Highlights:

• Simultaneous dual band N900 router with SmartBeam technology
• Gigabit Ethernet ports
• HD media router, fast 1080p video streaming and lag-free gaming
• Shareport plus USB 3.0 for share storage, printer, NAS and DLNA certified – 10x faster than USB 2.0
• Advanced security

This is what D-Link loyal users waiting for – the wireless N900 HD media router. This is the dual band version of the D-Link wireless HD media router with N900 technology. The dual band version with N600 DIR-827 has been around for a while. Among the other wireless N900 routers available in the market today, the DIR-857 includes one USB 3.0 port that makes it different with others.

What this Product Does

D-Link introduces three high performance HD media routers in 2011 as shown in the following table.

All the three routers are designed for HD media streaming and fast responsive gaming, which include one USB 3.0 port (except Dir-657) with SharePort technology and is DLNA certified for seamless connection with other DLNA compliant devices including XBOX, Blu-Ray, HDTV and more. Shareport technology allows you connect storage devices or printer for sharing across the network.

Not many wireless routers with USB port allow you hosting a USB printer for sharing, except the storage device. USB port on Linksys E4200 doesn’t support hosting USB printer, but Linksys E4200V2 does.  For a quick access to your camera’s SD Card memory, just insert it into the SD Card slot in the router and the good thing is that it is DLNA compliant too for seamless access.

click for spec details

The DIR-857 is designed with ultimate speed – using wireless N900 technology to double your bandwidth demand up to 900Mbps (each band up to 450Mbps theoretically). Any brand new laptops which are equipped with Intel® Centrino® Ultimate-N 6300 Wi-Fi adapter can connect optimally to the router. What about the wireless USB adapters, are there some with 450Mbps speed? Trendnet offers you TEW-684UB 450Mbps USB adapter, TEW-687GA wireless gaming adapter, and TEW-680MB wireless dual band Media Bridge with 450Mbps speeds.

Like other high performance wireless routers, the three routers include Gigabit interfaces in their LAN (4x) for reliable wired connection to any Ethernet-enabled devices including today’s brand new All-in-one computers which are equipped with Gigabit NIC adapter. Any models of powerful gaming desktop and laptops computers are also equipped with Gigabit port for high speed and lag-free gaming experiences.

D-Link DIR-857 Vs Netgear WNDR4500

Netgear WNDR4500 N900 includes two USB 2.0 ports. This is valuable to let you host both storage device and printer together. Media storage to support your media entertainment and printer to support home office for printing activities are two essential devices in your “work and play” network environment. Two is sometimes better than one, but USB 3.0 in Dir-857 is the next generation of high speed USB technology which is 10x faster than USB 2.0 (in other wireless routers with USB 2.0 port).

Other features are almost the same including gigabit ports, DLNA media server and security features but I don’t see guest network feature in Dir-857.

By Ki Grinsing

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