D-Link DI-713P Wireless Broadband Router and Access Point with 3-Port Switch

Cons: no support for bi-directional communications with my HP LaserJet 1200se (e.g., it no longer tells me I'm out of paper, etc.).

After scouring the Web for insight and equipment reviews (the PracticallyNetworked site was especially helpful) of the myriad of router options, I decided on this one from D-Link. My housemate and I needed to share our newly installed cable Internet service in our three-story house, so wireless seemed like the easiest option. I put the router in my office on the second floor, and he has no trouble accessing the Net by laptop from his office on the first floor, and I can usually get 500+ Kbps (on a PII-333 laptop running a NetGear PC card) in the living room on the third floor. 2Wire's bandwidth meter clocks about a 1.5 Mbps connection for my P4-1.2 wired directly to the router.

I haven't had to call D-Link for tech support, so I can't speak to their abilities/response time. I did use their Web site to download a firmware upgrade. All told, I had our wireless net up and running in less than an hour (which also included a call into RCN to get them to tweak our cable modem on their end).

One thing to bear in mind: pick access clients that are solid performers, whether they're PC card or USB devices. Routers like this are only the access point portion of the wireless equation -- speed and range can be easily hobbled by anemic clients that can't hold up their end of the bargain.

I first attached my desktop through a standard ethernet port, and it worked like a charm. The installation was no more than 10 min - really! Then, I installed D-Link 650 wireless card to my notebook, and to my surprise it too was working in 10 minutes. But, the mystery began once I reboot my notebook. My notebook could see the router, but for some strange reasons, router wasn't giving out the correct IP address. I spent the next 6 hrs trying out all possibilities, and I was ready to call it quit and ship it back. Then, as a last resort, I updated the firmware, and boom ... everything worked all of a sudden. The print server works with my Brother laser printer, but not with Epson ink-jet.

The signal strength is always at Good or Excellent inside my home. The signal gets weak and drop at certain angles from the yard, but I could still surf the net at the speed of well above 1 MB from my hammock. I only wish that the boss would let me work from my hammock everyday :)

Overall, I'm very happy with it. I only wish that I updated the firmware sooner.

When they arrived, I figured the installation was going to be problematic, since several reviews had warned users of some potential problems and the need to upgrade the DI-713P's firmware right away. I turned off my PC and Cable modem, unboxed the DI-713P and inserted it between the modem and my PC's Ethernet card, then powered everything up. Voila, success! Immediately I had internet access through the DI-713P.

I installed the software, then connected the DWL-120 to my wife's PC via a USB port. Voila again! Her PC had instant wireless broadband internet access, although I had to play around with the DWL-120's and DI-713P's unit and antenna orientations to get an acceptable signal level between them, diagonally (45 degrees) through two walls at 25'.

Next, I plugged the DWL-650 into a PCMCIA slot on our laptop and installed the drivers using the included Quick Installation Guide...and you guessed it. Wireless internet success! I was on a roll and my vision had shifted to include a complete wireless network, which I now sensed was within my grasp.

It was now time for real "wireless" networking. To give myself an edge, I downloaded and installed the latest firmware for the DI-713P and drivers for the other two wireless units. By now I was wondering why I had waited so long to set up a wireless home network. I read the User's manuals, took a deep breath, and started setting up my PC and the laptop to "talk". But...for some reason I could not get the two computers to communicate, except for internet access. The User's manuals are fairly descriptive, but I would have killed to know what Windows software options needed to be installed in each computer and a step-by-step procedure on how to set up Network configurations for Windows 98 SE and Me OS's correctly. Fortunately, I was able to get my PC and our laptop communicating after about an hour of trial and error semi-educated guesswork. When it finally started working, it was a thing of beauty to behold.

Unfortunately, I wasn't so lucky with my wife's PC. Apparently, two Windows Me machines are harder to set up to network together then are an Me and a 98 SE . I spent several hours trying to get it to work "properly" and finally shut everything down in disgust, thinking that I would call Customer Service the next day for help. When I powered the system up the next day, it worked PERFECTLY. My guess is that I needed to reboot the DI-713P before it would recognize and allocate an IP address to a second computer. What a kick!

So now I am a happy camper, smiling and chuckling to myself every time I use our ... wireless networked system with its two shared printers and 80 GB's of shared hard drives. I LOVE IT!

My only problem is that I think the advertised communication distances are overstated. Indoors, our laptop can only get about 25 meters (not 100) away from the DI-713P before useful internet/network communications are lost. Even then, the laptop/DWL-650, the PC/DWL-120, and the DI-713P orientation and antennas must be carefully aligned to transceive adequate signal strengths and achieve acceptable signal qualities. This is borderline performance in my book and cries out for product improvement.