| Netgear WGR614 54 Mbps 2.4 GHz Cable or DSL Wireless Router |
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Model: WGR614
Brand: Netgear
Manufacturer: Netgear
Average Rating: 
(submit your review here)
Total Reviews: 712
Operating system: Windows
Form factor: External
Hardware platform: PC
Data link protocol: Ethernet, Fast Ethernet, IEEE 802.11b, IEEE 802.11g
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| Features: |
Router
WGR614
4 port
54 Mbps
Wireless |
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| Description: |
| Netgear WGR614 802.11g Wireless Router with 4-Port Switch - The amount of homes with high-speed Internet access and multiple computers is growing steadily. Wouldn't it be nice to share that high-speed Internet connection with all of the computers in your home? Wouldn't it be great to also share files between your computers? And wouldn't it be amazing if you could do all of that wirelessly!? Well you can, with this 802.11g Wireless Router. Just add optional 802.11g, or 802.11b, adapters to each computer, connect your modem, run through the easy installation process, and you're ready to go. It even supports the slower 802.11b wireless protocol for increased compatibility. VPN pass-through |
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| User Reviews (712 total): |
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a big mistake, January 20, 2005
By David Douglass (Bloomingdale, NJ)
This thing loses connectivity almost every day. Your PC tells you no signal. The only solution is to reboot the router, which means cycling the power. With no switch on the unit you have to disconnect and reconnect the power line. Ugh!
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Does not last, January 19, 2005
By Gaurav (NJ, USA)
I bought this in March 2004. It worked great for the first couple of months. Then started to require a reboot once in a while and eventually stopped working. I called the warranty hotline, after more than an hour of trouble shooting he agreed that the product is bad and needs to be replaced. However, I was expected to pay for the shipping which was an additional $14.99. The new piece which I got worked for only a couple of weeks before going bad. I do not want to spend another $14.99 for shipping or something being sold at $30. Very bad, I would recommend buying something more reliable.
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Great stable router with easy setup, January 17, 2005
By T. Gustafson (Minneapolis)
After having upgraded from the SMC2662W, this router has been fantastic. My main area of concern is quality and consistency of the wireless signal and this unit has not yet dropped a connection in over a week and a half. Administration is very straightforward and as stated before the set-up was very easy with no hitches. I did not have to use the included CD-ROM at all and it ships with a nice guide detailing all the steps to getting it going.
Great router and a great price!
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Terrible Unit!!!, January 14, 2005
By Deena Duran (Miami, FL)
The unit that I ordered is completely useless. It reboots itself and must be reconfigured over and over throughout the course of the day. Netgear's only solution was that I pay to ship the item back and wait 2 weeks for the exchange unit :-( , or to pay more for the item than it is worth to get a replacement in 2-3 days.
Tech Support advised me that my router was defective. I would not only not buy this item, but I'll never buy from Netgear again!! TRY ANOTHER BRAND.....
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Unreliable, January 11, 2005
By A. Janecek
Since purchasing this router, it has continuously lost internet connection at various times.
I always thought it was some setting that I missed but after doing some research, many other WGR614v2 users have the same problem.
I have to powercycle the router at least once every two days, at most, once a day.
The thing cost me $100 when I buught it and it's given me trouble ever since. Netgear support is no help.
This is the first and last product I buy from Netgear!
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Forget customer service from these folks, January 11, 2005
By Jeff P. (Durham, NC USA)
This thing installed OK per the brief cheat sheet included, but then when I tried to configure security I found that the instructions simply didn't work. Not even close. URLs listed in the docs resulted in DNS errors or 404s. Called tech support once, navigated through the endless prompts and when I finally got dumped in the support queue, I was disconnected within a few seconds. I foolishly tried again, navigated through all the junk again, and was *almost* in the queue when a recorded message announced that "we're sorry, your call cannot be completed as dialed. Please check the number and try again." There's merely indifferent customer service and merely mediocre documentation out there, and then there's Netgear. What a joke.
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this router is a POS, January 8, 2005
By Josias Braganza
Like many others, first crack at the router was easy and simple. Plugged it in and worked. After a month or so, it got buggy, and eventually, could not access its setup page. It's been sitting there since collecting dust as I've given up with netgear's product support. Fast forward to a month ago and bro arrives with another wgr614 v4. Same thing, works great then dies on you. Bro, a google systems/network manager, worked for hours on end trying to troubleshoot, but unfortunately, to no avail. NETGEAR, WHEN WILL YOU HELP US?!??!?!?!? I say we band together, spread the word, and bring down Netgear!
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No problems whatsoever, January 7, 2005
By mdchachi (USA)
I've had this router (WGR614v3) for about 10 months now. Setup was a breeze and I haven't had any problems whatsoever since. I don't use its wireless capability on a daily basis but when I do pull out the laptop I have never had a problem taking it to the places I've wanted to go such as upstairs, outside on deck or in the garage. I don't "fix" things if they aren't broke so I haven't tried upgrading the firmware and am still running on ver 2.11.
Note there are actually five versions of this router each with its own chipset and different firmware. That might partially explain why there is such a variety of experiences.
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Get Something Else!, January 6, 2005
By James Igoe (NY, NY)
Purchased what seemed like a good wireless router, but eventually the performance dropped, pages timed-out etc. I scoured the internet, but found that my particular model, the v4, has persistent problems, and neither the company nor anyone else had a fix for it. Eventually I replaced it with a Linksys WRT54GS. Not a problem since.
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easy to use, but "buggy", January 3, 2005
By joel (Chicago)
This was my first router, and I found the configuration menus on this product to be easy to use, with nice detailed descriptions of options. HOWEVER, as some of the other reviews have hinted, it is often necessary to reset (power cycle) the router. Either DHCP fails at the beginning of a session, or it cuts out during operation. Assigning fixed IP addresses to local computers helps, but it will still cut out from time to time. Latest firmware upgrade seems to make things a bit worse. (outsourced firmware? haha)
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Easy set up, good price, works great, January 2, 2005
By S. Denzer (Marshall, MN USA)
I finally install wide band for my home office computer and wanted to be able to give my kids the advantage of a high speed connection as well. I hooked up the router to my cable connection, turned on the computer, and was taken to a website that set up the router. I didn't even have to load software! I then took another five minutes to install the Netgear adapter, which I purchased at the same time as the router, on the kids' computer. I did have to load the software for the adapter, but it was a snap. Now the kids are transfering date at 48-54 Mbs.
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Terrible support, January 1, 2005
By John Costello
I bought this so the Ipac I gave my wife for Chritmas would have internet and email anywhere in our and haven't been able to get it to work yet. I suspect it is because of the DSL issues others are reporting. My biggest problem with Netgear now is their complete lack of product support. Many emails have gone unanswered and the tech support phone number has hung up each of the two dozen or so times I have called it....all without speaking to a human. I plan on returning it Monday.
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Constantly resetting this router, December 29, 2004
By R. Torres (Worcester, MA USA)
There is something wrong with the DHCP server on this router. Even after upgrading to the latest firmware, the DHCP server constantly drops the IPs from my computers. I can be in the middle of surfing, playing games over the net or even mid-download, the DHCP server will attempt to renew and drop the internet connection. The LAN will still be operational, but the internet will suddenly be inacccessible. The support page only offers "reset everything..." which is ludicrous. A person should not have to constantly return to the router to reset it manually. I end up resetting the router 3-4 times a day.
I had a Linksys 802.11b router and gave it away to my brother when I upgraded to G. I seriously regret that now. This Netgear is the most finicky/exasperating router I have ever encountered. I will never buy from Netgear again, and will now spend more money for a new Linksys g rouiter.
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What a piece of junk!, December 25, 2004
By shanamc (Sacramento, CA USA)
I bought version 4 of this router and had troubles from the very start. First, the range was terrible. I live in a two-story house and although I expected the signal strength to be somewhat degraded in the upstairs portion of the house, it was continually dropping the connection. Within the first 24 hours, I had to reset the entire network because it had stopped working altogether. Finally, I could not get it to work at all -and this was after only having it for less than a week. Tech support was horrible. Netgear contracts with computer techs in India, and in addition to having trouble understanding the accents, it was not unusual to be put on hold for up to an hour before somebody would pick up. I finally gave up and bought a Linksys router. (Model # WRT54GS) What a difference! The range and signal strength is fantastic, I had it up and running out of the box within 5 minutes, and I have yet to experience a dropped connection. After this experience, I will never buy another Netgear wireless product again. Save yourself some time and aggravation and go with Linksys.
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Very poor quality, December 23, 2004
By L. Huynh (San Francisco, CA USA)
I had problems with this router the moment I got it home. I had to use the 90-day free customer service line 5 times in the first 3 months of having the router. Then on the fourth month, the router died for no apparent reason. Then I had to pay to send the router back to Netgear to get a replacement. I will never purchase another Netgear product.
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Terrible product, worse customer service, December 22, 2004
By Phil
This product lasted for about a month before one of the four ports failed and had to be returned to the company. In the short period of time that I owned it, it worked very poorly. Although the setup was easy, the range was poor with a useful range of less than thirty feet. I spent several hours on technical support with less-than-knowlegeable people trying to resolve the problem of poor range and apparent interference. After exchanging the product for a new one (at the recommendation of tech support people), I had the same problem. A few weeks later, one of the ports failed and technical support directed me to return the product to Netgear. I returned it three months ago and have not received the unit back nor have I heard a word from the company. This is a bad product from a company with poor customer service.
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Only good for basic routing, December 18, 2004
By J. Wu
I chose this Netgear product over other brands simply because in the past, Netgear products have always worked flawlessly. Nowadays however, Netgear's routers seem to be degrading in quality and the WGR614 is no exception. I recently purchased a version 5 and while it is good for basic routing, any complex addition to a network will cause this router to malfunction (e.g. adding a network printer).
I've talked to tech support over 2 days and the only solution they can give me is that my network printer is at fault however as soon as I tried using a Linksys WRT54G, my network works as expected.
If all you need is to route a couple computers together with no extra features, this product should suffice. Otherwise, look elsewhere, especially the Linksys products.
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6 months and died - a far cry from my trusty RT-314..., December 15, 2004
By Jay Lewis (Mililani, HI USA)
The sad thing about this is that it's only 6 months old and it went brain-dead while I'm deployed to Afghanistan with the Army. I thought I would have better luck than the dozens of other reviewers that had this router die on them, but I was mistaken. I had a Netgear RT-314 router that ran continuously for nearly 5 years without failing before going wireless with this router, so I'm really bummed that Netgear would produce such a problem-ridden router that so many people are dissatisfied with. I replaced it with a Cisco SOHO 91 to get my family back on line reliably until I return home in 6 months. When the replacement WGR614 comes in I'll just use it as an access point to get rid of the cable I had to run to my son's room, but I'll keep that cable standing by for when the replacement dies in 6 months again.
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Easy To Set Up, Secure, December 14, 2004
By woofboo (Eatontown, NJ)
I have installed this wireless router twice in home networks and had no problems with the router itself. I did have a little trouble connecting it in my friend's house because they have AOL and it took several calls to get the correct information from their tech support. Setting it up for comcast cable internet was a breeze, as the default settings for the router work.
What gives this router five stars is how easy it is to add security measures to your wireless network. You gain access to all the settings through your web browser by going to a special IP address. This allows you to add WEP encryption and MAC address filtering so that only the people who are supposed to get internet access from your access point are able to do so.
The firewall capabilities of the router are a little weak because it doesn't allow you to configure the ports that specific activities occur on. I don't know enough about other routers to say if that's actaully a weakpoint or if it's about standard, though.
This router does allow you to log the web activity of specific computers on your network, which could come in handy to monitor your child's internet habits. It also allows you to block keywords and specific websites to protect your children.
...and it looks nice too.
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Good set of features, unreliable, horrible RMA service., December 4, 2004
By Loka (Florida)
First of all, I used to be a Netgear fan. WGR614, just like MR814 has the exact set of features I ever needed. Unfortunately, the product died (now it would not even power up - even though I've got a surge protector) a month after I've got it. Shipped it to the RMA center overnight, and haven't got back for three weeks. Keep calling them every other day, and every time they say that the product was on backorder, but they will ship it overnight today. Needless to say, they don't keep their word.
Lesson learned.
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