Netgear WGT634U 108 Mbps Wireless Media Router
Netgear WGT634U 108 Mbps Wireless Media Router
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 List Price: $217.00 Sale Price: $210.00 Availability: unspecified 
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Product Description
Netgear WGT634U 108 Mbps Wireless Media Router - Experience blazing-fast wireless speeds, enhanced degree of security and impressive wireless range with the NETGEAR WGT634U 108 Mbps Wireless Media Router. You can have convenient access to your media and other files wherever you go. Just attach a USB hard disk drive or memory stick to your router and store all your files from any computer on your home network. From then on, you can remotely access your MP3s, photos and other stored files on the USB disk or memory stick from any wireless LAN notebook or desktop PC in your home or office, and from any Web-connected PC away from your home or office. The router features dual firewall with SPI (Stateful Packet Inspection) and Network Address Translation (NAT) to secure your network, PCs, files, and protect them against malicious attacks. It also supports multiple VPN pass-through tunnels that provide secure Internet connections for simultaneous multiple users. In addition, you can seamlessly share files with your friends and family members by using the Windows click commands, File>Open' and 'File>Save As' or by using the 'drag-and-drop' icon method. The WGT634U Wireless Media Router comes with Smart Wizard setup and install assistant that makes setup quick and easy, guiding you through installation in minutes. Connectivity Technology - Wireless/Cable Data Transfer Rate - Up to 108 Mbps 128-bit Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP) Encryption Dimensions (WxDxH) / Weight - 6.9 x 4.7 x 1.1 / 0.7 lbs
Details
- Back up, share, and access your files wirelessly & remotely
- USB disk drive or memory stick connectivity
- Smart Wizard install assistant for easy setup
- Supports both USB 1.1 and USB 2.0
- Compatible with Windows 98SE, Me, NT, 2000, and XP
December 1st, 2010 on 2:50 pm
Rating
The Netgear WGT-634U Wireless Media Router was very easy to install and setup. I successfully connected three laptops (1 wired, one wireless and one both wired and wireless) within 15 minutes. The router works great with good range. Although 108g is great, I’ve had to back down to 54g for the sake of my laptop with a 54g card built-in.
The router’s setup is a web of java-enabled web pages stored inside the router itself. You access it via IE or other java Browser. Very nice. The first thing I did was to update the firmware to the latest version: 1.1.0.6
I do not have a USB drive as yet to test the media applications of the router. I plan to get one very soon because it is a great idea with many possibilities.
I purchased this router with a PS121 printer server and WAG511 802.11a/b/g Dual Band PC Card. The printer server was a snap to setup requiring only a CD-ROM installation on all three computers. I was able to free up a USB port on one computer by doing this. Now I can print from anywhere on any computer.
The WAG511 card is for one laptop that I will use wirelessly only and offers access to a wider array of networks outside my home.
One of my laptops is wired only via a NIC/Modem PC Card and is in a permanent location.
My primary laptop is wired at its main location but can easily be switched to wireless via a built-in 54g Wi-Fi card.
It’s great having all three computers running streaming media. Also, I can now burn DVDs/CDs and more on one computer and still access my cable modem to get online with the others.
The router looks great too. Runs warm but that’s mentioned in the manual.
December 3rd, 2010 on 10:57 pm
Rating
I purchased this router specifically for the ability to attach a hard drive to the router and have access to this hard drive via ftp. This router has worked great! Instructions were suspect (as they always are).
The biggest caveat is that the drive can NOT be formatted NTFS. Other than that, it’s great!!!
December 4th, 2010 on 1:46 pm
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I know people wrote some negative reviews, but I was so taken with the idea of being able to access my external hard drive with my laptop from anywhere in the house, that I figured I’d try it. I read online that some of the problems were firmware upgrade related, so when I first logged into the router, and was given the window asking me if I want to upgrade my firmware, I selected “no”.
10 seconds later I was connected to the internet!! No need to even reboot! Set up the wireless – trivial. Worked immediately. I was thrilled. But then to the real test – it said to read the manual on the CD before connecting the USB device. I could not find it, so I just connected my Western Digital 250 GB external hard drive to the USB port, and turned it on. For about a minute, it seemed nothing was happening. But then it occured to me to look at my “network neighborhood”. IT WAS THERE! There was my hard drive, and I was connecting to it wirelessly from BOTH my computers! It is apparantly easy to access it from anywhere using ftp and the modem’s address, but I haven’t tried THAT yet.
The connection, so far, is fast and stable. So my advice – GET IT, and DO NOT upgrade the firmware unless something doesn’t work. Enjoy
December 5th, 2010 on 2:20 pm
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I experienced progressive deterioration in the performance of my WGT634U over two years and through perhaps three firmware updates. When the router finally would no longer access certain secure sites and continually dropped both secure and non-secure links, I delved into the instruction manual and discovered the caution to be sure to “reset” the router to default values after a firmware update. I had never done this before (I thought “reset” meant unplugging and replugging the router into the power source). After looking for and not finding a reference for resetting the default values inside the web-based interface, I reset the router using the “push” button on the back of the router. Now, the router is working perfectly!!!
Since it is typical to update firmware right out of the box when installing a router, I can only conclude that my installation problems with the WGT634U started when I first installed the router with a firmware update without resetting it to the default values two years ago.
“My Bad” for not reading or taking the time to understand the instructions. “Netgear Bad” for not being clearer in the instructions for so critical an item … or, for not including an automatic reset to default values as part of a firmware update.
December 6th, 2010 on 2:52 am
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The reviews here are old. It’s true that Netgear did release a product with lots of bugs – in the software (a.k.a. firmware). You can easily upgrade it from netgear’s site, or even better, use dd-wrt, openwrt, or roofnet on it, for superior functionality. You can even make your own mesh network, as I have done.
December 6th, 2010 on 6:43 am
Rating
I purchased this Netgear WGT634U router to work with a laptop with built-in Intel Centrino wi-fi at 54mbps, another PC with Netgear WG311T 108mbps PCI card, and finally another one with a plain RJ45 100BaseTx card. The RJ45 plugs via a cable directly into the one of the 4 available RJ45 ports. The broadband to the internet plugs into another port (5th one) dedicated to uplink. My setup uses PPPOE, and the router upon bootup had a wizard that automatically detected this type of connection and asked for login details. (this router has a built in webserver that serves pages just for configuring it via a browser). Because I have a mixed speed setting (54mpbs and 108 mbps), I chose the 108mbps Auto setting, which will allow multiple speeds to connect to the router. The 100BaseTX computer by default uses 100mbps. In summary, I was able to get all three to connect and share files and printers (make sure you add an account with the same account and password on all your three computers), but I had lots of problems before finally resolving them.
Problem resolutions: I have read a lot of reports on this router, and I had my share of them with constant reboots, connection drops, etc. I tried both the Netgear utility on the 108mbps pci card, and also microsoft’s utility. I also upgraded the firmware on the router (via their web interface), and the latest drivers on the PCI wifi card. But the connection just keeps dropping. If it worked, it would work for a certain period of time before problems appeared again. I used secure WPA for the two wireless connections, tampered with lots of settings. But they didn’t seem to isolate the problem.
Finally, after weeks of reading and experimenting, I nailed down the main problem: It is the HEAT of the chip that is causing it to misbehave. Luckily the design of the casing allows you to cut along the vent holes on the top cover to remove a round piece of plastic from the top of the router to expose the board with chips to air. The front panel and two side ones can also be removed (after removing and replacing 4 screws). So what I did was cut out along the vent holes on the top of the casing, and removed the two side panels and screwed the case back. This allowed free airflow to the board and chips. Did it solve the problem? YES! The thing worked like a charm. No connection drops, full signal, and perfect working order. (I don’t have a compabitle USB drive to test the that ftp drive though, so I may update this info later).
So in essense, if you have purchased this router, just cut along the vent holes on the top casing to expose the chip to air, and remove two of the side panels, and you are set to go. After the firmware upgrade, its the HEAT HEAT HEAT! Nothing else is wrong with it. To upgrade the router (and get the better WPA security included in firmware versions 1.4.1.5 and above), its just clicks away after pointing your browser to it. This product would have gotten a 5 star if not for the heat problem. I suggest also to put it on its included stands to make it stand upright. This makes air flow even better. If you want heavy duty operation in hot areas, just buy one of those tiny USB fans and point the fan at the heatsink of the biggest chip on the board (assuming you just removed the hole in the top cover like I mentioned above).
Some interesting notes: Before I removed the cover to cool it, it would constantly reboot during certain times. There is a switch on it where you poke a pen into a small hole that resets the router. If you press and hold it for 5 seconds or more, it erases all your settings (login info etc) but the firmware upgraded software is never erased.
So in essense, this router works great, but because of the slim design, and poor heat dissipation of the casing, it overheats very often. Removing the hole on the cover and two of the side panels, the product is rock solid and connection is great.
December 6th, 2010 on 7:02 am
Rating
I’ve had several wireless routers, and this one sets up and works as well or better than any, with excellent range, compatibility, and versatile security features. The unique server feature allows a compatible storage device attached via the router’s USB port to act as a media/file server accessible via FTP from the web – that’s why port 21 is open. It’s nice to be able to download/upload files from anywhere you have web access. Yes, there are some rough edges to the software, but nothing insurmountable.
December 7th, 2010 on 4:20 am
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Been running this router for about 9 months now and it works very well. Using the latest firmware the wireless connection is always 100% throughout the house and now there’s no firewall on my computer (relying on the router’s firewall) web access seems much faster too.
I’ve only got a couple of gripes;
1) You couldn’t forward both TCP and UDP on the same port number, although this has finally been fixed with the latest firmware ;o)
2) I’m using a Maxtor One Touch 300GB USB drive attached to the router, although this router claims USB2 the transfer rate I get when copying to and from the drive is only about ~10 Mbps. This should be at least 50 Mbps on a 100baseT network? I get about 70 Mbps when transferring files to and from my XBox. The drive is lightning fast when it’s connected directly to the computer.
A NOTE TO PREVIOUS REVIEWERS
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I don’t know if it’s been a firmware update since you reviewed your unit but you were complaining about the FAT32 support and having max 32GB partitions? I have a single 300GB partition on my drive and it works fine. And the max 4GB file limit, come on, any decent backup software should be able to split the backup into <4GB chunks
December 7th, 2010 on 9:58 am
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Reading the previous reviews really helped educate me on internet protection. First of all, I think this is a great product. I havent had a single failure or problem yet, and I’m doing every test I can to try to get it to hiccup. Based on the previous reviews, I scanned my ports to see if there were any open. And the default was to have port 21 open and 113 closed but viewable. It also returns a ping which isn’t totally internet stealthy. But after going thru proper set-up, and actually READING, I learned to change the default to stealth all my ports and turned my ping return off. Now I am totally secure and have an awesome fast wireless machine. And on a computer knowledge level. 10 being Super Computer Geek, 0 being No knowledge, I would rate myself a 6.5, just a tad above average. Anyone that takes the time to read this and research products is smart enough to set this up.
December 8th, 2010 on 11:56 am
Rating
Since it can only read NTFS and not write to it, I am assuming that the router runs some version of Linux kernel in its Firmware.