i recently bought a netgear wireless router cuz it was on sale. all the routers i've owned in the past were linksys ones, which i am not 100% satisfied with, which was part of the reason why i decided to try a different brand. but after talking to a couple of salesperson (who has no affiliation with linksys or netgear, whatsoever), i was told that linksys routers are superior because they allow more configuration options. for one, linksys routers allow you to set up a server, whereas the netgear does not. so i guess what i want to know is if the linksys are indeed superior to the netgear, and if the netgear do lack some configuration capabilities, in what way will i be limited?? the netgear i bought is still sitting in my room, unopened, so i can always return it. also, the wireless router i bought is a basic G router. my linksys B router is starting to become unstable at times and since my new laptop has a builtin G wireless adaptor built in, i figured i use that as an excuse to get a new router. lastly, aside from basic networking and internet sharing, the only other main functions i can see myself doing with the router is online gaming, and running an ftp server.

 

I guess it depends on what you are looking for. To be honest with you all of the brands are almost the same. A lot use the same chip set, the only difference is the features that one pays for. I work for D-Link so I of course use D-Link products. I have used Linksys and Netgear. Try Netgear out, when it comes down to wireless different manufactures perform different in different enviroments.

Netgear may out perform your old linksys router, wheren the linksys router may work better in someone elses home.

 

I've not had many problems with my Linksys in roughly 7 years, using DSL then Cable, with four different providers. That said, D-Link seem to offer a better package, with a more configurable firewall (some might say a "real" firewall), but I have very limited experience with Netgear. I don't think you can really go wrong with any of their products, but IMHO, Linksys has a cleaner, better interface, for what might amount to less configuration options. Set up the NetGear one you have, and see if it lets you do your thing, then make the call. You can always wrap it up and take it back if it won't do what you need, and trade it for a different brand, I would say.

 

I have a DLINK and it runs like a champ. never a problem. A friend of mine with linksys has complained to me a few times.

 

My experience.

I had the first generation Linksys DSL/Cable router connected to a first gen Linksys wireless B access point. The wireless access point was a piece of crap. I couldn't run 128 bit wep on it because it became really slow. Eventually I switched over to a Netgear router/wireless access point. It works like a champ. Didn't have a single problem with it in 2 years. I finally made a move to wireless G about 6 months ago with a Linksys router/wireless access point. I have to reboot the damn thing about once every 2 weeks because either the wireless stops working or its stops forwarding packets to the DSL modem. ARG.

 

[QUOTE=Voodoo_S2K,Mar 7 2005, 07:28 AM] I have to reboot the damn thing about once every 2 weeks because either the wireless stops working or its stops forwarding packets to the DSL modem. ARG.

 

Nothing wrong with Netgear, and yet it will allow you run an ftp server, or any other kind of server you might want.

 

Yup, you can run a FTP server using any modern router.

If LinkSys isn't working well in your network, then go with something else. The bottom line with routers and NICs is to get the ones that work best in your particular network. Networking equipment is picky and there aren't many absolutes on what will work best.

I'm currently using a mix of LinkSys and D-Link routers, NICs, and access points, and both brands have worked fine. If you're just doing a home network, online gaming, and a FTP site, then any router will have the right features, you just need to find the one that works best in your setup.

 

If Cisco didn't like their products, they would never have bought Linksys...

 

Just did a quick Google search, and I think your salesperson is seriously confused if he told you the NetGear router can't be used to run a FTP server. A router that can't support FTP servers isn't going to sell very well. The confusion might arise from the fact that the NetGear router appears to have a built-in FTP server. Hence, when a client FTPs in to your address, by default, he gets the built-in FTP server rather than the actual FTP server sitting behind the router.

This guy has a pretty detailed tutorial on how to direct the client's requests to your actual FTP server:

http://www.techimo.com/forum/t46958.html

The post is a few years old, so I don't know if the information is still relevant to the model of NetGear router you're looking at, but I think this is a likely explanation for the salesperson's confusion.