Guys I need your help, Gals if applicable, My signal is spiking all over
the place and I am starting to have more issues than I used to, I'm
307' off the road, 285' + the pole, and another 70' to my splitter, &
then another 20-25' to my modem, Tech support says a router will
help with my signal drop, any reccomendations? Charter guys gave
me these two names "D-Link" and "Linksys" I have 2 TV's and then
the one Desktop, but I also have a PS2, Thanks for all your help ;)

Runb as fast as you can from D-link.

Linksys is the only way to go in my opinion.

My opinion (only worth $.02) your phone service should have some sort of amp/repeater in your line. That is stretching it for a DSL connection. As that line gets older, you will probably notice alot more loss. I also tend to think there maybe other issues with your line. There maybe a bad spot down the road from you that is interferring with your house's pair.

They found a short pair on my phone 3/4 mile down the road that messed up my line. They said it was a lighting strike. Had I not had some test equipment from work for frequency response and dB loss to tell them I had a problem, they would have kept givin me the run around.

The router should provide you some help (it can't hurt), plus the Linksys models have hardware firewalls in them.

Linksys® BEFSR41 EtherFast® Cable/DSL Router With 4-Port Switch (bout $50)

Linksys® BEFSX41 Cable/DSL Firewall Router with 4-Port Switch/VPN Endpoint (bout $80)

I don't have a need for wireless and I prefer the security of wire. They make a wireless version also. For home use I think the top one is all you would need as I don't think you'll be building too many VPNs at home.

For DSL from the pole to the house is generally not an issue unless its bad wire. Your distance from the CO (central office or Fiber hut) is the distance you want to look at its called the loop. If its 15000 ft or more a router isn't going to do much for you. If your running cable a router may boost your signal enough to be useable again.

I'm not sure what you mean by your signal is spiking all over the place. Are you using wireless in the house? If thats your problem then plug up some netgear power adapters http://www.netgear.com/products/details/XE102.php
they work wonders in situation where wiring or wireless in a building is an issue.

A few more details I left out / answering some questions

It is a Cable Internet, I have their best available, 3M :rolleyes:

I am one of the last peeps on the line, when others are
on line, more now than there were, I have signal spikes

belkin and linksys

You shouldn't have much signal drop on the cable TV, they are probably coax, but you can try the router. Since you mentioned more are on board now, it is possible they are trying to squeeze to many folks through one unit, which will rob you of your bandwidth. The more folks on line, the slower it becomes. I've seen various cable companies push the numbers just so they don't have to up grade, or like mine is actin now, they are upgrading/still repairing Katrina damage so we are being suished to gether more for a short time (I hope).

Guys I need your help, Gals if applicable, My signal is spiking all over
the place and I am starting to have more issues than I used to, I'm
307' off the road, 285' + the pole, and another 70' to my splitter, &
then another 20-25' to my modem, Tech support says a router will
help with my signal drop, any reccomendations? Charter guys gave
me these two names "D-Link" and "Linksys" I have 2 TV's and then
the one Desktop, but I also have a PS2, Thanks for all your help ;)
For what you are looking for, head to Best Buy (or a store like it) and get the best deal. For general home use, they are all fine.

For a good deal on a router, if you think that's the way to go, I'd get the US Robotics USR5461. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16833135113

All of what Palf70 is saying makes sense though...

i would go with Linksys, great freaking support, online chat, all the goods.

For wired, I would go BEFSR41.
For wireless, anything in the WRT54G-series (G/GS/GX) will do everything you want and need.

Glad you posted this, I am to far out for DSL, no cable service here. I retired from AT&T, there are about a dozen or retired SWB hands around here. Therefore the local repairman spent some extra time grooming my cable pairs. I can still only connect at 24 Kbs. AT&T will be offering satelite service around the end of this month, I will need to install a router for our two computers in the house and a future one in my shop when I get the satelite installed. Fast Ethernet, wired is what I want to use, but know nada about the routers for Ethernet.

Linksys is the only way to go. They are reasonably priced and have all the backing of Cisco.

I have heard there are some Set-up tweaking needed w/ Linksys?

I don't know sh!t about routers so I am considered a idiot on em

And Bill, I am 15 miles out of town at the almost end of the line :whine:

Hey, LUV

They give you a CD - you connect your computer to the router, you pop in the CD and it runs a program that will connect to the router and help you configure it.

If you run through the wizard and have ANY problems, a phone call to them or a quick trip to their website will provide you with KILLER support and they will help you configure it!!

I have a Dlink at home, and it works fine now, but when I bought it and hooked it up I had to restart 5 or 6 times to get it to work right, funny thing is the same thing happend to my brother...

Lynksys is stronger and supports mutiple VPN applications better. not that it matters that much at home but I am a firm believer that if 2 cars are the same price and one performs better you go with that one.

Luv, if you are going to use a wire based router, the setup is pretty very simple...They have big pictures in the box. It only gets complicated if you want to program the router to do sub-networks and kid blocking etc.

What you described toi me doesn't soundlike an end of the line problem, since you didn't have it before. Sounds like they are trying to run too many folks on one terminal. Cable, unlike DSL has that problem. Cable company banks that not all of you are will be on line at same time, so they speeds won't sacrifice untill alot of folks get on, then you bog down and die. If you are paying for above basic service, they are supposed to guarenntee a certain speed. If they aren't Id be making them get off their butt and fix it or give me a refund.

So it looks link "Linksys" is clearly the leader in this group, so they come with
a card for the PC, is it hard to put in?, I have a Dell XPS and I have never had
to go into it, will it void my extended warranty? How does the cable to the TV
work? is there extra stuff to buy? only wanna go shopping once if you catch
my drift, I have cable in 4 rooms, plus the puter, so that is 5 connections, it
appears most routers are for a max of 4, but the computer is actually 2 in 1
I have Media center so I have internet and Tv on my pc, so technically only
4 connections, just want to know everything I need, also I have seen what
is called a PCI adapter, is that something needed also? or just a extra toy?
Once again guys, thanks for all of your help and comments with this post ;)

the router can only accept one cable input LUV. Where ever your cable modem is is how you will connect it. You will connect the cable modem to the WAN jack of the router with a standard network CAT5 or CAT6 cable. You will then run another network cable between the Router and the computer(s) you want hooked up.

Down here they have us hook the cable modem to a dedicated connection, another words not splittting the same jack to a TV and computer connection. Router has nothing to do with your TV reception.

If you go for the wireless router, you'll have to purchase seperate wireless network cards for each PC you want connected, unless they are already equipped with one. Most computer made in last ffew years have a regular network card/NIC built into the motherboard, so you probably won't need to purcahse extra equipment if you use a tradtional wire base router for your computer connection.

Not sure how the TV is run into your computer, but it doesn't run through the router.

No you will not void your warrenty with Dell by opening the box. Most of the time unless you bought an extended warrenty, your dead after 90 days with tem anyways.

OIC, So the router is computer only, and possibly my PS2, but I still
use existing coax for all my TV connections, so can I run the router
off of a splitter, and then all the TV's of the other line, I only have
one dedicated line coming into the house from the box outside :(

That may be part of your signal problem them. Cable company ran a seperate line from the house juntion for the computer and all other stuff runs off the other connection. Nothing should be on the coax connection with the cable for peak operation. They are essentually using a splitter outside before they run it into your house, but typically the splitter they use are much better than what you and I can find in Wally wolrd and Radio Slack.

Well my outside connection is in a place where I can't add a second line,
I can only split off under my house close to the original line, this sucks :(

The splitter should be where the main line comes in.

The splitter should be where the main line comes in.

The box on the side of the house that looks like a tortise shell right?

I cannot acces that due to the layout of my house, I can only split
off the wire they ran to my distribution block (Splitter) which is 80'
long to the block, I can split in at around 30' for the router, it's as
close as I can get, right now my connection to my puter is some
140' from the tortise shell, If I spilt at the 30' mark it would be 40'

Yes the turtle is the place.

Yes the shorter run would probably help a good bit.

Down here the cable will run another line for you from the shell to the computer area (ours i no charge for the computer drop) You might see what they say about that.

But yes if you can shorten the drop to the computer that much it should help a good bit.

Down here the cable will run another line for you from the shell to the computer area (ours i no charge for the computer drop) You might see what they say about that.



They only way they can do it on my house is to run the wires on the outside
of the brick, my garage is where the turtle is so no craw space under it :whine:

That's how they did mine, on outide of brick. I got lucky, computer room is on the outer wall right next to the turtle box.

I have 2 linksys WRT-54G's and both have performed flawlessly in both wired and wireless. I had a D-link and it was garbage, I had to reset it every 6-8 hours. Once the linksys's are setup you never have to mess with them again. My wireless reached pretty far too. I was in my neighbors garage about 200ft away and going through 1 interior wall and through 2 exterior walls and still had a strong signal.

Mike