Netgear shows off 802.11n line

The entire line is called RangeMax NEXT, and the most obvious advance is the 300Mbps speeds associated with the new standard, and all the related tech that goes with it. The line of products also physically stands out, mainly because of the lack of external antennas. They are quite sleek.

The next most important thing is the incorporation of GigE in several of the products. The flagship of the line, the WNR854T is an 802.11n router with a GigE switch on it instead of the usual 10/100. This is an obvious step, if you can pass packets at >100Mbps, you had better be able to feed it at >100Mbps or there exists one of the proverbial 'issues'. Luckily, the 854T does not have said issue.

The other interesting part is a notebook adapter called WN511T. It is basically a PCMCIA 802.11n card, nothing huge, but without it, the WNR854T is effectively an 802.11g switch with a fast wired switch on it. Together, they are sold as the WNB511T bundle, a decent place to get your feet wet on the new standard.

Netgear also has a 10/100 router called the WNR834, but it seems pretty pointless to me, unless your server has a -n card, everything but the wireless will be the bottleneck. To round things out, there is a PCI adapter called the WN311, an access point called the WN802T, and a DLS 2+ Modem Router with a 10/100 switch labeled as DG834N.

It looks like Netgear will kick off the 802.11n era of wireless networking with a solid lineup, no major gaping holes. The products run from $349 for the bundle to $129 for a simple PCMCIA card, no bank-breaking here. The only thing the lineup lacks is GigE on all ports, something that should be a necessity at this end of the market. Even without it, Netgear has a really good first set of 802.11n offerings. µ