Rant against wireless routers without external antennas. Arrgg with Linksys WRT310N

I simply don't understand the recent trend of sleek wireless routers without external antennae, namely Linksys.  Most reviews confirm that their wireless strength and speed drops off much more rapidly as distance increases, yet Linksys has essentially gotten rid of external antennae across their models.  

I was foolish enough to get Linksys WRT310N, which is fine close-range, but from upstairs, its download speed drops off to 1/3 of my old D-Link DI-624 G-router.  

That's when it was working well.  It suddenly started to become slower, not responding to power-off cycle, until it finally died. I then wasted hours on the phone with Linksys "support," and I am supposed to get another WRT310N under warranty.  The second tier support guy offered to sell me their E2000 at $120 minus $15 discount, saying the WRT310N has known "problems" and he recommends the new model.  

Seeing how the E2000 street price is $99 at Walmart, etc, I declined, but if the second WRT310N decides to act up, I guess I'm out of luck.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kirosia 

Have you tried installing open source firmware?

 

http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Linksys_WRT310N_v1.0

Well, it's too late now since there is something seriously wrong with the router, and I'm unable to even access the 192.xxx router web page to load any firmwares.  Even if I could, dd-wrt won't help with not having nice external atennae.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MCC 

My WRT610N also had less range than I expected. HAD. The wireless died on both bands yesterday, I'm hoping it's just DD-WRT and not a hardware issue. It'll at least work as a decent gigabit switch if nothing else.

That's too bad about he 610N.  I really need the range upstairs, so even if I get another Linksys WRT310N, I think I'll just try to sell it and get a better router with a bunch of antennae.  I've been researching, and it's VERY difficult to find a N router with multiple external antennae, confirmed by reviews to have great range with speed, reliable, AND reasonably priced.

It almost makes more sense to pick up an ancient Linksys WRT54GL or G2 G-router

 A little update.  I RMA'd the WRT310N and received another one.  I was sent a version 2, though the one I had was version 1; apparently the version 1 is the "better" version and more reliable 

At any rate, the second one set up fine and worked great initially; however, even after 3 days, it started to behave oddly again, mainly internet speeds slowly drifting down over time, which is fixed if you power-cycle the router but recurs every time.  

Doing some search, I found numerous posts about this same issue with this WRTXXX line.  Some reported better results after ditching the Linkysis firmware and flashing DD-WRT.  I flashed DD-WRT, and the router's been working great so far (fingers crossed).  Will report back if it holds up.

*Warning* Flashing the Linksys WRT310 with DD-WRT is not exactly trivial, so one must follow the steps carefully, but even after reviewing several different guidelines, I still had to work out a few kinks on my own..

In addition, I addressed the poor signal upstairs by buying a USB wireless N adapter with a large antenna.  Still not optimal but much better than before without the flexibility of placement and small antenna.

Oh, well, even after DD-WRT, my second Linksys WRT310N is still having wireless speed slowdown intermittently.  I have given up on Linksys support, since they refuse to do anything else other than sending me yet another WRT310N with me paying for shipping, which I already paid once for the first unit.  

I guess I'm stuck power cycling the Linksys after couple of days.  STAY AWAY from Linksys WRTXXX N routers, however cheap they sell them.  I hear their new E series routers are more stable; but you know who will never buy another Linksys to try finding out