Netgear's WNDR3800 Router Now Available Worldwide, Offers Clear Channel Selector

Posted 08/30/2011 at 10:35am | by Brad Chacos

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We weren’t impressed with the Netgear WNDR4000, to say the least. The router’s bizarre naming conventions (we’re still not sure what to call it, exactly) and dubious 750 Mbps speed claim raised our hackles, plus, the older WNDR3700 blew it away in benchmark testing. Netgear’s hoping that the newly announced WNDR3800 will right those wrongs. The router’s available worldwide as of yesterday and it packs a pair of interesting features.

First up: clear channel selector. Netgear’s press release claims the WNDR3800 is the first home router to come equipped with the technology, which detects when a Wi-Fi channel becomes crowded and automatically changes to a channel with less traffic. The WNDR3800 also offers Netgear’s ReadySHARE technology. ReadySHARE treats any flash drive or external HDDs plugged into the router as a sort of private cloud server, letting access its contents via the Internet or from another computer on your network. You can also tap into the files via an app for iOS and Android devices, but you’ll need to pony up a few bucks for the privilege.

The dual-band wireless-N WNDR3800 also offers a bevy of other features, including DLNA compatibility, parental controls and an option to give preferential treatment to video traffic. You can pick it up today for $180.