what router should i buy for my new place?

[fishjie]

Can someone point in the direction of a good router to buy for home? i'd want it to support wireless as well as wired. my new place is three floors, and i plan to have computers in all three. is draft n still crappy?

 

[JackMDS]

The general approach that I take for Coverage issues is the following.

The best way is to lay few CAT6 cables to central locations in the house, install Access Points, or Cable/DSL Routers configured as an Access Points ( Using a Wireless Cable/DSL Router as a Switch with an Access Point ), and connect them to the Main Router.

You do not want/can not/hate/your client hate to lay Cables.

You start with One affordable Router that can Do WDS (the reason for the WDS support is in case you need to add more Wireless hardware).

If you are lucky and your environment is conducive to get covered with one Wireless Router you are done.

Routers that can do WDS as is are old by (Zyxel, SMC, Belkin, and some others have models that do WDS as is out of the Box ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W...ss_Distribution_System ).

Linksys WRT54GL, and Asus, 520GU can do WDS when flashed with DD-WRT firmware ( http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/ind...title=DD-WRT_Docu_(EN) ).

Using a Laptop loaded with Netstumbler, do a Wireless survey in the house, http://www.netstumbler.com/downloads/

According to the Netstumbler's signal strength reading, identify spots that have strong signal. and spot with weak, or No signal.

Evaluate how you can cover the space and start placing WDS units.

Additional Wireless Routers in WDS Mode (Wireless Network - Configuration Modes. ) has to be placed in spots were the signal is good about Half way to the dead spots.

How many WDS units are needed? It depends on your specific environment (that is a good the reason to buying WDS units one at the time, try it, and decide on the Next step).

Otherwise.

Extending Distance - http://www.ezlan.net/Distance.html
Wireless Router as an AP - http://www.ezlan.net/router_AP.html
Wireless Modes - http://www.ezlan.net/Wireless_Modes.html
Wireless Bridging - http://www.ezlan.net/bridging.html
Hi Gain Antenna - http://www.ezlan.net/antennae.html

 

[sourceninja]

I have a 3 story house (basement, first, and second floor). I have a single linksys wireless g router at the top in my office. My house is shaped like a square and my office is on the top left hand corner. The total sq foot of the house is 3000 and I have full signal everywhere in the house. I can also pick up full signal from 3 different houses, one across the street, (in the front side of the house only) and both on my sides (anywhere in the house).

 

[kevnich2]

Depending on your house and other houses around you, one well placed wireless router may cover your entire house. Wireless is very condition specific. What works for person A may not work well or at all for person B. The major problem that I've seen isn't so much with houses but with apartments as they tend to have dozens of wireless signals in a dense area causes interference issues. If you are in a house, one wireless router may take care of it, a bigger older house may need a second wireless router in AP mode only placed on the other side of the house. If interference is a problem, look at 5ghz (802.11A & 802.11N) Just because a wireless router says it's N doesn't mean it's 5ghz so be careful. 802.11A is very reliable and also only runs on 5ghz but the signal doesn't penetrate as well as 2.4ghz, however.

 

[fishjie]

Originally posted by: sourceninja
I have a 3 story house (basement, first, and second floor). I have a single linksys wireless g router at the top in my office. My house is shaped like a square and my office is on the top left hand corner. The total sq foot of the house is 3000 and I have full signal everywhere in the house. I can also pick up full signal from 3 different houses, one across the street, (in the front side of the house only) and both on my sides (anywhere in the house).

yeah, i'm in a 3 story town home. mines more like a rectangle. my office will be on the bottom floor.

there are like 8 other wireless networks i detect, so i wonder if all that noise will be an issue?