Customer Reviews

TRENDnet 300Mbps Wireless N Home Router TEW-632BRP (Black)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

I bought this wireless router for a small home network. It took a while to set up -- an hour or so initially and then a week's worth of tweaking -- but now it's working relatively reliably.

PROS:
- It's an n router, so it has at least the potential to be as fast as your wired connection.
- Aesthetically, it looks decent.
- Compatible with both Windows and Macs.
- For Windows computers, setup is probably pretty simple (so long as you don't want to fully customize the install) since the router comes with an easy install CD.
- The range is good. I have strong signal throughout my apartment and a good distance outside it as well.
- For the technology, the price is great.
- Nice options for security, whether you want firewalls or encryptions, etc.

CONS:
- For Mac users: It's compatible, but you'll have to go through manual setup, the steps for which aren't yet up on the Trendnet site. For either platform, though, just plug your modem into the router's WAN port, plug the computer into one of the router's LAN ports, then type 192.168.10.1 into your browser's address bar to take you to the manual setup.
- The router disconnected too frequently for my tastes (say, two or three times a day, at least) when I had its n capabilities enabled. The speed was great, but the disconnects weren't worth it. After restricting it to b and g only, the disconnects stopped. While the drop in speed is hardly significant, it is something to keep in mind.
- Constantly blinking green lights on the front are a bit annoying if you keep the router facing you.

Be careful. If you are buying it for a specific advertised capability, make sure it actually works. The documentation isn't reflected in the product. This is a home use product. I've been using it for a couple years in my home. If you just want a plug and play wifi router with better bandwidth than a "g mode" model, you'll be happy with this. If you want to used the advanced features such as filtering access from various devices -- laptops, iPods, etc., it might not satisfy you.

PROS:
-price, advertised capability, range, online customer support (technicians actually know the product vs. reading from a script), works well with my laptop 2ft from my microwave and 5ft from my cordless phone base station.

CONS:
-firmware limitations or bugs.

I have the router installed on the 3rd floor. I consistently get around 100 Mbps throughput on floors 2 and 3. I max out at 130 Mbps. On the first floor, I get around 60 Mbps (still better than "g"). I was using fw 1.10B13 and everything was fine until I tried filtering my son's new iPod touch via the MAC address. It turned out there was a bug in the MAC address filtering which was fixed in 1.10B19. I upgraded and MAC address filtering worked correctly, but now the LAN wifi client DHCP connection is periodically dropped and not restored until the router is reset. So I can either filter my sons access to internet or have a reliable wifi connection. My solution... time to move on to a different vendor's product. For $24, it is worth buying if you are using g-mode or no wifi while you get educated on what you want to spend "real" money on.

UPDATE: This is the same hardware as a D-Link unit. I downloaded and installed the D-Link firmware (Google for location & instructions) and I've been very happy with the D-Link firmware, more features and no bugs.

I've used one of these routers for a few days, and although the wired connectivity seems to work fine, I am disappointed with the wireless connectivity. I lose my wireless connection fairly frequently, and sometimes my laptop has a hard time re-connecting. I also tried changing the channel of the wireless, which helped a bit, but it still disconnects too often, in my opinion. Another thing I don't really like is that in its configuration pages, it uses different terminology for port forwarding (port forwarding is set up under "Access", and then "virtual servers"). I tried setting up some port forwarding with it, but it does not appear to be forwarding.

I've set up port forwarding with 2 different routers (a Linksys and a Netgear) without problems, and I've had better wireless connections with other routers. This router has been very frustrating for me.

Don't waste your money on this router or any other TRENDnet product!
This is First and Last TRENDnet Product.
I had a TEW-632BRP (wireless N-300mbps) for about 9 months that started disconnecting me more and more frequently
Every time i have to power cycle and in 15-20 min it drops all wire and wireless connections. I called techical
support and we worked for three weeks to do all possible solution now finally they are ready do replace..
It says three year warranty ... They wants me to send this router first to them and then after they will send me
new one....Shipping is on me ( as it's my fault to buy it )...If i pay one way shipping it cost me $14.95 and even
after that i will get same garbage router....No way...I rather spend that money to buy something new from other company.
On top of that replacement will take more than 10 days....Wow...I have every thing in my home wireless...What i do for those
10 days????
Unless you are totally free and have lots of time then only buy product from TrendNet.

I bought this wireless router and installed and configured it in about an hour. Then I worked on my wired network for a couple of weeks to get ready to use the wireless. When I was ready to hook up the wireless, I logged into it change a static route. It said I would have to log in as "admin" in order to make changes, but I WAS logged in as admin. I logged out and logged back in and power cycled the unit to no avail. Finally, I pushed the reset button for 15 seconds as directed in the User's Guide to set it back to factory defaults. Then when I tried to connect to the configuration page, it said something about updating firmware. I power cycled the unit again and haven't been able to get anything out of it since. It is dead. I'm sending it back.

Out of the box, I'm not sure how this router measures up to others but to me, if you have some knowledge of reflashing the router firmware, there are some options to improve the usability.

Note that reflashing with alternative firmware voids your warranty unless you can restore the original firmware. This is not always possible; in fact, you can render the router inoperable ('bricked'). Proceed at your own risk.

Under the covers, this router is essentially identical to the D-Link DIR-615 and the firmware for the D-Link product can be installed on it. I found the D-Link firmware to have more options than the Trendnet original firmware which is frankly dumbed-down and only provides very basic function. A starter firmware that will load on this router is at [..] Once that is installed, the latest firmware from D-Link for the revision C hardware can be loaded.

Going a bit further, the very popular (for techies, anyway) DD-WRT firmware is available in a beta form, i.e., it has not been fully vetted for functional stability. You won't find it at the official DD-WRT download site but it is available at [..](latest build).

I have one set up as an access point to my FIOS router (a 56Mbps wireless router that can't be replaced because of the set-top box networking over coax requirement). DD-WRT provides the ability to bridge segments wirelessly so I will be acquiring another to network to my PS3 and media player box. I am now using another Trendnet product, the game extender TEW-647, with a switch to do this - works flawlessly, but I'd like to reduce the number of components and cables.

Read up on the DD-WRT forums and get some background. This little router can shine with a firmware update. I like that the antennas are removable (unlike the newer TEW-652) and have replaced the 3db gain antennas with 5db gain. You can, with discretion, increase the output power of the transmitter on the router which DD-WRT gives you an option.

This small, piano black box fits in inobstrusively in my home network.

I bought this router at J&R in Manhattan, NY for about $60. All I have to say is that ti is a good buy. Though it is wireless N, I mostly use wireless G. This router is hooked up to a Playstation 3 (WIFI Wireless G), 2 ASUS Eee PCS(running linux...and it works!!!), and an HP Media Center. As far as range, the wireless G can go from the top floor of my house (2nd Floor) to the basement about 60 feet away and it could possibly go farther. The speed is quite good. It makes online multitasking good. It also is good for gaming. I hardly ever lag which is good. The oonly reason I gave it 4 stars was because of the installation. The installation was a little hard considering the installation software did not find the router. (For linux users, you have to configure the router manually via 192.168.10.1. This is because the instalaton disk is NOT linux compatible.) Luckilly, I know how to configure routers so it was fast and easy. For the price, It is pretty good considering other N routers are 100 plus dollars.

I bought this router because of the price and the fact that Trend does make some other good products.
This product didn't work out however. I connected it, with some difficulty to my HP laptop and HP desktop and had good performance. My husband had been out of town for a couple weeks and upon his return we tried to configure his Dell laptop. I've been in computer technology since 1986, built numerous computers, setup dozens of WIFI routers and have never been through a worse experience. I spent 8 hours with Trend's tech support, who basically said the unit wasn't compatible with Dell but went out of his way to try to reach a solution. My husband spent another 4-5 hours with a clueless Dell technician, who had him pull the modemn card and reinsert it! (Hang up - immediately - on anyone who ever tells you to pull your Dell laptop modem card!!!!) Worst of all I knew in the first 1/2 hour that this router was incompatible.

All of that and I had to return the modem for partial credit because by then it was past the full credit return date. Amazon was great about it though and found a way to give me a little extra credit toward a new D-link. I was replacing a D-link that I'd had for 9 years. The new one, model DIR-625, was a snap and I've been using it for a year with no glitches on any of our systems. It also works seamlessly with my son's Toshiba laptop and our Droid 2 phones.

Bottom line: BEWARE if you have a DELL computer.

I bought this for my boyfriend's apartment. He has a desktop, but I occasionally have to bring my laptop or netbook to get stuff done while there. He also has a PS3 which hadn't been internet connected. At home I have a more expensive router (cisco linksys)to handle 3-6 wireless connections at a time and 2 Ethernet connected computers.

I bought this for less then $30, and figured there was a 50% chance I would have to send it back. I am pleased with it though. It is fast enough to stream SD video onto my laptop without it having to buffer often, as happens in other places. He seems to be able to play games online through the PS3 without any problems. I have never had this router freeze up or stop working out of nowhere, which my more expensive router does about twice a month. It does not seem to have any interference problems with other electronics or other routers (there are usually around 40 within wireless range of my computer). I am very pleased with this purchase.

Got a great deal on this product. I couldn't set it up by myself using Windows 7 so I called the support line at Trendnet and they had me up and running in 10 minutes. Great service from Trendnet and a great product. I had it for about a month now and have had no problems whatsoever. I would purchase this again.