D-Link DIR-660 Limited Edition
August 14th, 2007 | by Josh Norem
Full Review - Use and Testing
Use and Testing When you run the CD, it walks you through the installation step by step via flash animations that show, for instance, you unplugging your broadband modem, plugging in the router, and so forth. We followed all the instructions and everything worked perfectly. Though installing wireless networks should be this easy, it usually isn’t, so we give D-Link credit for making it so simple even our mom could do it. After several minutes, where the router found our connection and dished out IPs, we decided to take it for a test drive in both G and N speeds to see if we could discern a difference. For testing, we used our recently reviewed Lenovo 3000 V200, which includes an Intel wireless adapter that is capable of B/G/N performance. We set up file sharing between the notebook and our desktop, enabled encryption, and then timed file transfers in both G mode and N mode. Below are the times we received for both speeds. 802.11G mode (minutes: seconds) As you can see, there is a dramatic increase in performance when switching from G to N mode. It’s astonishing, really. And also, we weren’t even connected to the N router at the highest rate possible. According to Vista, our connection was running at 144Mbps, instead of the 250Mbps-300Mbps it is capable of running.
When you first pull the router out of its anti-static bag, it’s pretty clear what you need to do to initiate the installation. There’s a bright orange tag that tells you to run the included CD before connecting anything.
The Flash-based installation walkthrough is perfect and works very well
Transferring 800MB file: 6:12
Transferring 253MB file: 2:07
802.11N mode (minutes: seconds)
Transferring 800MB file: 3:20
Transferring 253MB file: 0:41
Suffice it to say, this performance leap is impressive and makes an N router (along with an N adapter, natch) a must-have for people who transfer files across a network on a frequent basis.
The 660 router delivers wireless speeds that are triple that of 802.11G
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by Ben K on August 23, 2007:
“Is it worth the extra money to have that fancy display? Probably not, but the router itself kicks some serious butt. Super easy to setup and I have not had a problem with any games to date. The range is pretty good too.” More...