Buffalo’s WHR-HP-G54 Router

Sometimes, life will throw a curveball right at your head. A dropped wireless Internet connection here and there is nothing new when we’re talking about Linksys or D-link routers. But when mine started dropping out frequently within minutes apart, I knew it was time to go ahead, cut my losses, and get a new one. When the Buffalo WHR-HP-G54 router arrived in the mail, I was actually impressed at the value for the price. You get the router, a vertical stand, an adapter, power cord, Ethernet cable, quick setup guide, setup CD, Air Navigator software, and even a wall-mounting bracket. It’s a tad pricier than other routers in the same class, but it also has quite a bit more bang for that buck.

The design of this router is a cut above the conventional consumer routers, unlike Linksys‘ blue and black design schemes that stand out like a sore thumb. That wasn’t the only thing done differently from conventional routers, though. The CD setup program will coddle you to get your router set up and the automatic settings in place, almost to the point of insulting you. After your router is set up and everything’s working for you, you’re essentially tossed to the wolves, and it’s up to you to navigate the built-in router configuration utility. The problem is that although extremely functional and fully-featured, it isn’t the easiest one to use. Lots of technical terms could confuse new users. Buffalo’s website has a ton of technical information, as well as useful utilities for all of their products. You can even download the setup CD ISO’s in case you lose them.

Although it wasn’t laid out as simply as Linksys and D-link would have done, everything I needed (and then some) was at my disposal. After all, performance is what I was after, not necessarily ease of use. Since this particular router is designated as an “HP” (High-Powered) model, living up to its name was more important to me than simplicity. Fortunately, this router more than lives up to the promises made by Buffalo and by the users on Newegg.com. It’s been five days now, and I have yet to experience any drops in connection, period. The range and speed of the router are slightly above average. While in range you’ll notice the speed and connection simply will not drop.

So the Buffalo WHR-HP-G54 delivered on performance and reliability, but have you ever owned a router that didn’t deliver or only half-delivered on its promised features? That’s something I was worried about. This router advertised itself as having an access point mode, which is typically not true from most manufacturers. Buffalo eased my fears as they actually include a physical switch to switch between routing and access point modes, and it works. The router delivers on quite a feature set. It has four ports, the typical 802.11b/g standards, the extremely obscure 802.3/3u standards, Buffalo’s own AOSS (which works great with the Nintendo DS), MIMO, WPA-TSK, built-in amplifier, optimized high-speed routing, a two-year warranty on both parts and labor, and a lot more. You would be hard-pressed to find a router with more features for the price.

The router isn’t perfect, though. The web-based configuration utility will be a bit disarming for router/networking novices. People who have done this before might actually appreciate the way they set it up. I also don’t understand why the draft-N (802.11n) standard couldn’t have been included in lieu of the 802.3/3u standards which are even more obscure. These are very minor issues, and in no way really detract from the performance. Price, performance and feature set all considered, the WHR-HP-G54 is really in a class by itself. If you’ve found that Linksys or D-Link no longer cut it for you, definitely consider this router.