| D-Link DI-524 Wireless 54 Mbps High Speed Router (802.11g) |
 enlarge
|
Model: DI-524
Brand: D-Link
Manufacturer: D-Link
Average Rating: 
(submit your review here)
Total Reviews: 263
Form factor: External
Hardware platform: PC
Data link protocol: Ethernet, Fast Ethernet, IEEE 802.11b, IEEE 802.11g
|
|
|
| |
| Features: |
Share your Internet connection with built-in 4-Port switch
Compatible with 802.11g and 802.11b networks
Advanced Firewall and Security Controls
Built-in 4-Port SwitchOperating range of up to 328 feet indoors, up to 1,312 feet outdoors
Quick and easy set-up |
| |
| Description: |
| D-Link AirPlus G 802.11g Wireless Router - The DI-524 from D-Link can handle all of your networking needs. Utilizing the built-in 4-port 10/100 Ethernet switch, you can wire your computers together in the standard fashion, or you can go wireless with 802.11g technology. Transferring data through the air at up to 54Mbps! The router and built-in firewall portion of the DI-524 allows for easy & safe broadband Internet sharing. Advanced Firewall Features - NAT with VPN Pass-through (Network Address Translation) MAC Filtering IP Filtering URL Filtering Domain Blocking Scheduling Dimensions - 5.6 (l) x 4.3 (w) x 1.2 (h) Weight - 7.8 oz. |
| |
| User Reviews (263 total): |
|
Flakey, February 5, 2005
By user
Look, this is an OK product if you do not use heavy networking. If you play games or fileshare, you may have problems. I bought one for ~$20 after rebate, and I'm glad I did not spend and more on it. Mine will start the cycle of rebooting every 20 sec until I reset the thing. This was caused only during load from the wired side. This should not be a hard load for a wired connection to handle. You may want to consider a Linksys. It is worth the extra money.
|
Not ready for prime time, February 2, 2005
By user (Mission Viejo CA)
This product is simply not ready for market. As a product developer for over 25 years I know when a product is ready to go to market and this ain't it. This device is not plug and play by any stretch. Look forward to spending more in time tweeking this device than the original cost of purchase. There are thousands of complaints on Google at this time and I anticipate that retailers are going to stop carrying this if returns reach a threshold of pain.
|
Firmware Disaster, January 23, 2005
By user (U.S.A.)
Firmware version 1.05 doesn't work. The router hands out new DHCP addresses to every wireless device every few seconds, so obviously your connection will drop continuously like so many people have reported here. This isn't a fluke, it's a well-documented, reproducible problem that has been discussed at length on hardware forums like BroadbandReports.com. Flashing back to old firmware 1.03 solves it, but that version introduces another issue with buffer overflows when using P2P file sharing.
At the time of this review, 1.05 is the latest firmware version available. Incredibly enough, this horrible piece of broken code isn't a beta version, it's the final release that D-Link has been recommending for months. How a company can get away with this for so long is beyond me.
I rolled my DI-524 back to firmware 1.03 and it solved all my connectivity problems. I don't use P2P so it's actually working great for me now, which is why I gave it two stars instead of one. But I spent countless hours tearing my hair out to get to this point and D-Link tech support wouldn't admit the problem, so I can't recommend buying this, or any product, from this company. Knowing what I do now, I'd buy a Linksys instead.
|
Works well, but the wireless requires tweaking, January 21, 2005
By user (Houston, TX USA)
The "wired" part of this router works very well out of the box. The installation wizard runs smoothly and gets you on your way fairly quickly. It detected my SBC DSL configuration and I was on the internet within minutes. At the same time, I had just bought myself a new iBook G4, with an Airport Extreme 802.11g card. Getting the wireless to work was an excercise in frustration for a couple of hours. The documentation and online FAQ, as well as Google were all consulted to find a solution. What I ended up doing was disabling *all* security features in order to get any kind of connection at all, then re-enabling them one by one. In the end, it was the MAC address filter that was stopping the wireless connection from working. My configuration now has SSID broadcasting turned off and WPA-PSK turned on, for better security (this is called WPA Personal on the Airport configuration utility). In all, this device is a good deal, but take note of some of the gotchas noted in the other reviews.
|
Nice appearance; wireless connection full of bugs, January 14, 2005
By user (The Southern Tier, NY)
Purchased this router a week ago. The hard-wired connection works OK. However:
1) Try to change the password, then do a hardware reset; dont be surprised that admin password will not reset.
2) Encrypted Wireless connection worked for about two days; it stopped working shortly after; router is either not detectable or if it is, then you cannot log into it. Of course, you can disable encryption but then anyone near can use the connection.
3) Customer support when contacted, told me to downgrade the firmware from 1.05 to 1.03. It helped a little bit; I can connect occasionally via encrypted connection. Still, periodically router disconnects and I cannot reconnect.
4) When emailed support back and asked when is expected release of newer version of firmware; I got a reply with link to current version of firmware and suggestion of "not sending additional questions for this information"
So, if You're gone use this as a hard-wired connection router, it works good; its wireless capabilities I would not vouch for.
|
not for macs, probably not windows either, January 9, 2005
By user (chicago)
The signal fades away after about 20 minutes, Changing the channel does not help. It needs to be unplugged and plugged in again. This is a waste of money. I replaced it with airport express which works flawlessly. You get what you pay for. If you are having problems connecting to the internet, check out Jack Szwergold's review at the very end. Thanks Jack! This router did not work with my modem at all before following his instructions. Selling routers preset like this is a major screw up on d link's part. I called technical support and described my problem, and she did not even suggest this.
I will not purchase any products from them in the future, only from the apple store.
|
A very ordinary product, January 2, 2005
By user
This router required a lot of pampering to work, including downloading new firmware and manually setting the WAN port to 10 Mbps. It also requires a hard reset periodically (sometimes several times the same day). I'm not sure why I put up with it. It also reports that WEP is disabled when using the superior WPA encryption, suggesting that your network is unprotected. At least it supports WPA.
|
Router beset by bugs, December 28, 2004
By user (Natick, MA)
I purchased a DI-524 when first upgrading my network to 802.11g. While installation was easy, operation was abysmal - the router had compatibility problems with most of the other wireless systems I owned (These include a TiVo, Palm Tungsten C, an Airport Express for online music.) There were two major problems: First, the DHCP service constantly got into states where it would start handing out new addresses to any active client every 45 seconds - one minute. This had the effect of causing slow connections and lots of lost connections. This problem was particularly bad with my HP network printer, and print jobs would frequently fail or hang. The second problem (which may have been related to the first) was that it would frequently lost the ability to route between the wireless and wired network.
An amusing side effect of these were that the log file on the router would fill up constantly - I'd get two or three emails a day from the router documenting its frantic efforts to hand out DHCP addresses.
I ended up replacing the DI-524 with a Belkin F5D7230-4 after less than two months. The Belkin is a hands-down winner, both in terms of stability and features, like WDS and parental controls.
|
Get the Linksys wireless G - trust me, December 24, 2004
By user (The Middle of No Where)
First problem was ever time I rebooted my main comp the Internet connection was lost and I had to reset IE to default.
Second it wouldn't work with my old Gateway, not only was tech support worthless, they were vaguely insulting about my still using a PII.
So having been using a linksys wired router for the last 3 years, I decided to give them a shot. Everything set up and ran perfectly, all I did was sit there and watch.
spend a little more and get the linksys- you will be happy you did.
|
Incompatabilities, December 14, 2004
By user (Detroit, MI USA)
As long as the rest of your wireless equipment is DLink, you may never have a problem, but try using a cheaper non-DLink card and you quickly find out that you've been locked in. I've never had problems with the router, but it really narrows your choices when you're looking to use a cheaper h/w or share connectivity with non-DLink friends.
|
|
|
Don't buy this router!!, December 12, 2004
By user (NY)
Some guys here are giving review saying that other people don't know how to set up the router and so caused a lot of problems. This does not apply to my case. Although I'm not an expert, I do know something about the router hardware and parameters settings. I'm sure nothing was wrong with the settings. As said in my previous preview quoted below, connection drops out frequently and D-link tech support went through all the settings with me, trying with different sets of parameters without any success. Finally, they concluded that the hardware might have problem and I had to pay for the shipping to send it back to get a replacement. The story did not end here. The replacement router got exactly same problem. I contacted D-link again and this time they passed me to a product specialist. Still, he could not get the problem solved. However, he's willing to test the model himself and try to get a solution. I ended up waiting.
I borrowed a Belkin 54G wireless router from a friend and set up with exactly same settings as the DI-524. The Belkin worked for 5 days without any problems. No drop out at all. When I switched back to DI-524, same old problem came back. I reported this to the D-link specialist and he finally emailed me a new version of beta firmware 1.06 for me to try with.
Once the new firmware is loaded. There's no more connection drop out. It's been working for a week without any problems. So, if you are buying this router, remember to get the 1.06 beta firmware from D-Link or else you will experience drop out problems.
One last thing to note. The firware was dated a month before the first time I started complaining to D-link. So, why didn't they give me the firmware in the beginning so that I didn't have to go through that much trouble? This is why I still only give it a 4-star rating instead of 5.
============================
Original review quoted below
============================
It just doesn't work. Every thing was set up correctly with latest firmware loaded. However, it keeps reassigning IP addresses to every station every minute. That means link drops every minute (in worst case even every few seconds) and then try to reconnect. Sometimes it gets wild and just can't reconnect. Need to restart system to get connection again.
Tried with older version of firmware but that also had some other problems. Link broken every few hours and need manual reset every time to get back connection.
D-link support just keep telling me to try all that I had already tried. No solution.
|
Nice router, December 7, 2004
By user (St. Louis, MO USA)
I upgraded from a D-Link 802.11b router to this one. Works great. Set up is very similar--no trouble at all. Administration menus very straightforward. I'm using it in a mixed Mac OS X / Windows mixed -b and -g environment and having no problems.
|
It is simple and easy to use, November 16, 2004
By user (San Francisco, CA)
I bought this thing a couple of months back. I had learnt from a friend of mine that it is not a good router. However I could not resist the price at which it was available. THOUGH MY MAIL-IN REBATE HAS NOT REACHED ME EVEN AFTER TWO CALLS.
Anyways, I found this thing to be very simple and easy to use.
Simple English that we have learnt so far is good enough for the installation. I was a first time user so followed the book to the hilt and faced no issues. It is still running happily. I keep power cycling it (once a month) when I'm bored with nothing else to do. And I can catch the signal from my parking lot, don't ask me why i do that.
|
Works well for me, November 11, 2004
By user (Elizabethton, TN United States)
I just bought the Dl-524 along with DWL-G120 wireless USB adapter for my remote desktop and the DWL-G630 wireless cardbus adapter for my laptop. I already had an established -11b network with 3 desktops on land lines and 2 laptops and 2 desktops connected wireless. I switched out the old router with the new D-link and was up and working immediately. I went ahead and ran the wizard so my laptops would be ok with WEP and have had NO PROBLEMS. The signal for my desktop fluctuates between 24 and 54 mbps. The signal for my 2 laptops runs between 36 and 54 mbps (staying mostly between 48 and 54). My son's desktop that still is connected with an -11b usb adapter seems to run faster, as well. Overall, I'm very pleased. The reason for 4 stars instead of 5 is that the signal strength isn't rock solid at 54....but still way better than 11mbps.
|
I bought this to use while traveling, November 11, 2004
By user
This router is very small and weighs nothing. Its power adapter is hardly bigger than a normal plug. I keep it in my laptop bag and its come in very handy for setting up improptu networks during meetings or for use in hotel rooms. Never had any trouble configuring it but I always read the manual first.
|
Works for my simple setup, November 10, 2004
By user (Minneapolis, MN)
I gave this dlink d1-524 router 4 stars because it was easy to setup and configure. I also bought the D-Link DWL-G120 Wireless 802.11g USB Adapter for another desktop machine to go with this router. Only problem I encountered was after going through the setup instructions, I couldn't get a connection to the cable modem so I read the "troubleshooting" section. It instructed me to turn modem off for 2 minutes, turn router off, turn router on, etc. etc. After I did this it worked!
While I'm not a sophisticated user (i.e. multiple wireless clients, complex security setup needs), I would guess my setup is pretty average. For this type of user, I would recommend this router based on it's price and features (security). The user manual is very average and doesn't waste a lot of words explaining to novices what certain features are for. However, the bottom line I got my wireless network setup up on two boxes in less than 1 hour and IT WORKS! Good enough for me!
|
Lots of trouble making it work, poor web interface too, October 26, 2004
By user (Milwaukee)
I've used wireless equipment from Netgear and Belkin but this was my first experience with D-Link after a friend's glowing recommendation. It simply took too much time to get this unit set up, especially due to the counterintuitive web interface. I could never get the wireless capability to work completely--when any one of my three PCs would connect, the others wouldn't. It especially aggrivated me that I had to manually type in WEP keys rather than the unit generating them for me from a password.
I like that the unit is small, mountable, stackable, and attractive (as wireless routers go); has a removable antenna; and has a lot of advanced configuration features. But since I just couldn't make all my computers work with it I had to take it back. Unless you really need the advanced settings (which I doubt, e.g. wireless transmit power, fragmentation threshhold, beacon interval, preamble size...) or have previously had good luck with D-Link, I'd recommend Netgear or Belkin instead.
|
Rough beginning, October 23, 2004
By user
After a lot of hair pulling and trying to understand the minimalist instructions, I finally (for now) have this thing working. Setup was tough, unit did not want to communicate with my laptop and stopped transmitting entirely several times. I finally figured that it and SBC DSL don't like each other. Since I've deleted all SBC software it has been working great. Don't just uninstall the DSL connection software, search it out and delete it. I think that their software is like spyware and doesn't give up easily. Worked for me at any rate, after having tried everything I could think of and the booklet/help manual suggested. Hope this helps someone.
|
Drops PPPoE DSL Connection Every 20 minutes, October 19, 2004
By user (San Luis Obispo, CA USA)
I have a similar problem to what other users are reporting, it drops the connection every 20 minutes. I would downgrade to firmware 1.03 but that firmware made my FTP uploads extremely slow.
|
Buggy firmware makes 524 a poor choice, September 29, 2004
By user (Midwest US)
The 524 is seemingly a good alternative for sharing a cablemodem to multiple clients. However, ongoing problems with firmware that lead to multiple router reboots and configuration loss make this a router to avoid.
DSLReports contains listings from multiple users that indicate firmware release 1.05 to be buggy and unreliable, and certain security features don't work properly. Most users are encouraged to drop back to version 1.03. Both 1.05 and 1.03 firmware releases are available for download from the DLink website.
I've not been able to get the router to maintain its activity logs, time configuration, or even connections for much more than two minutes at a time. Two XP Pro wireless client report innumerable drop/reconnect events; that, combined with the loss of time configuration/log data suggest the router is perhaps not merely dropping connections, but crashing entirely.
Some pages of the internal router webserver don't even identify the correct product, listing the "514+" instead of "524." DLink's technical support has been only marginal helpful, with a promise to forward my debugging steps to their labs but with no return information.
Although I've had good luck with DLink products in the past, this is an exception. I'd have to encourage shoppers to look toward LinkSys or NetGear products as a more reliable alternative. As it is, the frequent reboots/reconnects make connection-dependent network applications, such as certain network games or email downloading, a practical impossibility.
Sad to say, but there are better wireless routers. The 524 is one to avoid.
David
|
|
|
| Copyright 2001-2008 NTReview.info |
|