I just bought my SMC Barricade router and set it up the same day and I love it already. I had been looking for a router to share my cable modem internet connection for a while now, but I was waiting for more functionality and the prices to drop. When I saw the price and the functionality on the SMC Barricade I was sold. The unit performs three functions, which for any multiple PC home is must;

Router

SMC Barricade is a router which allows you to share your broadband (cable, DSL,…) connection with the rest of your PCs at home.

Hub

Depending on the model you can connect several PCs directly into Barricade and thereby eliminating the need for a separate hub.

Print Serve

If you have a printer that you would like to share among multiple PC Barricade has a built in print server that allows you to do just that. This eliminates the need to purchase additional hardware (i.e. HP JetDirect) to share your printer on the network.

firewall

The unit has a built in firewall to keep you safe from the hackers.


Set-up

Now I think the documentation on the unit has much room to improve. However at the same time it is definitely not among the worst either. The manual fails to mention some crucial things and leave things up to your reasoning, imagination, and deduction. But if you run into problems you can always call the free technical support.

Technical Support

Other than the long wait (15 minutes or so) technical support was great. I had to call them because I was not imaginative enough to figure out what the manual failed to mention. But technical support came to my rescue and everything was working perfectly in a few minutes.


Recommended: Yes