Had bad luck with a wireless router

[lovemachine]

First of all, I'm not computer stupid. I set up all the computers at work, set us up for wireless. Take care of my parents and inlaws computers, set them up for wireless. Finally decided to do the same for my own house. Plus I just wanted to play online with the nintendo wii. Bought Call of Duty, Modern Warfare. . Anyway, I bought a Linksys router. Got the N router. Set it up. I could not, repeat, could not, get my brand new Dell laptop and Ipod Touch to detect any wifi signal. Played with the settings some more, and after 2 hours later, Yes!, picked up the signal. But, the only thing that would connect was the laptop. Ipod touch couldn't get on, neither could the nintendo wii. So, I called Tech support. Guess what? An Injun was talking to me. Crap, I hate that! Anyway, after an hour of dancing around the fire, singing and praying for rain and drinking firewater, I gave up, hung up on him. Took the dern thing back. Now I'm going to look at NetGear.
Has anyone else had that kind of problem? Anyone have any other router recommendations?

 

[Soundslikejosh]

STOP!!!

Save yourself the hassle, buy an Apple Airport Extreme . Zero hassle. Yes, it costs a lot more but you know the saying "Buy once, cry once".

How much is your time worth when you spend an hour on the phone with tech support, or when you have the router crash regularly? In 4 years, my Airport has crashed one (1) time!

It's not just blind Mac love, I truly believe this is a better product. Also, it allows wireless printing from any computer on the network.

 

[Scutter01]

You sure your brand new Dell laptop has an N wireless card? Yes, an N router can do B and G, but you generally have to turn that on manually on the router as it's not usually on by default.

 

[HandK]

First of all, I'm not computer stupid. I set up all the computers at work, set us up for wireless. Take care of my parents and inlaws computers, set them up for wireless. Finally decided to do the same for my own house. Plus I just wanted to play online with the nintendo wii. Bought Call of Duty, Modern Warfare. . Anyway, I bought a Linksys router. Got the N router. Set it up. I could not, repeat, could not, get my brand new Dell laptop and Ipod Touch to detect any wifi signal. Played with the settings some more, and after 2 hours later, Yes!, picked up the signal. But, the only thing that would connect was the laptop. Ipod touch couldn't get on, neither could the nintendo wii. So, I called Tech support. Guess what? An Injun was talking to me. Crap, I hate that! Anyway, after an hour of dancing around the fire, singing and praying for rain and drinking firewater, I gave up, hung up on him. Took the dern thing back. Now I'm going to look at NetGear.
Has anyone else had that kind of problem? Anyone have any other router recommendations?

Yes I had 12 hours into mine before I found out it would not work with Verizon I had to call them and they sent me one that did work for free, so call your provider first!!

 

[Greg.B]

Yes I had 12 hours into mine before I found out it would not work with Verizon I had to call them and they sent me one that did work for free, so call your provider first!!

+1 for this; I have the Linksys WRT160N and have had zero problems with it (even running DD-WRT firmware) with both N, G, and B devices after I correctly set it up

 

[lovemachine]

That router was the WRT160N.

You sure your brand new Dell laptop has an N wireless card? Yes, an N router can do B and G, but you generally have to turn that on manually on the router as it's not usually on by default.

I'm assuming it does. When I bought the computer, I picked the best wireless card. I'll have to check my receipts though, unless you know of another way I could check.

 

[Jubbie]

Can check your Device Manager to see what network/wireless card you have instead of digging around for your receipt. Check for a driver update for that, and also a firmware update for router. I'm gonna throw a guess about the iPod touch that it can only handle certain encryptions or broadcast channels. Open the router up to different channels without encryption/security and see if the iPod picks it up.
Just suggestions if you want to actually take the time to mess with it. If not can always just try a different router, can't say it'll work right off but there's a chance.

 

[nalees]

i would have started with everything wide open broadcasting b/g/n to make sure your devices can all connect correctly, then began locking down from there to see if you encounter any problems

 

[SavageEagle]

tag

I was just having issues gettin a PPC to connect to my Dlink N router. Haven't had a bit of trouble from it yet, but it's only a couple months old now. I enabled multicasting and now my PPC connects everytime within seconds unlike before when it might or might not connect after a minute or so of trying.

Oh, and my router was setup by default to accept B/G/N and every B/G/N device I have connects just fine.

And while we're on the subject, what's better if I have a PPC running WM6.1? WPA or WPA2? Performance wise I mean.

 

[Hardballer45]

I have had problems with my router. i just bought a new computer and it took me almost 2hrs to set up the wireless card.