Customer Reviews

NETGEAR WGT624NA Wireless G Firewall Router

5 star:		(94)
4 star:		(58)
3 star:		(18)
2 star:		(30)
1 star:		(128)

 

 

A month ago I bought the Netgear WGT624 Version 2 wireless "Super G" router, on the basis that it was affordable and that Netgear had always given me good service. Having professionally installed networks in the past, I have always been happy with Netgear's commercial products and was expecting this one to be the same quality. The router was super easy to install and set up, their setup wizard was great, and when it worked, the router was blazing fast. I only got to use the cable connections, never got time to setup a wireless connection. As other reviewers have said, it was setup and running within five minutes of plugging it in.

***CAVEAT*** - It worked GREAT for two days, then began to randomly drop the LAN connections, resulting in the dreaded "Network Cable Unplugged" message (search for "netgear wgt624 network cable unplugged" or search Netgear's forums for pages of similar complaints with no resolutions). This got worse, beginning at a few times per day, finally getting down to every few minutes - it now only worked a few times per day! After a week of swapping NIC's, cables, and confirming settings, I finally broke down and e-mailed Netgear tech support - who was kind enough to reply after two days with the same things I had already tried (confirm settings, hardware reset, update firmware, etc.), and a request for more detailed system info if the problem persisted. Even with the most current firmware release, it would not work reliably - so I sent them back every detail they had requested but got no response after a week.

When I finally called them, I got their tech support department in India who confirmed that I was eligible for free tech support (they only offer it for 90 days from purchase, then you have to pay) and then began to go over the e-mails we'd swapped. After 10 minutes with no luck, he suggested that I try the Beta version of the firmware release, AND that this beta version would void my Netgear warranty. After making this suggestion, he said goodbye and hung up in the middle of the conversation. When I immediately called back to India, I got a different tech and was told that I was already out of the 90 day free tech support period (I bought the router a month ago mind you) and that I would have to pay for any support or to get the router replaced under the warranty. After some argument, he finally agreed to help me, but found that the router was indeed defective - and pointed out that there is a known problem with these particular models and he could not guarantee that a replacement would work any better.

In order to get the router replaced under the warranty, I would have had to fax or mail my receipt to India (not a toll free #), and wait a week for them to confirm that my Router was within the warranty. After this was done, I would have to call them back and PAY for the "Extended Tech Support," since their computer showed that my router was out of the 90 day free support period (again, it was only a month old). If this return call to tech support proved that my router was defective, I would then get an RMA and have to either ship the defective router to India at my expense and wait three weeks for them to ship a refurbished replacement unit back, or pay them $30 to have a replacement shipped to me first, then ship the defective unit back to them at my expense.

***SOLUTION*** - I returned the router and bought another brand. In searching the Internet, I found that the equivalent D-Link model (the DI-624) has strikingly similar problems so I bought a Linksys and have been happy thus far. I agree with the reviews that the Linksys is not quite as foolproof to set up, but it's worked great for two days now. We'll see.

That's my observation. Ever since I installed this as a replacement for my D-Link DI-764, I noticed a drop in performance - downloading web pages and such. I thought it might just be some slowness to my cable provider but the problem persisted - Upon tinkering, I noticed that performance went from 1300-1700 to 2600-2900 Kbps when I disabled the router's Stateful Packet Inspection. That's a pretty big performance hit for SPI (in my book). Other than that, it's delightful and the wireless works great, can't use 108 much since it only works on channel 6 and my neighbor laid claim to channel 6 a long time ago.

I bought this router to replace a Netgear MR814 v1 that I outgrew.

Right out of the box, this router worked without changing any settings at all! I turned off all pc's and my cable modem, connected the router, turned on my cable modem, then the router, then the pc's. Everything worked like a champ.

Next I went into the web interface (which you can get to by opening Internet Explorer and typing 192.168.0.1 into the address bar, then type in the user and password) to setup the security settings. I was very impressed to see all of the latest security features included. Probably the one feature that I like the best was the auto firmware upgrade feature. The firmware of the router is what tells the router how to work. New versions of firmware can fix problems as well as give you new features. On many other routers the process of upgrading the firmware can be quite difficult for "normal" people that aren't techies. With this router, you just click "Firmware Upgrade" and it will go out to netgear, find new firmware if available, and install it all automatically for you. Great feature.

Range was also a big deal for me as the house it was being installed in was a split 3 level house with the router being in the 2nd floor. I never used to be able to go outside at all with my old router and the signal in the bottom floor was always very weak. This router lets me have full coverage throughout the house and venture off into my backyard to the edge of my property! Amazing improvement. I am using the Netgear WGT511 card in one laptop, the 802.11b pci card in a desktop downstairs, and a wired card in a desktop upstairs, all with no problems at all.

I purchased this product after Netgear posted its long-promised 2.0 firmware for the WAG511 card, finally giving it 108Mbps support.

The good:
The product works as advertised; Turbo G mode gives me excellent speeds even at a modest distance from the router.

The not so perfect:
Netgear's Turbo mode support is incompatible with b/g mode. You can either set the router to b/g mode (max 54Mbps) or you can set it to 108 mode (any wireless device that does not support 108 mode will not see the router). By comparison, on October 13 2003 competitor D-Link announced firmware upgrades to add "Dynamic Mode" to their products, supporting 108Mbps mixed with b/g mode. Netgear's website states: "A firmware upgrade will be available allowing mix mode (802.11g and 108Mbps turbo) operation in the near future," so hopefully Netgear will match D-Link's features soon.

Also, there is no way to disable NAT on the WGT624 with the current firmware (rev 1.1.1). This annoys me, as I really just wanted a Wireless Access Point, but Netgear has no WAP with 108Mbps support, and 108Mbps support is why I bought the WGT624.

**Update**: I wrote the above originally on October 23 2003. In January 2004, Netgear finally provided mixed mode support across all versions of the original WGT624 (apparently different firmware is required for different serial numbers). Also, there is now a newer version of the hardware, dubbed the WGT624v2. Newer firmware for the WGT624v2 allegedly improves SPI performance if you use it (I don't). No hardware upgrades are available if you have the original WGT624. Unfortunately, Amazon.com doesn't have a separate ASIN for the v2 model so it is difficult to tell if you will receive an original WGT624 or a v2 when you purchase on Amazon.com.

I purchased my WGT624 v2 from amazon.com. As soon as I pulled it out of the box it was constantly rebooting (dropping me off the internet both wired and wireless). I was able to fix it though and I will tell you how and what happened. When I had this problem out of the box, I called for netgears free 90 day support. They were horrible! They answered the phone without a long wait, but they knew very little about this product. They gave me an RMA and I received the new router. Unpakced the replacement and same problem. Updated firmward to latest, and followed all the troubleshooting on the netgear site and I still coudln't fix it. Just when I was ready to return it to amazon I found out how to fix the problem. There is a setting on the router for preamable and it is set to auto by default. Auto is supposed to detect if the card(s) support short preamable (short is usually only useful when there is a lot of interference from other wireless devices in and around the home and most cards don't even support it). I changed the setting from auto to long and that fixed the reboot problems. I have gone around to as many forums as possible to try and post the solution so that others can cure themselves of this problem. It works great now that I found out what the problem was. This is not a router for a novice computer user. If you are a novice I suggest you get a linksys product. This netgear has a lot of features for the price though, and this is just a stupid problem with the firmware.

Hrd2k

I bought Netgear WGT624 Super G from Amazon for $85-$25 rebate and the corresponding WG511T from Best Buy for $89-$40 rebate.
Actually, I like Linksys because it is reliable. So, I bought Linksys WRT54G first from Fry's, but they sent me an old version of WRT54G which was reviewed having a lot of problems. I returned Linksys and bought Netgear because it says it can go up to 108 Mbit and it is cheaper than Linksys. Hopefully, they really send me the rebate.
Installation to replace my old wired Linksys router was relatively easy (with Comcast and RCA modem). However, for some reasons, I can not make my laptop to work at 108 Mbps. The fastest it can go is 54 Mbps. This is after firmware refresh (both the router and the card) and using channel 6.
I can not say that the signal is great, since from about 10 feets distance in the same house, the speed drops to 24-36Mbps.
I have not try with 11 mbps b card, so I can't say anything about this.
Few things to remember when installing the router:
1. Do not rush opening the box. You need to check if the router you have is firmware upgradable. Netgear was reviewed to have some rotten apple in their batch that do not allow firmware upgrade. Go to their web site: http://kbserver.netgear.com/support_details.asp?dnldID=592
and enter the serial number of the product to see if the one you have is firmware upgradable. If not, you should return it.
2. You want WGT624G version 2 or later. This later version uses a better chip set. However, I think there is no way of finding the version without opening the box. I order from Amazon because according to reviews Amazon ships version 2; although mine has a low serial number.
3. They have a URL that describes the setup for various ISP: http://www.netgear-support.com/ts/doc/ispguide.htm.
It would be a good idea to check it before installing.

I rate this as a good product althought I am not quite satisfied since I can not make it to work up to 108Mbps as advertised.
-- bens

This product has (like with many other reviews) stopped working around month six, I would also like to confirm that it does drop the connection and require a reboot about every six hours... do yourself a favor and buy a compeditors product

Good router, nice firewall features and affordable

I have had this router for about 3 month now, it works great. Excellent firewalls features, and for the price you can't do much better. A lot of bad review on this piece of hardware, most of the complaints is about the dropped connections. I happen to know a lot more about networking then those people, and can tell you how to solve that problem very simply. I too was experiencing a lot of dropped connection, I rebooted the router and changed a few of the setting and now it work perfect. No dropped connections.
Take the following steps if you are having the same issue:

Access the routers setting through your browser by going to http://192.168.0.1/ , default user name should be Admin, and the password, is password.

Go to the "advanced" category and select WAN SETUP and make sure Connect Automatically, as Required is checked.

Then go to "basic setting" under the SET UP category. Go to Idle Timeout (In Minutes) the default setting will be I believe 10 or 15 min. change that to 0 (ZERO). This will prevent you router from disconnecting when it is not in use.

This should solve you dropped connection issue. It did for me.

Enjoy....

It's fast, easy to set-up and fun to sit on the couch and browse. For two or more people living under one roof with lap-tops, it definitely makes sense. I don't know why I didn't do this sooner.

For those of you not router savvy (myself included), connect the computer you intend to be wireless through the router FIRST with a hardline, make an internet connection and THEN make a wireless connection. You may have to adjust settings in (XP) control panel. ...

First, let me preface, like many have posted, the unit can reboot continously. However, this can be FIXED and the unit is rock stable afterwards. The solution: Update the firmware. Unfortunately, the automatic "check for firmware updates" menu function does not do this correctly.

Go to Netgear's website and download firmware V4.2.6_1.0.1. After downloading, manually update the router from the "Router Upgrade" menu.

The link to the firmware is:
http://kbserver.netgear.com/support_details.asp?dnldID=900

Prior to the upgrade, under heavy load (ie. Bittorrent), the unit would reboot continously and lock up after 6 hours. Since the upgrade, the router now has handled 6+ days of a continous heavy load (300k down, 50k up) without as much as a hiccup.

As for the router itself, it is beautiful and functions perfectly. It has a small footprint than almost every other router available and hosts every conceivable option necessary. The only function it does not have is QoS (quality of service), but I have never encountered a situation where it would be necessary. I've had VoIP for over a year now and not once has heavy downloading affected my phone quality.