toshiba cable modems. Ah-ha. Off to TW and retrieve a new modem and Voila, thru speeds at 12mbs through the modem and router compared with 7.5mbs with the old modem connected directly to the computer. This is a great value as my laptop now connects at 200 feet from the house in my shop. None of the connection and problems were difficult, but it took a little patience. Apparently this is a fairly new model and I guess Netgear is still working some issues, but once the new modem was in place everything is excellent. And once again, thanks to Amazon for their excellent service and competitive pricing.

I had to replace the Belkin N+ router when the Comcast service man could not make it work with the Arris modem he installed. I had purchased the Belkin router to get extra range out to my shop and it was working great. The Comcast tech rep told me they had these Netgear routers available for the cost of shipping ($10) so I got one. The Netgear router signal barely gets beyond the room it's in, far short of the 300 foot range suggested for N class WiFi signals. It looks like I'll have to run a Cat 5 cable out to the shop.

I had the opportunity to set up this router for my parents and my in-laws, and while the speed increase over my Linksys WRT54G router is appreciated, and the range seems good from the second floor despite having this router in the basement, it is not without some drawbacks. First, the instructions are nearly useless - don't bother with them. They will state that you should powercycle your cable modem, wait two minutes, then turn on the router, then the computer. In my experience, the router had a hard time obtaining an IP address from the cable modem if you wait that long - best to powercycle them essentially simultaneously. Second, the setup disk didn't work with my in-laws' Win 7 setup at all. It's best to just log into the router web page itself and set it up manually. Third, the automatic firmware updating didn't work on either setup. You have to first refresh your IP address from the cable modem before updating firmware, since in neither install did the router automatically attain a working IP from the modem, and therefore it never updated the firmware on login.

Once you get past the somewhat irritating setup, the router works well. Setting up wireless security was simple (they recommend using WPA2-AEP, which works nicely), though when I tried to set it up with the same SSID and security as the previous router, Windows laptops didn't seem to recognize it. Better start from scratch with a new SSID. Once running, the speed was fast and, thus far, stable. Netgear really needs to make the setup a lot better with these routers.

Hello
I've been using routers for several years now. This is probably my 4th router. I usually go with Netgear, and with good reason. They usually work well and don't constantly need to be reset. However, I have had issues with one router in the past. Now that I have used this router for slightly over a year, I decided to write a review about it.

First off, the ease of setup is remarkable. You take it out of the box. You put the cd disc in, it shows you the step by step process, and now you are done. Ready to go. I have mine hooked up to Clear, which is a 4G network.
I have multiple laptop users in the house, as well as a Wii and a ps3. The router works well for every system. I haven't had issues with losing connection with my video games, nor have I experienced inability to detect network from the laptops. Lastly, some routers need to be constantly reset because the signal fades in and out. With this router, I haven't experienced that yet (knock on wood).

Basically, I just wanted to write a quick review that allows others to know what success I have had with this router after a year and change. Out of the many options, it is one of the better ones. Good luck