Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. And to this beholder, the $119.99 (direct) Belkin N+ Wireless Router (F5D8235-4) is a beauty, with its upright design and bright blue status LEDs. Is the device more than a pretty case, though? Yes and no, but mostly no. One big plus is the ability to use it not just as a 2.4-GHz router but also as a bridge to extend the range of your wireless network. And USB 2.0 port makes it simple to add a USB 2.0 storage device—a useful feature not offered by many routers in this price range. But the router's interface is mediocre, and it just can't deliver when it comes to performance.
Belkin paid attention to design with the N+ router. Like theNetgear RangeMax Wireless-N Gigabit Router WNR3500, Belkin's router locks into an included stand that keeps it solidly upright. A number of rival products—some Linksys N routers, for instance—tip over easily because of their poorly designed stands. This is an important point, since your throughput is bound to take a hit if the router falls behind your desk. The N+ also includes a thoughtful touch that helps with initial setup: Affixed to the router is a large white sticker printed with simple, three-step instructions that walk users through starting the router and plugging in the cables.
In addition to the router's WAN (wide-area network) port, which lets you connect to the Internet through a cable or DSL modem, you'll find four Gigabit Ethernet connectors and a USB 2.0 port for connecting an external storage device. Handy front-panel lights are molded into shapes indicating what they represent. The LAN-connection shape let you see the router's status from 20 feet away. The front panel even sports speedometer lights, so that you can gauge the traffic going across the router at a glance. Like most similar routers, the N+ has omnidirectional antennas in a 2-by-2 MIMO setup, which means it has two receivers and two transmitters. The antennas are adjustable, so you can position them for the best wireless performance.
Installation
Specifications
- Device Type
- Router
- Networking Options
- 802.11n
The included quick-installation software does a thorough setup job and has a friendly, effective question-and-answer troubleshooting procedure. For security setup, however, you'll need to go to Security Assistant, a separate utility (on the installation CD) that displays and lets you select your WPA2 or WEP encryption settings. Choose WPA2—it's more secure. The security wizard suggests that you either print out the WPA2 key and install it manually on your computers or save it to a USB flash drive and transfer it with that. I wish this security app were integrated with the installation software, but on the whole, the router does a better job than many others when it comes to instructing users on how to manually set up security.
But you may not have to do it manually—that is, if all your Wi-Fi–enabled network devices have a WPS (Wi-Fi Protected Setup) button like the one on the N+ router and the included wireless adapter. You just press the button on the device and the router simultaneously, repeating the process for each WPS-equipped item. WPS doesn't provide a new type of security; it just simplifies the setup by automating formerly manual processes. The technology assigns both the code that lets the network devices recognize one another (the SSID) and the WPA encryption key. A blue LED above the router's WPS button comes on when you enable wireless encryption. For WPS devices without a button, you have to enter a PIN code manually.
The management interface has an unusual layout that I found confusing and irritating. Information and settings for related capabilities, such as guest access and the domain name system (DNS), are displayed on separate pages, each of which has its own tab. While that may make the interface look more feature-packed, it means that you have to hunt for related settings instead of seeing them all in the same place.
Features
In addition to the setup software, Belkin provides a storage manager that works like a charm. I tried it with a Seagate FreeAgent Pro 750GB and, after that, a 500GB Western Digital My Book Pro plugged into the router's USB 2.0 port. The utility worked well and mapped both units as local drives. The combination of the utility and the port provides a tremendously useful feature you won't find on many routers at this price.
Besides WPA, WPA2, and WEP (64-bit and 128-bit) security, the router also supports guest access, as does the Netgear WNR3500. This is a popular feature with hotels, coffee shops, restaurants, and other places that allow strangers on their networks but need to restrict what they can do. When the capability is enabled, users land on a page that asks for a key. Unfortunately, the router allows only one pass at a time, has no guest-pass management, and doesn't offer time-sensitive passes. An administrator would have to actively manage encryption keys. In the real world, Belkin's take on this feature is impractical. The WNR3500 does a much better job at guest-pass management.
The Belkin N+ router lets you block or allow wireless clients that have particular MAC (hardware) addresses and apply Internet-access policies to clients you allow. The access-control features also provide a simple way to manage your kids' computer use. You can set schedules, block URLs, and prevent children from reaching sites that contain certain words. But the interface gives you only five lines for entering restricted words, which makes this a pretty useless feature. On the other hand, few users rely on their routers for parental control anyhow, so I won't penalize the router much for that.
You can also put the router into access-point mode, which makes it behave like a network bridge. A bridge extends a network connection by relaying a signal between two distant routers to reach areas where you normally get weak Wi-Fi signals. All security features work in access-point mode. In my testing, setting up the N+ router as an access point was a snap. Once I checked the access-point option in the interface, the Belkin router immediately started passing the IPs from the DHCP server from the other router I used in the test (a TP-Link TL-WR941ND).
Performance
In theory, the router's GigE wired ports should let it outperform rivals with slower 10/100-megabit-per-second ports. For example, the 10/100 LAN ports on both the ASUS RT-N11 EZ Wireless N Router and the TP-Link TL-WR941ND limited their Wi-Fi performance. Yet despite its bigger pipes, the Belkin router's Wi-Fi performance was below average.
I evaluated performance from the router to the client and the reverse with the standard IxChariot high-throughput test. The IxChariot server ran under Windows XP SP3 on a 3.0-GHz Pentium 4 PC that was connected to the router via GigE. The client PC that was connected wirelessly was a 1.83-GHz, Intel Core 2 Duo HP dv2000 laptop running Windows Vista SP1. At close range (3 feet), the measured throughput was below average: 68 Mbps. Other routers with GigE LAN ports did better. The $125 Netgear RangeMax WNR3500, for example, managed 71 Mbps, and the $150 Trendnet 300Mbps Wireless N Gigabit Router (TEW-633GR) pushed data at 125 Mbps.
At 20 and 50 feet, the Belkin router's throughput was 47 Mbps and 30 Mbps, respectively. These aren't great scores by any stretch of the imagination. At the longer distance, the Netgear WNR3500 router was on a par with the Belkin. The Netgear scored 58 Mbps and 34 Mbps at 20 and 50 feet, respectively. While the Netgear WNR3500 is not that much better a performer, it has a feature for extending wireless range. Even the ASUS RT-N11, with its lowly 10/100 LAN ports, beat the Belkin hands down.
Bottom Line
The Belkin N+ Wireless Router (F5D8235-4) is attractive, and the ability to add external storage easily is certainly a plus. It's a decent choice if you want a network with storage or need a router that can function as an access point. But the router's features are prettymuch vanilla, and some of them (such as parental control and guest access) need work. The interface is disorganized, and the wireless performance just isn't up to par. I'd recommend spending about $30 more for the 2.4-GHz Netgear WNR3500.
- Pros
Makes adding network storage easy. Well-designed case. Easy setup.
- Cons
Below-average performance. Confusing interface. Some extra features are poorly implemented.
- Bottom Line
If you want, or may want in the future, to add extra storage to your network, this router is worth considering. But you can find better performers for not a lot more money.
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