Linksys Wireless N Notebook Adapter review

Verdict:

Review Date: 18 Apr 2007

Price when reviewed: inc VAT

Reviewed By: Chris Finnamore

Our Rating 1 stars out of 5

Review
Specs

The Linksys Wireless N Broadband Router's setup wizard uses diagrams to guide you through the setup process, and the instructions are very clear.

However, even though the router was plugged into our test PC with an Ethernet cable, the setup wizard couldn't find it and refused to continue the setup. We had to quit the wizard and use the router's web setup to configure the wireless network. The web-based interface is logical and has plenty of online help.

Transferring files to and from our Centrino notebook was slow at first, but improved greatly once we switched to channel one. The Linksys Wireless N gave the best overall performance in the Centrino tests. It managed 21.51Mbit/s at 1m, 20.8Mbit/s at 15m and a particularly quick 11.66Mbit/s at 25m.

Unfortunately, we had less success with the CardBus and PCI adaptors. The router wouldn't hold its connection at the default settings, but after a lot of fiddling with the wireless channels and a couple of firmware updates we managed to get a stable connection. It was still slow to transfer files, managing just 16.03Mbit/s at 1m and 14.62Mbit/s at 15m with the CardBus adaptor and 13.48Mbit/s and 7.71Mbit/s with the PCI card. This is far slower than the other Draft-N routers and even slower than the Linksys router's own 54g speeds.

It's a shame that the Linksys Wireless N Broadband Router's Draft-N mode is so poor, as it is fast and has plenty of range in 54g mode. If you have a Centrino notebook, this long-range performance could be worth the price - just ignore the Draft-N facility.

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