| Linksys-Cisco WRT54GL Wireless-G Broadband Router (Compatible with Linux) |
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Model: WRT54GL
Brand: Linksys
Manufacturer: Linksys
Average Rating: 
(submit your review here)
Total Reviews: 321
Form factor: External
Hardware platform: PC
Data link protocol: Ethernet, Fast Ethernet, IEEE 802.11b, IEEE 802.11g
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| Features: |
Firewall - SPI
VPN Support - Yes
VPN Passthrough - Yes |
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| Description: |
| The Linksys WRT54GL Wireless-G Broadband Router combines the functionalities of three devices into a single device, a wireless access point, a four-port full-duplex 10/100 Mbps switch and a router. The wireless access point lets you connect Wireless-G or Wireless-B devices to the network while the switch connects your wired-Ethernet devices together. The router function ties it all together by letting your whole network share a high-speed cable or DSL Internet connection. The push button setup feature makes it easy to configure your wireless devices. The router serves as a DHCP server, includes an SPI firewall to protect against Internet intruders and also supports VPN pass-through. The WRT54GL even features TKIP and AES to protect your data and privacy with up to 128-bit encryption. With the Linksys Wireless-G Broadband Router at the center of your home or office network, you can share a high-speed Internet connection, files, printers and multi-player games with flexibility, speed, security and simplicity. Status Indicators - Port status, link activity Compliant Standards - FCC IEEE 802.3, IEEE 802.3U, IEEE 802.11b, IEEE 802.11g Data Link Protocol - Ethernet, Fast Ethernet, IEEE 802.11b, IEEE 802.11g Interfaces - 1x network - Ethernet 10Base-T/100Base-TX - RJ-45 ( WAN / DMZ ), 4 x network - Ethernet 10Base-T/100Base-TX - RJ-45, 1 x network - Radio-Ethernet Dimensions - Height 4.8 cm x Depth 20 cm x Width 18.6 cm Weight - 0.5 kg |
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| User Reviews (321 total): |
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All a wireless network at home with a single apparatus. Good-bye to the cables., November 17, 2007
By user (Miami, FL, USA.)
I am very happy with my new one router, I had seen these apparatuses but never had been able to have one. Not even that were so useful.
Very easy to configure. I could not install it with the CD that brings, but since in the browser is very easy and in few minutes this installed.
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Linksys Wireless G Broadband, November 14, 2007
By user (Florida)
This router has worked correctly from the moment I opened the box. Very easy user set up. Signal is excellent all throughout my home.
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Easy setup, good range, works with all my Macs, November 13, 2007
By user (San Jose, CA USA)
I purchased this unit a few months ago and have had a very good experience with it so far. The setup is easy and the signal strength is good from one end of my house to the other, and into the front yard. (It's a small house, but still...)
I use this router with both PCs and with Macs, as well as a laser printer with Ethernet. Everything works perfectly.
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Setup Essentials - What They Don't Tell You, November 10, 2007
By user (Kansas)
Firstly, Linksys support was Outstanding! Maybe because it was 10:30am in India... but the guy I spoke with knew his stuff. Bypass the installation CD. Go into the Router setup program (Type [...] into your browser address bar). Leave name blank, type Admin as your password. Once in the Router setup program, type in a new SSID name, then change security to WEP (it sets WPA as a default), the set a string of numbers in the KEY 1 field. (This will serve as your security password.) Save settings. I also disabled IEEE 802.1x authentication in the authentication tab of Local Area Connection Properties.
For remote locations, disable the Linksys or Dlink or whatever little monitoring Icon on the right and let Windows establish your wireless connection.
Really. It was that simple. (If I missed a step, I'll try to return here and edit.) Connection has been stable and fast (36 to 48 mbps) since I followed his advice. And I'm 75 feet and up and around stairs away. Other reviews will reveal the upgrades this router is capable of.
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Horrible customer support, November 5, 2007
By user
I had this unit for about six months. The set up was quite complicated but after several days of email to Linksys, some of which included incorrect steps for setting up the router, I managed to get it set up. It worked great for six months and then stopped working entirely. After two days of trying to deal with their tech support, they determined the router was defective. They however refused to replace it or make good on the warranty -- which is a 1 year warranty. I tried to get beyond the person I was talking with at their customer service line and she actually refused to connect me with anyone else. I would never buy a Linksys product again after the way they treated me. Be warned. They do not value customers at all. If you have any problems with a Linksys product, don't expect to have any recourse.
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Good Range, October 31, 2007
By user (Kansas)
Works as advertised.
I located the router in a 2'nd story window and am receiving wifi all throughout the house as well as in another building on the property that is about 500' away and on the other side of a fenceline/treeline.
Granted, I only get 1-2 bars of reception in the outbuilding, but it is steady and throughput is as fast as my DSL bandwidth allows. I'm actually using wireless B USB adapters rather than G, just because they are cheaper. No problems. It did take me about 3 hours to get things set-up but it was only my 2'nd wireless router to hook-up, so I'm a newbie.
UPDATED**I am now getting 500' range with 4 of 5 bars typically after making a parabolic reflector (google TechAnvil, also on youtube). I am using aluminum flashing (sheet aluminum) as the aluminum foil didn't work for me. Very pleased with performance. Glad I didn't spend the extra money for wireless N.
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Great out of the box and even better when customized, October 29, 2007
By user (Maine)
I'm purchasing my 5th unit today. With my son doing the Linux programming, 4 nonprofits now have custom wireless setups. Whether it is multiple subnets or custom firewall rules, this unit has the extra memory needed to make it happen. Lots of info at [...].
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Easy upgrade to dd-wrt, October 29, 2007
By user (Ann Arbor, MI USA)
This is the simplest router to upgrade to dd-wrt, which adds many high-end features to this cheap router. I find that it is often necessary to hit the reset button at the end of the install, and that all is fine thereafter.
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I love the stability!, October 25, 2007
By user (Bellevue, WA, USA)
I got this router solely because of the -L at the end. "Compatible with Linux" means that you can install your own Linux-based operating system onto the router, which is what I did. I installed DD-WRT, and the router has been working well ever since. It's never crashed (unlike the stock firmware), and has never been slow.
True, installing custom firmware takes a bit of time, but if you want a stable router, get this one. It's not much more expensive than WRT54G, but you'll be happier with it if you ever use your network extensively.
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Great little router, October 18, 2007
By user
Great router, just flash up with DD-WRT generic image, and you have a rocking powerful router.
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Turns into an enterprise vpn solution with DDWRT, October 17, 2007
By user (Boca Raton, FL)
using ddwrt and openvpn, this $60 item, with lots of wiki reading (not for the technically challenged) has been turned into a vpn server that works as well as my usual cisco vpn setups, but with more options and overall a more robust connection, tcp tunnel over udp, aes-256, listening port is 443 udp, adds an additional HMAC signature to all SSL/TLS handshake packets for integrity verification. feeling up to the challenge?
[...]
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Good Router, October 16, 2007
By user (MA USA)
This is a good product. Works great. Provides excellent connection strength in any room of my house. It was a little hard for me to set it up at first, but once it was set I have not experienced any problems.
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Great product, October 11, 2007
By user (Wilton, NH)
I bought it for a small business environment to sit between a Microsoft SBS 2003 server and the DSL modem. The modem / router supplied by the ISP had firmware of limited flexibility and some bugs so it was relegated to act purely as a modem and all the smart stuff like NAT and port forwarding is now done by the WRT54GL.
I installed the DD-WRT firmware (yes, that does void the warranty).
I really can't find anything to complain about the WRT54GL.
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Not Vista Friendly, October 10, 2007
By user (San Diego, CA USA)
After countless vain attempts (with and without Link-Sys tech support) to get this router to work with our new laptop, we finally got a customer service rep who told us this router was not Windows Vista friendly. Nothing more to say...
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Awesome with DD-WRT firmware, October 9, 2007
By user
If you know what you are doing, you can turn this into a near-enterprise-class beast of a router. This is a nerd's dream. I have openVPN up an running and can now VPN into my home network from anywhere, with very tight security. Unfortunately, if you don't want to play with it, it is really only an average router for the price due to Linksys's firmware having poor support for P2P sharing, and other applications with many open connections, not to mention not supporting all of the advanced features DD-WRT provides.
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Their Best So Far!, October 7, 2007
By user (United States)
worth the upgrade? probably. a perfect router? not even close.
Out of the box:
A great router for every day users, I am sure. For bittorrent and other high powered users, this still doesn't cut it. It handles massive amounts of connections far far better than previous linksys routers, but still no where near perfect, I can squeeze about 300 simultaneous connections out of this thing before it barfs - that's about 3 times the previous linksys routers I've used, but still not acceptable in my books.
-Edit-
My poor review had 1 out of 5 votes for being helpful, so i felt the need to add this section, which I thought went without saying:
With DD-WRT firmware:
Router works very well with DD-WRT firmware, as expected. But the product still deserves its meager 2 stars, because you should not have to void your warranty and rely on free third party tools to make a product usable.
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Awful support, bad firmware if you want security. Avoid!, October 5, 2007
By user (USA)
WPA does not work out of the box. Installing third-party firmware doesn't fix the problem and also voids the warranty. Unless you want to go in circles with very narrowly trained tech support reps, avoid! You will be blamed for any malfunction.
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Linksys-Cisco WRT54GL Wireless-G Broadband Router, October 1, 2007
By user (NJ, USA)
This router is great. Had to call the company though for setup, but to my amazement, service was matched with product. It took about an hour to setup the home network and whole time customer service person from the Linksys stayed with me on the phone and walked me thru step by step setup. Great product, great service.
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The ultimate in mod-able routers, September 29, 2007
By user
Linksys's WRT54GL router is, to paraphrase "Penny Arcade," the FUTURE PAST. While including some of Linksys's latest hardware improvements, the WRT54GL router uses a Linux proprietary system, allowing for upgrades to third-party firmware such as the ever-popular DD-WRT. These firmware allow for the router's gain to be amplified, allowing a larger coverage area, and even for the router to be used as a gateway--a great way to network game systems such as the XBox 360 and PS3 without purchasing wireless upgrades or dealing with the PS3's sometimes sub-par wireless performance. The only downside of this router is its price: it is $15 more than the latest WRT54G upgrade, and DD-WRT and other third-party firmware is also compatible with older revisions of the WRT54G hardware.
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good router, September 26, 2007
By user (il,usa)
i got this router for one and only reason that in future i'm going to install a open source software in that. one important thing that i noticed is WRTP54G(i got from vonage for my voip) doesn't support vpn which very much killed my enthusiasm and immediately disliked any linksys product because my other dlink router supports vpn. i was very apprehensive when i bought this, but to my delight i can do vpn.
i haven't had time to play with this router yet, so i don't what else i can do with this
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