Trendnet TEW-812DRU review
This excellent 802.11ac wireless router doesn’t cost too much but you can get more consistent performance for a little less money elsewhere
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The router also has network share (SMB) and FTP server features, which you’ll find in the Administrator settings and can use to share a USB hard disk connected to the port at the back, turning the router into a very simple NAS device. You can also share a USB printer, but will have to install the Windows-only Trendnet control utility on every system that wishes to access the printer.
We tested the router’s wireless performance with both our Centrino 2 reference laptop’s integrated wireless chipset and a £25 Trendnet TEW-805UB USB Wi-Fi adaptor. Using our laptop’s own wireless adaptor, which supports 802.11n 5GHz but not 802.11ac, our 5GHz test produced transfer speeds of 86.99Mbit/s at 1m and 82.33Mbit/s at 10m but the connection was unstable at 20m in our heavily congested testing environment. Our 2.4GHz test using the same internal adaptor gave us 41.3Mbit/s at 1m, 37.6Mbit/s at 10m and 15.9Mbit/s at 20m. When it tested it with the Asus PCE-AC68 PCI-E wireless adaptor, it achieved a transfer speed of 80.4Mbit/s at 20m, making it one of the fastest performers at this range.
With a clear interface, surprisingly low price, effective wireless performance and plenty of features, this is an excellent choice if you want to get into the world of high-speed Wi-Fi. However, BT Home Hub 5 maintained a more stable connection during some of the tests carried out in our interference congested wireless test environment.
Basic Specifications | |
---|---|
Rating | ***** |
Modem type | none |
802.11b support | yes |
802.11g support | yes |
Draft 802.11n support | yes |
Draft 802.11n 5GHz support | yes |
MIMO | yes |
Turbo mode | channel-bonding |
Stated speed | 1,300Mbit/s |
Security | |
WPA | PSK (TKIP, AES), RADIUS |
WPA2 | yes |
Firewall | yes |
MAC address filtering | yes |
DMZ | yes |
Physical | |
Size | 180x48x155mm |
Antennas | 6 |
Internal/external antennas | internal |
Upgradeable antenna | no |
Number of WAN ports | 1 |
Ethernet ports | 4 |
Ethernet connection speed | 10/100/1000Mbit/s |
Other ports | 1x USB |
Wall mountable | no |
Power consumption on | 8W |
Other Features | |
Dynamic DNS | yes |
Universal Plug and Play support | yes |
DHCP server | yes |
MAC spoofing | yes |
Port forwarding | yes |
WDS Support | yes |
USB device support | yes |
QoS | yes |
Buying Information | |
Price | £85 |
Warranty | three years RTB |
Supplier | http://www.dabs.com |
Details | www.trendnet.co.uk |