Posted 10/29/09 at 08:06:00 AM by Paul Lilly

Alcatel-Lucent on Wednesday unveiled a pair of new IP routers the firm says are designed to give service provides a cost-effective alternative for "offering smaller communities the same advanced mobile, residential, and business services" that are currently employed in larger metropolitan areas.

The new units include the three-slot, 5RU 7750 SR-c12, and one-slot, 3RU 7750 SR-c4. Both serve up 90Gbps of forwarding capacity and can support edge routing interface speeds from T-1 to 10G Ethernet. Alcatel-Lucent also noted that both run under the same operating system as the company's entire Service Router family.

"With these additions, Alcatel-Lucent is effectively extending a proven, feature-rich platform to address new market opportunities where they need the capacity and capability, but at more cost-effective price points," said Glen Hunt, principal analyst, Carrier Infrastructure, Current Analysis. "The elegant integration with the existing portfolio -- especially with a single operating system from end-to-end -- makes it attractive to operators who are looking to deliver full featured, high performance services from their smaller or more remote points of presence in order to drive new revenues."

Other features include native IPv6 support, non-stop routing, non-stop services, Multi-Chassis-LAG, and support for a range of legacy and Ethernet and interface types.

The SRu 7750 SR-c12 and SR-c4 are available now, although Alcatel-Lucent didn't say for how much.

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Posted 10/15/09 at 08:30:30 PM by Michael Brown

D-Link’s DIR-685 Wi-Fi router generated a lot of buzz at CES this past January. And when we took a gander at its spec sheet, we thought it a contender for Best of the Best in the router category; something that would finally displace the Linksys WRT600N, which is becoming hard to find. Alas, ’twas not to be.

The problem certainly isn’t with the DIR-685’s feature set: This router is absolutely loaded with goodies. The 3.2-inch color LCD can inform you of the router’s status and configuration; present digital photos from Flickr, Picasa, and Facebook; display RSS feeds, such as sports scores, weather reports, and stock quotes; and a lot more (this is one router your significant other won’t insist be hidden in a closet).

Next up, there’s a 2.5-inch internal SATA hard drive bay, which can turn the router into a NAS box (complemented by a built-in FTP server and BitTorrent software). There are two USB ports featuring D-Link’s SharePort technology, which allows you to plug in both an external hard drive and a printer and share these devices with any computer on the network. The router’s four-port gigabit switch automatically powers down any ports not in use to save a modest amount of energy.

Continue reading this review after the jump.

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Posted 10/14/09 at 04:12:42 PM by Bart Salisbury

Wi-Fi’s about to get a whole new look to it, one that eerily resembles Bluetooth. The Wi-Fi Alliance has announced it is nearing completing of specifications for Wi-Fi Direct which will provide peer-to-peer connections between any two Wi-Fi devices, such as mobile phones, cameras, headphones, printers, computers, keyboards, and mice. The new standard will be backward compatible to include all currently Wi-Fi certified legacy devices.

Wi-Fi Direct will make connecting to Wi-Fi a lot easier, and it may well prompt a shake-up in the Bluetooth and wireless router industries. Because Wi-Fi Direct essentially replicates Bluetooth, and Wi-Fi is more prevalent, manufacturers may opt to consolidate on the more widely available standard, and consumers more comfortable with Wi-Fi may likewise put pressure for Wi-Fi direct devices and peripherals. With peer-to-peer relationships available the demand for standalone routers could significantly diminish.

Besides getting to have a wireless keyboard without a dongle, finding a Wi-Fi hotspot becomes simpler, as we all become Wi-Fi hotspots.

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Posted 10/08/09 at 07:00:00 PM by David Murphy

I'll admit, I was a little bit excited when I read earlier this week that Netgear was launching a quote-unquote open-source router. It's not very often--well, hardly ever--that one sees a larger corporate manufacturer of computer hardware so brazenly embrace the ideals (and code) of the open-source enthusiasts. If anything, it seems that companies in the networking space tend to go a little out of their way to ensure that one can't add or tweak a store-bought device with unofficial firmware. I think they'd much prefer to up-sell you additional features than watch you unlock them yourself, but that's just me.

And yet, here we are! An open-source router! Just the kind of thing you want to bring home, install into your network, and begin updating with the best DD-WRT, OpenWRT, or Tomato firmware you can get your hands on. Imagine the possibilities! Imagine the new features you might be able to play around with! Imagine the joy in your family's eyes when you tell 'em how you've transformed your Jekyll of a local area network into an beastly, unrestrained Hyde. They'll talk about this day for the next five family gatherings at least!

I exaggerate, but only because it seems that the marketing team for Netgear's WNR3500L gigabit router is probably benefiting the most from this "switch" to open-source. I can't see average consumers using this device to its fullest potential, if that's even possible to begin with. The WNR3500L isn't actually open-source all the way. By incorporating closed-source drivers into the product--and triumphing third-party firmware that may or may not run afoul of the GPL itself--Netgear could actually be costing consumers valuable security and functionality. 

That being the case, why would one ever want to switch to open-source?

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Posted 10/06/09 at 06:25:40 PM by Jason Barry

Netgear announced their latest foray into the open source wireless router realm with the Netgear WNR3500L. Cisco based Linksys routers targeted at consumers have been flaunting the Linux OS for quite some time. However, Netgear has plans to become a favorite amongst the open source networking community.

The WNR3500L rocks the latest 802.11n support and is fully customizable with the latest open source firmware out there: DD-WRT, OpenWRT, and Tomato. Som Pal Choudhury, senior product line manager for advanced wireless, also mentioned their “Development Partner Program, with multiple software vendors and developers creating customized, robust, commercial-grade applications on the WNR3500L.”

In addition to the open source community, Netgear has collaborated with software application companies to deliver applications such as hotspot software by Sputnik, and remote access by Leaf Networks, among others, to run additionally on the Linux platform.

In terms of hardware, it sports a 480MHz MIPS 74K CPU, 8MB of flash memory, 64MB of RAM, 5 gigabit Ethernet ports, and USB ports for shared peripherals. Netgear will launch the router this Fall with a starting price of $139.99.

The price is a bit steep; do you think the flexibility of Linux and additional software, not to mention full 802.11n support is worth the price tag?

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Posted 09/29/09 at 04:00:28 PM by Michael Brown

With 802.11n Draft 2.0 routers becoming as common as Storm Troopers at Comic-Con, manufacturers need a feature that sets their product apart from the crowd. Like many of its competitors, Belkin added a second radio to its N+ Wireless Router—but this one is used for a very different purpose.

Rather than operating on a separate frequency (to separate audio and video streams from more mundane data), the second 2.4GHz radio on Belkin’s router establishes a guest network that limits clients to Internet access. Belkin’s web interface provides extremely limited access to this second radio’s settings: You can turn this radio on or off, change its SSID and passphrase, and choose between WPA/WPA2 pre-shared key or “Hotel Style” security.

Continue reading this review after the jump.

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Posted 09/02/09 at 07:00:20 PM by Gordon Mah Ung

Netgear’s MOCA (short for Multimedia over Coax Alliance) adapter is the can solution to the can’t. If you can’t get a reliable Wi-Fi signal throughout your home and you can’t make an Ethernet cable run and you can’t tap your home’s electrical grid with a HomePlug Powerline adapter, than MOCA is the can.

Using existing standard cable coax wires, the Netgear MOCA adapter lets you turn your cable TV runs into a “home entertainment network.” What the hell is that? Since the adapter is built around passing data through your cable TV, it’s no surprise that MOCA wants to push its adoption as an easy way to get Internet connectivity to your set top box, game console, or media center PC.

Setup is Joe-six-pack friendly: Just unplug the coax cable from your TV set and plug it into the Netgear MOCA adapter. Run a second coax cable from the adapter to the TV. TV signals are passed through transparently, so your American Idol viewing won’t be disturbed. And if the signal is degraded you can actually change the frequency the adapter operates on.

Continue reading this review after the jump.

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Posted 08/03/09 at 09:43:49 AM by Paul Lilly

Two security researchers on Saturday have warned that if you use cPanel to administer your website or certain Linksys or Netgear routers, you're leaving yourself open to web-based attacks that could potentially take control of your systems.

The attacks are based on CSRF, or cross-site request forgery, which can be exploited simply by surfing to the 'wrong' website, say Russ McRee of HolisticInfoSec.org and Mike Bailey of Skeptikal.org.

"CSRF is bad stuff," Bailey said at the Defcon hacker conference in Las Vegas. "It's a very under-appreciated vulnerability, and it's all over the place. Because it usually gets rated as a pretty minimal issue, it almost never gets fixed, and that means we have these kinds of holes all over."

When visiting a malicous website while logged in to the program, the attack is able to trick cPanel into carrying out sensitive commands by duping the device into thinking they came from the victim. And it doesn't look like this will be fixed anytime soon. 

"The response I got from cPanel was we can't fix this because it's a feature," Bailey said. "Apparently, they're worried it's going to break integration with third party billing software, so they can't fix this."

Much more info here.

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