Kristina Goes Geek With Her Linksys Wireless Router
Written: Jan 15 '02 (Updated Apr 26 '02)
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Pros: Installation is rather easy for someone uneducated, like myself.
Cons: Live technical support is an oxymoron.
The Bottom Line: Looking to put yourself into the 21st century? Here's the toy to do it.
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| kristinafh's Full Review: Linksys (BEFW11S4) 802.11b Wireless Access Point |
This review is dedicated to all of the chicks that are intimidated by anything remotely technical. If I can do it, anyone can do it.
Preamble
Oh my! I've stumbled over to a category that frightens me - computer hardware. My deepest apologies to the editors who must subject themselves to this read :).
I was alive in the 60's but of course, not old enough to remember anything let alone participate in all of those radical feminist movements. Consider this review a late comer to the bra burning festival held at some major university something in the U.S. in 1968.
NO LONGER AM I RESTRAINED, CONSTRAINED, OR HELD BACK BY THE EVILS OF SOCIETY! I AM A FREE WOMAN! I CAN WANDER THE HALLS OF MY HOME, WIRE FREE!
The Remediation Area
All hardware geeks, please skip this section. Girls, before I actually review this product, I want to get you familiar with a couple of things. That way, whatever I write, you might actually understand and thus, this not only makes you a smarter chick, but a more understanding consumer!
Level 1
Let's talk first about connecting to the Internet. I know that if you are all here then you must at least have a dial up connection. That's where a telephone line is plugged (one end) into your computer and the other end, into the wall jack. This is a slow, painful process. No, not the plugging in thing (unless you don't understand the plugs), but the speed at which you connect.
Level 2
Not too long ago (couple of years ago), something called broad band (or what I call Cable) support came into the picture. That's where your computer has a special modem that connects to the outside world through the already established cable lines. Like my cable company is called Insight. They also offer a service so that I can be connected through the internet with their broadband service. It costs additional dough a month and the speed is amazing. Believe me, once you get this, it's like chocolate. You'll never want to go without it again!
Level 3
So what if you have more than two computers in your house? What if you and your adorable, loving child/husband/dog, want to be online at the same time? If you both want to be online at the same time, you need to have a router to connect to. It's this little box where you plug in the cable modem to the box and then both computers, you plug into the box. Both of you can be on at the same time which is cool. The only down fall is that unless you have a long, long cord, both computers will need to be fairly close together.
Level 4
This is the level of heaven and what this product review will cover.
What Is This Product?
Congratulations! You have just purchased an Etherfast(r) Wireless Access Point + Cable/DSL Router With 4-Port Switch by Linksys!
In English girls, you've just bought something which makes your life easier! Think of this little box (sized 6 x 8 inches) as a mother's helper. It slices, dices, and serves white wine on special occasion :).
It was recommended to me by some very wise and wonderful geeks. Linksys is a solid technology company with a good reputation. All the geeks have their products, so if it's good enough for them, it's good enough for me.
But really, this is a piece of hardware that will allow you to take your computer - either desktop or laptop - virtually anywhere else in your house (or even outside) without having all of those horrible cords and wires attached to it.
How, you may ask? Well once you install the hardware and jive it up (or configure it as the geeks call it) with your computer, it's as easy as walking off.
How Do I Get Started, Oh Semi-Wise One?
To become wireless (and thus gain your freedom), you need two basic pieces of hardware (besides that computer). First, you need this wireless access router and second, you need a wireless card. What's a wireless card? It sort of look like a credit card and if you have a lap top, it's something that you can place externally into your computer. If you take a look at the right or left side of your lap top, you'll see compartments that will pop out. If you have a cdrom, you can pop that out and put something else in. Most likely though, the place you'd put your wireless card would be right in front of that device, especially if you have a COMPAQ laptop.
When you buy a wireless card, the company will enclose instructions on how to ensure that it is properly installed in your computer. Honestly? I didn't do this part. Not because I didn't think I could but because my lap top is issued from my place of employment, I didn't want to violate any major law by doing something incorrectly. It's one thing to trash your own computer...another thing to trash company property.
Let's pretend for a moment that you have already completed this step (wireless card, hon). Let's move on to the next step.
Step 1
And I can't stress this enough, GO TO THE MANUFACTURER'S WEB SITE FIRST. Why? Because you don't know how long that product has been on the shelf. Technology changes all of the time - minute by minute. Go read the product information to see if you should know anything new and unusual.
Step 2
Pull the equipment out of its home. Feel it. Love it. Caress it. Don't be afraid of it. It's just a bunch of wires and plastic. Remember, you gave birth and that was MUCH worse.
Step 3
Throw away the user manual. Use the TECH HELPER cd rom that came with your equipment. Two big thumbs up to Linksys for providing a piece of media that was actually useful when it came to setting up this equipment. The cd was written in a way that was easy to understand and just when I thought that only *I* had a problem - it would be listed there in the FAQ's.
Step 4
Install your hardware. This is so easy. In a nutshell, you turn off your computer. You plug a connection from your computer into the back of this box (and it clearly tells you how and where). You plug the power chord in. You turn every thing back on. Ta-dah! Girls, you've just configured your hardware!
Step 5
This one is a little tougher. Now, you've got to get your cable modem and your computer to talk through your new toy. The cdrom (and instruction booklet) leads you through screen examples of what to type and when. Don't worry, you can do it. The actual screens where you will be changing things to get your router to work is all web enabled (and user intuitive). Don't be intimidated by terms that you aren't familiar with (DHCP, IP, NAT). They're just abbreviations ;). Just read and you'll be fine.
Guess what?! You're done! Yep, that's right.
How My Installation Went
Honestly girls, it took me about 30 minutes to do all of it. I had one problem because of course, I was reading too much into the instructions.....I thought, what the heck! I'll call the 1-800 number to ask a question. But noooooooo.....
Invisible Live Technical Support
That's right. If you call their 1-800 number, count on being on the line for at least an hour. Yes girls, that's what I said, an hour. When you call in, the number tells you (after a brief pause of a minute) that you have "X" wait. In my case, it was 66 minutes. I might wait that long for JC, but not for technical support!
I hung up immediately and eventually, realized that I was analyzing stuff way to much. I figured out my issue and went on my merry way. I had absolutely NO problem connecting my home computer. It was beautiful to see all the blinking lights on the router box :).
Hooking Up My Work Laptop
This was a little more difficult. If you work for a pretty large company, chances are, they have some kind of connection that you can make into their network from home. With my employer, they have something called VPN. It's just a piece of software, loaded on my computer that allows me to reach my company's network.
I had to have my company's technical support work with me on getting my laptop up and running because the documentation they furnish with it was obviously not written by any one who has actually worked with VPN :).
When it was finished...guess what???? I was able to take my lap top anywhere in my house and do work. I cleaned up email in my big, lazyboy recliner. I wrote an analysis of a proposal at my kitchen table. It was neat!!! I didn't have to worry about getting off of the computer because someone else needed access to the broadband support (i.e. husband/child). Although others have written here that they've had issues with the wireless part (you know, being able to go anywhere in the house), I haven't had that issue. A good friend of mine suggested that I put the router up somewhere high so that the signal would be unobstructed. I did as I was told!
Other Things
Your router comes with a built in firewall. Some of you may have firewalls on your computer like ZoneAlarm. Linksys tells you to uninstall your firewall application but I left mine in there. So far, it hasn't interefered with anything.
You can have up to four computers running through this router at one time. This is barely enough for the true/blue geeks who want to hook up other things to it, but for the ordinary user like us, four is more than enough. If you're a real geek, Linksys offers other models with more ports in them. Of course, you're going to pay more for it.
Girls, there is an added security feature which you should know about. It doesn't have an effect on whether or not your equipment is operational. Rather, it's just another level of added security. It's called WEP (Wireless Equivalent Privacy). This is a method of encrypting data that is transmitted over your wireless network to ensure data security. What? Yes. See, when you're wired up physically, the security is maintained through the physical wire. I don't want to get too deep into this, just know that this is one of those advanced features you can play with on your wireless network.
There's a 1 year, limited warranty on this puppy which I consider to be standard.
The End
I apologize for the length however, I wanted the simple, non technical person to understand what this piece of equipment is and why you would even think of purchasing it.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 199.99
Driver Availability: Windows, Linux, and Mac
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Epinions.com ID:
kristinafh
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Member: Kristina Frazier-Henry
Location: Indiana
Reviews written: 1344
Trusted by: 1168 members
About Me:
Cannot breathe. Missing Barbara.
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