Netgear HR314 Cable/DSL 802.11a High-Speed Wireless Router

Speed, easy access, and protection - you can count on all three when you install this NETGEAR's Cable/DSL 802.11a High-Speed Wireless Router. Data transfer at blazing speeds of up to 54 Mbps or even 72 Mbps in "turbo mode" puts your business in the fast lane. You'll not only experience speedier file transfers, but you can share your broadband Internet connection, files and printers with up to 253 computers! This high-performance router lets you extend your existing Ethernet network to remote locations within the building with all the ease of wireless connectivity. It gives users the freedom to roam throughout the office and stay connected to the corporate network. At the same time, you can be assured of total privacy with NAT routing protecting your computers and your network against hackers. There's also a free and complete Freedom Anti-Virus and privacy software bundle included to provide additional protection for your network. And your optimized network will be up and running in minutes - Smart Wizard and Install Assistant help to make setup fast and easy.

1 Piece of Junk
I just bought one of these and right out of the box it didn't work in wireless mode. Fails POST. It appears to be a very cheap WAP attached to a very nice wired router. After reading the reviews here, and reviews about their use of offshore technical support (sending american jobs to India). I would urge people to aviod this router and netgear in general.

2 It Does have it flaws but it stills works for me!!
Ok when I first got the Netgear HR314 I played around with it on my wired network. Now I have 5 computer systems 4 wired and one wireless thats in another room. Now when I connected it to my cable modem and to my wired systems I had no problems, but the issue came when I tried connecting the wireless system. This was a problem. My network was two rooms away from the wireless system so its obvious I did not receive a connection. So after trying a whole day of unsuccessful tests my instructor at school give me a few ideas, so I tried them and they didn't work. But I found out that the signal must be strong not to mention you must not be around intefearence when trying to connect for the first time. Now this goes also if you set your connection and then you reboot your system and come back on thinking your going to connect which will not work unless the router is in the room, So I suggest you get a wireless access point and put it in the middle of all the areas you work at. Plus keep your router in a cool area away from heat cause that is your problem when your system acts a fool on connection. Also sit your router up in an elevated area that will help your connection also it will keep it cool a lil bit. Then beware of walls or metal walls that block you from your connection cause it will degrade your signal. This is what has helped me and if you don't have an access point between your network and the wirless computer then you need one that way you can shut your system down and not worry about going through the long setup trying to get a signal again just bootup and your connected. Also the price on this is wrong it is not a 100 dollars or more it's more like 40 dollars from Tigerdirect.com so go there and look for all your computer peripherals cause thats where I have been shoppin for my equipment.

3 HR314
I have had this product for 2 months now, I have had no problems with it, the set up was extreamly easy. My only complaint, which I should have known, is that the signal degrades fast, especially thrue walls(due to it opperating at the 5MHz band). In the same room I get a 54Mb/sec connection, 40ft and two walls away I get a 6Mb/sec connection, which is fine for web surfing (Roadrunner = 1.5Mb/sec). I just have to bring the laptop into the room with the router for file transfers.

4 Shame on you, Netgear
I bought my HR314 wireless router and Netgear WAB501 dual mode wireless pc-card in April, 2003. I wanted to equip my laptop so that I may browse internet anywhere in the house.

At the time, I decided to go with Netgear because it was a reputable company and offer great value to its products. Of course, my opinion toward its products and services changed after my problem with HR314. Stay tuned.

On paper, HR314 offers a great set of technical features that will do great for any home network. It offers 4 LAN port and a wireless access point. It supports 802.11a (5GHz) protocol that allows transfer rate of ~50 Mbps at normal mode and 108 Mbps at turbo mode.

I liked that fact that it operates at 5 GHz range so that my microwave or my neighbor's cordless phone will not interfere with my router. Of course, I later learned it interfered with my wife's cell phone. :-( Furthermore, I like the fact it offers up to 108 Mbps with its turbo mode. I figured it is also as good as a T100 connection.

The installation of the router was very simple and straight forward. Just plugged in my desk top to its LAN port configured it (via its router web page at 192.168.0.1) according to its user guide, and there it went. Installation of my WAB501 pc-card was also a breeze. Just installed its driver, plugged in to my laptop, and it started to connect to my rest of home network.

After everything was set up, I walked around the house with my laptop and monitor transmission signal strength and expected transfer rate reported by WAB501 configuration utility tool. I noticed that transfer rate suffered quickly as I moved away from the router. Transfer rate dropped from 108 Mbps to 50 Mbps when I moved from my study (where router was located) to my kitchen/bedroom that is about 30 feet away. Keep in mind, for internet browsing, 50 Mbps was not bad at all. I could not get any signal if I moved my laptop to basement, even though it was still about 30 - 40 feet away from router. I guess wireless signal does not travel downward. :-? One more thing, HR314 runs hot and is a noisy little guy (electronic humming noise).

I was happy with the product for 4 months, and my trouble with HR314 started two weeks ago. It just would not connect with my WAB501. It first stucked in reset mode. According to its router configuration page, the access point was always "rebooting". I later found out that this problem only occurs after the unit is powered up for a few hours.

Right away, I called Netgear's technical support. It was busy and I left a message for it to call me back. After a few hours, someone actually called me back. That was a pleasant surprise. After trying a few things, the technical support gave me a RMA# and asked me to send the unit to its service center. I wrote down the instructions and quickly sent the unit out. After a week, it came back. I wish the story stops here, but it doesn't. Sigh...

I was very happy to see my HR314 to come back so soon. I right away connected it to my computers. The unit was no longer stuck at reset state. Good. I turned on my laptop and checked if WAB501 could connect to the router. Yes, great. As soon as I opened a web page from the laptop, I noticed a big problem. The connection transfer rate is now only 5 kbps. That is 10,000 times slower than before! Appearantly, its service center didn't perform a full diagnostic on the unit.

I called the technical support right away. After working with me for a long time, the technical support decided the problem was not of HR314. It believed that my computer configuration slowed down the transfer rate. What a nonsense! I could connect my laptop with a wired connection to my network and worked just fine.

I continued to work with the HR314 and WAB501 for another couple days, even reloading Win2K on my laptop, and this is what I learned.

1. HR314 stucks in rest mode after being powered for a few hours.
2. HR314 configuration web page becomes inaccessible after using it for an hour.
3. Transfer rate reported by the WAB501 configuration utility does not reflect the actual tranfer rate.
4. Its wireless access point becomes unstable and reboot frequently.

I am still trying to work with Netgear technical support on this problem, and I hope it will finally resolve this problem for me, but I will not get my hope up. It is likely that I have bought a $150 paper weight.

5 Replacement unit also proved defective
The issue both times was that the WAP functionality was not working at all. The test light was on steadily. The replacement unit did not work at first, then I upgraded to firmware v1.2 and it did work. A day later I upgraded to firmware v1.4.2 and the test light again would not go off (i.e. as far as the implications for the WAP component, it said "AP is now rebooting" forever).
The non WAP components worked fine.
It looks like basic unit testing is not performed on these routers as they leave the factory in China. It boggles my mind that such simple tests as powering on the unit and watching the
test light are not being done and retailers are shipping defective routers. In my opinion there is a bug in the firmware
but instead of getting a fix, you're more likely to get a RMA number.

The support lines were unreachable in the first week of 09/2003.
"Due to heavy call volume we cannot answer at this time, try again later" was a message I heard at least thrice at different times of the day/evening. 24/7 support is being handled in India and the quality of the lines, as well as the competence of the staff leave much to be desired. I've worked in the areas of networking (including routers, switches, etc.) for over 10 years, and from the support calls I gather that 1st level support lack even basic understanding of this product. They did not even ask me to reset the unit to factory defaults, and sounded upset that I've tried to upgrade the firmware (as if this is proscribed)!!
I am not a happy customer.

6 Hotmail nor Yahoo would work thru the router
The Hr314 was a breeze to setup but wouldnt let me access my hotmail nor yahoo accounts through my DSL. I downloaded the latest firmware and am still in the throes of dealing with customer support on how to resolve this issue. Seems the model MR814 also had a similiar problem with that router. Buyer beware.