D-Link

So, now that the bulk of the renovation projects are finished, i sat down tonight to install the new 802.11n wireless router that i bought last month.

The first box i bought was a PoS from a company called TrendNET. Spec'd out nice, and i bought the router and 3 USB wireless N adapters to go with it. One of the adapters was DOA, the other two worked sporadically, and the router could not use DHCP properly, and constantly assigned IP addresses out of the specified range. It went back to the vendor after 3 days.

I bought the D-Link cause i've been using an 802.11g router from them for the past 3 years, and it's been flawless.

First problem was that the D-Link adapters didn't run on Macs. So they went back.

Then, the software for the router was bad on the supplied CD. No quality control whatsoever. When you download the corrected software from the D-Link site, you also get another version of the corrupted software as well, in addition to a version that works. Install problems occur when the router acts as though it's rebooting to apply the changes in settings you've just made, though it really isn't. So you've got to manually reboot the router to get those changes to take effect. Once i figured all that out, getting all the computers in the house to connect to the internet was fairly straightforward.

Here's the deal, though.

I bought this device because it comes with "SharePort" software which allows you to "Share a USB printer or storage device on your network."

That's what i need. It's called network attached storage. I want a single hard drive with all of my music in one central location that can feed iTunes on the 3 computers that are hooked up to speakers for listening anywhere in the house. Network attached storage. The copy on the box reads "With SharePort technology you can connect a USB printer or storage device to your router and allow users to access them from anywhere on the network. Conveniently turn your existing USB printers and storage devices into network devices for everyone to share."

What a surprise to discover that only one computer at a time can actually "share" a device using "SharePort." Seriously. I must have read a hundred pages of documentation, reviews, and hype about this device before i bought it without encountering that limitation written down anywhere.

Why bother?

Probably too late to return this sucker for a full refund, since i bought it 6 weeks ago, and just got around to installing it tonight.

Now, i will say that i've been listening to streaming music for the past 2 hours running through my computer from the hard drive upstairs. So it works, and does that much pretty well. But that one connection at a time limitation is a deal breaker.

And it should have been mentioned somewhere.

UPDATE: D-Link tech support confirms the one user at a time limitation with the SharePort software.

Linksys tech support says their competing products offer multiple simultaneous connections to attached USB drives.

Guess what i'll be doing today?