EnGenius ESR600H Long Range 300+300Mbps Dual-Band Wireless-N Router EnGenius ESR600H Long Range 300+300Mbps Dual-Band Wireless-N Router

Pros: Turns on

Cons: NAT is screwy. About 8 months ago, installed this in a dentist office that uses client/server software. We had replaced all the workstations and server, as well as a new gigabit switch, cabling etc. New software was always sluggish. I had chalked it up to the new software being buggy (which it is). Last week there was a bug fix release for their software, which improved the speeds somewhat, but some of the software clients wouldn't connect to the database on the server. Windows networking seemed fine (could see all the machines) all pings to the server and gateway (this router) would come back with almost 0 latency as one would expect from a gigabit network, but the software would not connect, and would give a tcp request error showing 2 or 3 different WAN IPs. After a go around with their (the dental software) tech support, we decided it was a routing issue, and, low and behold, if I disconnected the internet connection, the system worked perfectly. I flashed the router with the latest firmware, reset to factory settings and rebuilt the configuration a couple different ways. (DSL modem in bridge with router handling PPPoE session) (reset DSL modem to let it handle PPPoE session and set the router to receive a dynamic IP) No resolution no matter what I tried. So I removed the router and went to just letting the DSL modem act as the gateway and the system works perfectly. Better than ever in fact.

Other Thoughts: The only way around NAT is to set up static routing, which I have no intention of doing. Will probably use this as an access point only. Now I'm seriously concerned as to what's going on with this router because I use this as the gateway for my shop as well. It was puzzling too that only certain machines were affected, insofar as they actually wouldn't connect to the server, ALL the clients were sluggish before removing the router. I ran virus and malware scans on all the workstations and they came up clean. Hopefully DD-WRT has a firmware for this router as I no longer trust engenius with my networks.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear ToadeR,

We appreciate your time in posting your comments and feedback. We are sorry to hear about your experience.

We understand that you are having issues with the NAT on the ESR600H. It would be great if you could give our customer support team a call so we can check on the router. We look forward to getting this issue straightened out right away.

You may reach us through our number at 1-888-735-7888 or e-mail us at support@engeniustech.com. Our support team would be glad to be of service to you.

Thank you for your patience and we look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

Mike
Engenius Customer Support Team

Pros: Sleek, removable high-gain antennas, fast interface, LOTS of options in the interface. Has Basic and Admin sides to the config.

Firmware update is easy to find.

Performance is solid. Love this unit.
Technical support at EnGenius speaks english, located in California and is 100% on point. The guy I spoke with was actually a wireless network engineer and actually knew what beam-forming and SNR meant.

Had this unit running solid with heavy daily traffic for over 6 months straight without a single reboot.

dual band.

Cons: Can't think of any.

Pros: Very fast when you are close to it.

Cons: Dosent cover my 3 bedroom appartment , very poor wifi signal , super short range , my old netgear rounder gets better range.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear maksim,

We appreciate your time in posting your comments and feedback. We are sorry to hear about your experience.

We understand that you are having wireless range issues with the ESR600H. There might be some possible settings you have not tried yet. We look forward to getting this issue straightened out right away.

You may reach us through our number at 1-888-735-7888 or e-mail us at support@engeniustech.com. Our support team would be glad to be of service to you.

Thank you for your patience and we look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

Mike
Engenius Customer Support Team

Pros: none

Cons: didnt work right from day one. now that I have another router, this one was junk from the start.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear tommy2oclock,

We appreciate your time in posting your comments and feedback. We are sorry to hear about your experience.

We understand your decision but we still hope to earn your business in the future. We take your feedback seriously and continue to work to improve our products and customer support.

You may reach us through our number at 1-888-735-7888 or e-mail us at support@engeniustech.com. Our support team would be glad to be of service to you. Thank you for your patience and we look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

Mike
Engenius Customer Support Team

Pros: I have yet to find one

Cons: This thing is terrible, the wireless network crashes a few times an hour and takes a few minutes to reboot. The range is average, I had to setup a repeater running dd-wrt to get full coverage of my house. This thing can't stream any video through one floor and across my house. The admin is not user friendly and support is almost non existent, 8am - 5pm M-F, so I can't resolve this issue because I work and would have to take time off to try and resolve this issue. I give up and I'm buying another router, one that will work.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear Valued Customer,

We appreciate your time in posting your comments and feedback. We are sorry to hear about your experience.

We understand that you are having problems with the ESR600H. The firmware might need to be upgraded to the latest version. We look forward to getting this issue straightened out right away.

Please allow us to do some troubleshooting with you. You may reach us through our number at 1-888-735-7888 or e-mail us at support@engeniustech.com. Our support team would be glad to be of service to you.

Thank you for your patience and we look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

Mike
Engenius Customer Support Team

Pros: A above average router at an affordable price.

I installed this on Dec 1st 2012. I have not rebooted or shut it down. It works great and has not gotten hung like most over the counter routers. It is as reliable as a commercial brand router.

It has lots of advanced features. I mainly purchased it to stream video, watch internet TV, and to do backup transfers over the gigabit switch ports. The landline transfers between gigabit enabled computers is very fast. I set up QoS to manage my over the internet Nettalk phone communication and everything else. I have tested QoS on my phone while downloading large files and it maintains my quality of voice flawlessly.
I have had up to three family members streaming internet media simultaneously without a hitch. It works well at high wireless bandwidth streaming. This router can handle it well.

Cons: It is touted as long range. I do not think the range is any better than most of the standard wireless routers. I do not see a range boost from my two previous routers running at 2.4Ghz. My old D-Link DI-624 and Netgear Mr814 feature wise are not even close comparison wise but the range I get are about the same. So if you're looking to boost your range this router may not be the right one. The range is about normal with the Tx Power Range set to 100%.

Other Thoughts: All of my wireless devices get a consistent 54Mbps connection rate. I have tweaked one of my newer laptops to get above 100Mbps connection at the 5Ghz band. Getting higher connections is a ticky thing and it all has to do with the adapter capabilities and settings. This router is great that it can broadcast both bands simultaneously. It is like running two separate routers.

Pros: Old router was causing my internet to be slow so purchased this one, mainly for the external USB port. It was a little different setting it up but once I got used to the gui, making changes is easy. USB Hard Drive feature is nice. Can access it from any PC connected to the router. You access it like network share which you can then do a mapped drive. Set it to auto map once you connected to your wifi.

Cons: A little difficult setting it up. You have to install their software on a PC to get the USB hard drive working. I thought it would just be plug-n-play but apparently not. Speeds are good, service has pretty good range, and plenty of ports on the back.

Pros: Great Range
Great Speed

Cons: none so far

Other Thoughts: Great router especially for the price. Have not installed the usb sharing feature yet, but other than that everything is fantastic with this

Pros: Good range, better than my previous Buffalo router. I get excellent signal everywhere in a 2000 sq.ft house. This is my first N router but internet streaming (Netflix, ect) seems improved. This router has been solid so far, after one reboot for initial configuration I've had 42 days of uptime with no hiccups.

Cons: The setup UI is slow to respond at times, sometimes a refresh will bring it up and sometimes not. Options are limited compared to DD-wrt but I can do most everything I need to do. The included documentation is not very helpful for anything but basic setup.

Other Thoughts: Previous reviewer mentioned this router doesn't support a guest network, this is not true. You can make a separate ssid in Wireless/basic, then set the parameters in Wireless/policy.

Pros: it showed a faster connection than my old "n" router, dual band, worked well with wired computers

Cons: It dropped connections and could not connect to some computers. The shown speed would slow to a crawl whenever i tried to use the internet. I updated the firmware, but it did not help. I am going to try to send it back. Also, the blue flashing lights are really bright and cannot be dimmed or turned off.

Other Thoughts: it had the same range as my old "n" router

Manufacturer Response:

Dear ND,

We are sorry for any inconvenience this might have caused you. If you are willing to do some troubleshooting please contact us at 888-735-7888 or e-mail us at support@engeniustech.com. Our support team would be glad to be of service to you.

Sincerely,

Mike
Engenius Customer Support Team