Tuesday, October 25, 2011

TRENDnet GREENnet 300 Mbps Concurrent Dual Band Wireless N Gigabit Router TEW-673GRU (Black)


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The 300Mbps Concurrent Dual Band Wireless N Gigabit Router delivers unsurpassed Dual Band wireless speed, coverage, and reliability with up to 14x the speed and 6x the coverage of a wireless g connection. Concurrent Dual Band technology creates two separate 300Mbps wireless n networks at the same time—one on the 2.4GHz frequency and the other on the less congested 5GHz frequency. A color LCD management interface provides real time performance, security, and device information thereby reducing the need to login to the router. Share content by connecting USB flash drives, hard drives, or printers directly to two USB ports on the back of the router. Gigabit Ethernet ports offer exceptional wired throughput performance. Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO) antenna technology reduces wireless dead spots, advanced wireless encryption protects your digital content, and WMM® Quality of Service (QoS) technology prioritizes gaming, Internet calls, and video streams. Wi-Fi Protected Setup (WPS) connects WPS compliant computers at the touch of a button. Wirelessly stream HD multimedia using the uncongested 5GHz frequency while surfing the Internet using the 2.4GHz frequency

This review is from : TRENDnet GREENnet 300 Mbps Concurrent Dual Band Wireless N Gigabit Router TEW-673GRU (Black)
In comparison to the Cisco Linksys E3000 . I get suddenlink 10 MB down/sec:1 MB up/sec cable internet service

Speed: With this router I get about 10.1-10.4 MB/sec downspeed and 1.03 upspeed via [...] via BOTH wan and wireless! With the cisco e3000 I would get about 8.5-9.7 MB/sec downspeed and similar upspeeds.

Set-Up: The Cisco set-up is pretty idiot proof, but the interface for advanced settings is lacking. With the Trendnet, while not as easy to set-up, it's pretty intuitive if you just follow the instruction booklet.

Range: Have yet to carry my laptop outside and really test it out, but I get "excellent" signal on my crappy lenovo x60 with Class G wireless.

Wired Printer set-up: Once you install the driver from the included CD printing to my usb-linked-to-router printer was very painless and easy. Cisco e3000 only supports wireless printers (so if you're like me and don't have a state-of-the-art wifi printer you're sol for network printing with the e3000).

LCD monitor: e3000 doesn't have one... but... on my model it kinda sucks. If I try to change any settings via the web-interface or install new devices onto the wireless network the picture on the screen scrambles. I just downloaded the newest firmware and it still has this problem. Hopefully future firmware updates fix this because otherwise, the 673GRU is phenomenal.

Network shared storage: I attached a 2gb usb jumpstick to the router (note the 673gru has 2 usb ports, e3000 only has 1) and it was easy to access via the network software. I really wish it would just appear as a removable drive under "My Computer" like a native usb port, but I'm happy with the performance. The e3000 didn't even recognize my jumpstick - in fact, on the e3000 you had to go through this annoying step of creating shared folders (ugh...).

I bought this router knowing I'll be getting a sweet Class N Dual band capable laptop within the next few months, in the meantime, I'm very happy with this purchase!

*Note to TrendNet* This is a 5 star router if you can fix the screen scrambling with a firmware update.
TRENDnet GREENnet 300 Mbps Concurrent Dual Band Wireless N Gigabit Router TEW-673GRU (Black) Reviews
Solid Choice for a dual band router . So I decided to upgrade my wireless router to a dual band, I moved into a new condo and everybody had a wireless router and I knew it would be trouble. I checked and nobody was using the 5GHz spectrum so I knew it was the way to go.

I initially purchased the Netgear WNDR3700. Objectively, The Netgear is a nice router too but I had to exchange 2 units of the Netgear because of an issue with the wired gigabit ports going to sleep and not waking up. Do a google search for WNDR3700 and Tivo and you'll see complaints about the Netgear. Anyway, so I had to find another dual band router after wasting 2 weeks with the Netgear. I really liked the Netgear much better than the Trendnet because it has a hackable firmware using DD-WRT but hey if the ports go to sleep and won't wake back up, you can't use it.

Setup of the Trendnet was very straight forward, nothing out of the ordinary. The best features of the router is the 3 year warranty compared to 1 year for Netgear and other companies. I did have a older Trendnet I bought from amazon 2 years ago. I was about to throw it in the trash when I looked up the warranty and it was 3 years. It was a bit of a hassle to call them up, get transferred to India, talk to 2 levels of tech support, then you email someone in the US that you talked to the 2 levels of tech support, then they RMA your device. I did have proof of purchase but they didn't even ask for it but then again, my router which was a single band N didn't come out more than 3 years ago. They sent me a brand new one within 2 weeks. So warranty support is top notch, a bit of a hassle but I did get a new machine.

If you read the reviews, this router gets good ratings for speed. The LCD screen is nice in theory but you'll never use it. It has these 4 buttons and not easy to use at all. I am not going to sit there for hours learning how to use it because it's not that helpful to begin with. The router has a blue led light in front that is always on. This is the most annoying thing in the world. Who designs something like this, this blue light can light up the whole room at night. I think someone at Trendnet needed a night light, so they decided to put one on this router. No joke, the light is bright and it's just annoying. It's not like normal flashing lights on a router, it's a blue beam and you might go blind if you stare directly at it. The router comes with extra rubber feet nubs in case you decide to put the router on it's side, vertically. Use the rubber feet to cover the blue light.

Another bad, no guest network, so that if you have friends over, you don't have to give them the password to your network. The netgear had that feature and all the expensive routers do to. The USB ports are worthless, you need to install a software to use it and only the computer that you installed the software on can use the device attached. So if you attach a printer to it, only the computer you installed the software will be able to use it. Not every computer on the network.

Overall, I am keeping the router, I have no problems with the gigaports like I did with the Netgear. There's really nothing special about this router compared to others in its range but it gets the job done and the price is decent.
TRENDnet GREENnet 300 Mbps Concurrent Dual Band Wireless N Gigabit Router TEW-673GRU (Black) Opinions
No longer working after firmware update . I received the router a few days ago. Got it all hooked up. The display isn't anything all that fancy and it in fact is more or less useless as the button response is not great and takes a while to get to the info you need, you can just use the web config interface. It looks high tech anyhow. I bought this to get more throughput than my prior D-Link DIR-655, also I think the D-Link was the culprit to frequent disconnects during online gaming. For the time it worked, it did seem to be almost double the speed. The web interface take some getting used to, I had all my devices on my network plugged in but the DHCP table didn't recognize them (though they had connectivity). I prefer to set static ip reservations for my devices, however given they were not showing up in the table, I had to hook only one device up at a time for it to show up with an IP and MAC and then reserve it. Also, though I'm sure it's for good measure... it takes a whopping 2 minutes just for the slightest change to be made to the router which was painstaking when configuring 10 static reservations. What was the worst was the fact that it got bricked after I attempted to flash to the latest firmware (from rev 24 to rev 36 I think). I made sure I had the right firmware and followed instructions but after the 2 minute counter, nothing happened on the web config page though it said "Succes..." Waited up to 10 minutes to make sure, checked router and it will not boot up past the splash/logo now. Customer service is of course script readers from India and quite impatient with users... I'm very tech savvy and had already done most everything he stated, seemed pretty eager to get me off the phone and he may have hung up on me at one point as the "call dropped". Basically, I didn't much care for their tech support across the world. I will see how the replacement from Amazon fairs. I may forego firmware updates for fear of another brick, and likely will not be calling tech support back.
Easy as 3.141593 . Installation and set up was easy. Fast as fast can be. Only issue encountered: wireless printer did not want to connect, tech-support recommended (erroneously) to change security to WEP. Changed it to WPA-Auto and all is well. I did not install the router software (I normally let the OS handle it).
All in all, a great dual band router.
Again . Not a bad router. LCD screen is good. I entered in a very long-winded review earlier, but it never got posted.

So, to summarize: My wife can connect easily from across the house and downstairs from the router (2700 sq ft)

The router turned on and just worked.

The LCD screen is good, but not very intuitive.

Also, and this is important. This device operates on DUAL bands, which means it operates in the 2.4 Ghz range and the 5. Ghz range. It actually broadcasts two distinct networks. But if you only have devices (historically) that can see the 2.4 Ghz range, you will never even know the 5 Ghz one is out there.
So before you buy this, and think you're going to operate on both bands, make sure your devices operate on both bands.
I wanted to love it . I really did want to love this router. It had all the specs I'd been waiting for, and I waited many months between the CES announcement and the actual release. However, I'm left disappointed and will ultimately replace it with something else. First, it has all the features that most people want, so I'll leave that to other reviews. Here's the things that leave me disappointed.

1) My SSL VPN (Juniper Connect) reconnects all the time using this router. This doesn't happen with any of the many other routers I have tried. My corporate instant messenger also disconnects regularly when using this router (but not with others). So working from home is bumpy at best. After working with support, I'm not aware of any setting that will resolve this. It appears to be a firmware bug that hopefully is fixed down the road.
2) Any change you make to any configuration item, no matter how small, requires the router to reboot. This takes a good 90 seconds. Many other routers' firmware require reboot only for major changes. That makes configuring the unit a time-consuming task.
3) Tech support has not been very helpful. The first fix they provided after I reported the first above problem actually froze the unit and caused it to need a replacement. The saga goes on and the firmware has yet to be fixed for the VPN issue (not worth detailing here), but I had hoped that for a higher-end unit that I would get higher-end support. Sadly that has not been my experience.
4) I was excited to see the LCD on the unit itself. However, the way you maneuver the screens is so challenging that it's an unusable feature.

If you are the type who just sets up basic functionality and you don't have to VPN via SSL, then it's probably not a bad unit. Firmware updates could fix nearly all of these gripes and make the unit a true star. In my case, I'll have to keep looking.
Good but not awesome . My number one requirement was for simultaneously dual-band access point. I didn't need routing, but this costs less than the TEW-670AP access point. And it's a good solution. But don't expect a lot of features.

For instance, don't expect a way to adjust the wireless signal strength. Most people setting up a Wifi access point will accept the defaults - 2.4 GHz channel 6 at full power. But you might not want a full power signal, especially not if you live in an apartment, condo, or townhome. You don't really want your own signal to go much beyond your own walls. If for no other reason than because having clients connected at the edge of a wifi access point will slow down throughput for everyone. So providing Internet connectivity for your neighbors will slow your own pipe down.

The dynamic dns client support doesn't seem to work. Or at least doesn't seem to work very well.

On the plus side, the antennas are upgradeable. On the downside, as someone else noted, the blue power light is really annoyingly bright.

But, as long as you don't expect any bells or whistles, this is a decently cost-effective way to fire up WLANs on both the 2.4 and 5 GHz ranges at the same time.

Cons Review
Very disappointing . I bought this one as a replacement for my aging DI-624. Initial setup was simple and the things worked well as far as internet connectivity. Wireless worked very well for my media players and phones.

But, then the network performance issues started appearing. Large file transfers between computers over wired gigabit connection clocked only 25Mb/s. Even more, file transfers to/from my NAS (Seagate BlackArmor 440) were just unusable - in Kb/s range...

After a whole day of trying different setup options, I called TrendNet tech support. The only answer I got was that "router's purpose is only to connect you to the internet...". That was the last drop - I put back in DI-624, and packed TEW673-GRU for prompt return.
Waned to like this router . Pros: Wireless Dual Band has worked fine and I like the screen even though I seldom use it. Config was simple and easy to set up.

Cons: I wanted to love this router - I really do love my Trendnet 633GR - been nothing but rock stable for 5 years with great speed but my speeds on a directly plugged in computer to the 673 are much less than my 633. My ISP is direct fiber and I get a rock steady 20 MBPS upload which comes out to (through multiple internet test sites) from 17 to 19 MBPS with the 633 but only see 12 to 16 MBPS with this router (this is literally seconds later and before) tested 6 or 7 times over a 24 hours period. A side by side swap and a couple times where I let it sit for a while before doing any tests cause it just seemed strange to see any kind of change in a directly connected computer.

Dual Band is not worth a +20% loss of speed for standard browsing.

Sidenote: I opened a help desk ticket and got the cut and paste answer of 'If you are having trouble with your wireless...'. Which had nothing to do with my issue, an obvious quick, no read response and haven't heard anything since I told them that. Poor service (over a week ago) but I never had to contact them with my 633
USB Ports Not Really Sharable - No Wireless Connect MAC Address filter. . The box desribes one of this router's features as: "Two USB ports for sharing USB flash drives, hard drives, or printers." However, the only way you can get access to a device attached to the USB port is if you install a utility program on your Windows or Mac computer. And even then, only one person at a time may access the "shared" device. In my opinion, the concept of a "shared" device has been well established to mean that it is available in a generic, widely supported way (no utility required) and that more than one person should be able to access the device at the same time. One of the primary reasons to share a device, especially the first two devices listed (USB flash drives, hard drives), directly from a router, is to "share" files. Having to coordinate between one person connecting to write a file and another connecting to read other files is absurd. Not being able to point a media player device (e.g. WDTV or a network share streaming capable TV) at the "shared" devices attached to this router makes that feature essentially worthless to many people." So, this major selling-point feature, listed prominently on the Trendnet TEW-300GRU box, is misrepresented.

Another common feature found on every other wireless access point router I've EVER configured is a MAC (physical) address filter for wireless devices that are permitted (or prohibited from) connecting to the access point at all, even for access to the local network. This router implements the MAC address filtering only to allow or prohibit wireless (and maybe wired too) devices from "accessing the WAN/internet" through the router. There is no way to prohibit or permit devices from connecting locally and accessing other computers on the local network. This is an extra security measure that many people should have activated, or at the very least available as an option in the wireless router configuration, especially those with technically capable neighbors close by.

I would have given it only one star but I suppose in spite of the misleading, device sharing un-feature, and the "basic user only" configuration options, it still serves its main purpose as a wireless access point. If those things are important to you, just pass this by and find a different product from another manufacturer (Linksys, Cisco, Netgear, DLink, etc.) that more accurately represents the actual features of its products on their packaging and marketing material.

Product Image


Feature TRENDnet GREENnet 300 Mbps Concurrent Dual Band Wireless N Gigabit Router TEW-673GRU (Black)

  • Concurrent Dual Band technology generates two separate 300Mbps wireless n networks at the same time
  • Wirelessly stream HD multimedia using the uncongested 5GHz frequency while surfing the Internet using the 2.4GHz frequency
  • Up to 14x the speed and 6x the coverage of a wireless g network
  • Features Wi-Fi Protected Setup (WPS), all Gigabit Ethernet ports, and 2 USB share ports
  • 4 x 10/100/1000Mbps Auto-MDIX LAN ports, 1 x 10/100/1000Mbps WAN port (Internet), 2 x USB 2.0 ports




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Product Details

EAN : 0710931600445
UPC : 710931600445
MPN : 0710931600445
Brand : TRENDnet
Color : Black
Weight : 3 pounds
Height : 3 inches
Length : 12 inches
Width : 10 inches
Binding : Personal Computers
Manufacturer : TRENDnet
Model : TEW-673GRU
Publisher : TRENDnet
SKU : AZDH-TEW673GRU-B003C2SZQE
Studio : TRENDnet

Where To Buy


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