Calling Netgear's support line was an adventure within itself. The call center is located in India. Don't call this place if you're on a noisy phone or don't have lots of time to waste. The first person I reached could barely speak english. He was obviously reading from a script, because when I explained that the router did not work, I had followed the troubleshooting guides and this was the result, etc, etc, he still started reading questions and asking me to connect it to a network and do silly tests. That's hard to do at work on your lunch break. He hung up very abruptly with the classic "Thank you for calling bye bye now. " Call #2. Another person, who could speak marginally better english. I went through his troubleshooting script, connecting my "router" to an "air" network. He decided that it was indeed not working (duh!) and gave me an RMA number. Ok. What, exactly, is a doofulfife? Well, it's 55 (double five.) He did explain to me that the dash (in the RMA number) is the little line on the keyboard, you may find it beside your number 0. O-kay!

Got the RMA (I think.) Returned it and received a refurb unit and stuck it aside. In the meantime, router #2 was in use. It died one day, about 3 months after purchase. Started forgetting IP addresses and not communicating with the printer. It got returned to the store it was purchased from, and Router #3 went into service. So far, it's worked for about 9 months. Router #4 is waiting, and will be the last one.

This is really a good piece of technology, it has just about everything you'd need to set up and protect a home or small office network. It runs extremely hot, which may be the reason it dies so quickly. Now, if only it was more reliable.

I regulary monitor my bandwidth speed using DSLreports.com and with the router I get 1900 bps and 2900 bps if I connect without the router. Big difference!

Another negative is that there is apparently a design flaw. They die in less than a year! Mine just died after 10 months.

Comments from other reviewers...
"the thing broke after 6 months of light usage"
"Ran it continually for a year. Then BANG, one day it died."
"bought my FM114P 10 months ago. It stopped working couple days ago"
"However, 11 months later the router failed"
"My FM114P failed after 8 months of operation"
"My only complaint: I've had mine die on me twice, each time after about 2-3 months of use."
"The first one I own died after 3 weeks...The second unit died after 6 weeks"
"my box died after only 2 month."

I think this router is very sensitive to power fluctuations. I'll put the Netgear's replacement router on my UPS - hopefully it'll get more stable and won't break again.

Gosh! this thing generates a ton of heat just sitting there, doing nothing!

This is a great product, when it works. I purchased this unit in Septerber 2002. Very easy to set up, great browser-based interface. I have past experience with the Netgear MR314 and the FM114P is more user friendly and less flaky. No problems getting the print server to work. Great wireless signal strength with the stock antenna. Ran it continually for a year.

Then BANG, one day it died.

Called tech support, got right on (no holding!), very friendly but a bit hard to understand (from India). They did some trouble shooting. Nothing worked. I got the old "My manager will have to call you back." I thought "Great, how long will that take." Got a call back in 3 minutes. Got my Return Material Authorization (RMA) without any argument, and I hope to have a new unit in a couple days. They also have a nice feature where for a couple extra bucks, they will express mail you a new unit, with a postage paid box, and then you mail back in the dead one after you get the new one.

Unfortunately, they will be sending me another FM114P. It seems like these things are good for about 6 to 12 months then they die. Netgrear should really discontinue this model and offer an upgrade or replacement with a model that does not have the same design problems. But great tech support, great capabilities, and high marks from a user-interface and capabilities standpoint.

I am quite pleased, so far, with how it works (granted I've only been using it for a week).

BUT - if you're using Windows XP, be prepared to figure out any problems by yourself. The support staff, via the web, could only quote the manual for me.

HINT: if you are using XP, DISABLE the XP firewall in the Network settings. Your computer won't be able to find the Printer Port on the FM114P, otherwise.

You're not going to need that Firwewall, anyway. The router IS a firwewall. I used to get upwards of 30-40 potentially harmful inbound events registered on my Personal Firewall software before using the Neatgear router. Now, I'm surprised if I see 3 to 5 (even with XP's Firewall shut off).

We have had intermittant lock-ups where the router simply stopped working and we had to reboot the router to continue connecting to the web.

We have had nothing but grief from the built-in print server, which likewise has sporadic failures requiring reboot. (We are looking at buying a separate print server to solve this problem.)

The wireless works OK, although the throughput seems quite variable.

Overall, I'm unimpressed, and will not likely buy any more Netgear products. Giving it a 2 may be a bit unfair; a 2.5 would be about right.