Asus WL-500g Premium - Wireless Bridge Is Up Again
I had to put the Topcom SKYR@CER WBR 254G router to sleep after its exposure to electro shock therapy. I'll keep it, of course. It may be completely useless as it is now, but with tomorrow's technology, I may be able to revive it. To replace the Topcom, I opted for a Asus WL-500g Premium, which I received this evening.
I chose the WL-500gP over another WRTG54G because the WL-500gP has more juice (266 MHz CPU, 8 Mb flash, 32 Mb RAM vs. 200 MHz CPU, 4 Mb flash, 16 Mb RAM), plus several neat features that I'm eager to try out:
- Two USB ports for connecting external drives, a webcam or a printer.
- Built-in BitTorrent client
- External drives can be accessed by FTP or Windows shared drive
My only initial beef concerns the WL-500gP manual, which does not appear to cover more advanced configuration settings. For instance, the WL-500gP is being hyped as featuring Afterburner (speedbooster) and BroadRange (increases wireless signal coverage), but the manual mentions neither. The hyped features may just be marketing mumbo jumbo, but this forum post suggests otherwise…
A couple of links:
- Brief rundown of Asus WL-500g Premium specs at Melbourne Wireless
- Download different versions of Asus firmware
- Official Asus WL-500gP forum
- (Un?)official WL-500gP forum
- Asus' list of printers supported by WL-500 series devices
- Lists of compatible hardware as reported by users (webcams, printers, HDD's etc.)
I have just finished setting up the WL-500gP and it was no biggie. My Linksys WRT54G running DD-WRT firmware in client-bridge mode hooked up with the WL-500gP without any problems and my home network is now fully functional again, w00t!
I'm running Asus firmware on the WL-500gP and it seems to work well despite the clunky web interface. I must be spoiled from working with the slick Linksys interfaces.
I bought the WL-500gP from Proshop and it was an altogether pleasant experience: shipping was fast and I received several emails with updated information on my order, including shipment track 'n' trace.
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