News - Belkin to buy Linksys from Cisco

[HEXUS]

Cisco retreats from consumer market, to focus on core business-to-business activity.

Read more.

[sweey]

I wouldn't touch Belkin hardware if you paid me. I actually decided last weekend to soon replace my Linksys WRT54GS (still working after around 9 years) with an Asus wireless router in the near future and based on this, I'll never own another Linksys product again because future hardware will likely be tainted by Belkin ownership.

[jnutt]

I wouldn't touch Belkin hardware if you paid me.

I agree but I also think Linksys wasn't much better. Any I had worked quite well but never worked for very long. D-Link stuff is good but the new kid on the block has to be TP-Link. I've added a Nano as a reapeater to my home network and I recon you don't get a better bang for your buck. If I ever need another router that's the brand I'll look at first.

[OilSheikh]

God. No!

Belkin are so crap that only PC World employees believe they are the best!

[synaesthesia]

Belkin are the worst of the worst. I've had some diabolical stuff in my time but Belkin takes the crap and adds their logo and a markup. I rate Sumvision stuff over them!

[rabbid]

Linksys should make a budget brand offering to the Belkin stable!

Cant say I have experienced the same as the previous posters with the Belkin cables I have had...

[rabbid]

I agree but I also think Linksys wasn't much better. Any I had worked quite well but never worked for very long. D-Link stuff is good but the new kid on the block has to be TP-Link. I've added a Nano as a reapeater to my home network and I recon you don't get a better bang for your buck. If I ever need another router that's the brand I'll look at first.

had a TPLink WAP, have to agree it worked well for the money

[b0redom]

Constantly surprises me that people who spend hundreds on computers, tablets and phones, want the single connection point to the Internet which is going to last for a LONG time, comparatively, to be as cheap as possible. Ages ago I bought a Draytek, and it's been absolutely rock solid ever since.

[crossy]

Linksys should make a budget brand offering to the Belkin stable! Cant say I have experienced the same as the previous posters with the Belkin cables I have had...

Going to +1 on that cables comment - plus I've had a couple of KVM switches from Belkin that were quite good.

Only Linksys I've had is the E4200 that's my current router. Far better signal strength than the sh**y Netgear stuff that came before (both direct and via Virgin), but it shocked the hell out of me that a router that was pushed as "professional" (even down to "Linksys by Cisco") had so little in the way of "professional" features - heck, you can't even set which wireless band to use - which is a bit of a pain for me because the band it chooses is actually quite busy. And it's darned annoying that if I used the NAS feature that I then had to reboot the router weekly because otherwise it'd lose it's connection to the outside world at inopportune moments (esp 2pm when I was trying to get some work done!).

Funnily enough, the reputation I hear for Belkin's networking gear is that some of it is actually pretty reasonable - so if you're careful then you won't necessarily end up with a "pup".

If I can't buy a Belkin replacement for my E4200, and I won't be buying another Linksys or Netgear, then it looks like Asus are going to get my business. RT66 perhaps.

[AGTDenton]

Nothing exciting really, suprised Cisco lasted this long I actually thought Linksys were dead and buried. Not come accross any of their equipment for years.
PC World should just buy both companies to make the biggest pile of you know what for the Guiness world records.

I'm happy to stick with Draytek and Netgear, though I tend to get Netgears business range rather than their home stuff.

[jim]

Constantly surprises me that people who spend hundreds on computers, tablets and phones, want the single connection point to the Internet which is going to last for a LONG time, comparatively, to be as cheap as possible. Ages ago I bought a Draytek, and it's been absolutely rock solid ever since.

Thing is, as much as that's true, and I don't doubt the credentials of a Draytek, you can get a second-hand Netgear router for £10-20 usually on eBay, and in my experience they've been exceptionally reliable.

Of course, you might buy a duff one, but it's not expensive to replace.

Assuming you don't need the additional features of the Draytek, it won't make the slightest bit of difference day to day as long as it works.

[Alperian]

What is it about Belkin? I have seen some lovely looking products that are great on paper and yet the drivers and the hardware all seem to fail to perform (went to trash can long ago).

I agree though. Linksys is probably going to be soured. I have a geordie router made by Huawei. they are the big competition now.

[crossy]

I agree though. Linksys is probably going to be soured. I have a geordie router made by Huawei. they are the big competition now.

Indulge my curiosity, what's a "geordie router" - one that runs around in a toon army top even in the depths of winter?