D-Link DIR-655 Xtreme N Gigabit Router

D-Link DIR-655 Xtreme N Gigabit Router
Not too long ago, wireless routers for the home were little more than unattractive plastic black boxes with flashing green lights in front and protruding antenna out the back. Nowadays, though, home networking manufacturers are putting a little more effort into their designs. The AU$399 DIR-655 Xtreme N Gigabit router sports a white facade contrasted with a band of black rubber across its LED strip. White it may be, but it lacks the iPod inspired minimalism of the Netgear WNR834B. Still the D-Link's not a bad looker ... for a router

Based on the draft 802.11n wireless standard -- commonly referred to as Draft-N -- the D-Link DIR-655 Xtreme N Gigabit router promises a lot, like sustained wireless transfer rates of around 200Mbps (twenty times that of 802.11g) and a range of 50 metres. Testing for wireless claims are carried out by manufacturers in controlled environments that are free of the radio interference, walls and sundry solid objects which pepper the world in which we live.

To test the D-Link's bold claims, we used D-Link's DWA-645 RangeBooster N 650 PCMCIA network card attached to our laptop. Even with the laptop in the same room as the router, we were unable to attain the claimed 200Mbps. Despite a claimed signal strength of 300Mbps, we reached an average of just 28Mbps during a 4GB file transfer. In other rooms and at a distance of roughly 15-30 metres, reported signal strength dropped to 250Mbps with our file transfer averaging out at 20Mbps. At the edge of the router's claimed range, 50 metres, web surfing brought back memories of the days of dial-up internet, while our file transfer speed dropped to 260Kbps.