Linksys WRT610N is a simultaneous dual band wireless N gigabit router. When you need to purchase the router for your home wireless network, should you choose the WRT610N or Linksys E320 N600?

Linksys WRT610N was very popular at that time before other new wireless routers introductions which adopt N750 wireless technology were shipped. Linksys introduces new lines of E series wireless routers including Linksys 1200, 1500, 2500, 3200 and the fastest one is Linksys E4200 N750 router. One of the new E series that can be compared to the WRT610N is Linksys E3200 N600 router. Are there any feature differences between them? The table below shows you the main features between them.

Wireless Standards

When you need to choose the best wireless router, the fastest wireless technology will become the main reason to choose one. The latest wireless standard is the 802.11n technology which was ratified in Sep 2009 replacing the draft version. WRT610n was introduced into the market using the draft 802.11n technology, while all the new E series routers adopt the 802.11n standard.

Both routers are powered by internal antennas, 3xinteranal antennas with MIMO technology each bands for better range and speed. Linksys WRT610N delivers the high speeds up to 270Mbps each band, while Linksys E3200 delivers the high speeds up to 300Mbps each band (N600 technology). In the real world you will never reach the maximum wireless speeds due to many environment factors.

Ethernet Ports

Both Linksys WRT610N and Linksys E3200 N600 are equipped with Gigabit Ethernet ports both for LAN (4xports) and WAN (1xport) interfaces. You can take advantage of gigabit LAN ports for high speed and reliable wired connections to any computers with Gigabit NIC ready. For Cable broadband Internet users, you can take advantage of DOCSIS 3.0 cable modem with Gigabit Ethernet port such as Surfboard SB6120. Note that the modem and wireless routers used will not improve the performance of internet connectivity unless you upgrade your bandwidth plan with your ISP.

USB Port

Both routers include one USB port to let you share the external USB storage across the network. Unfortunately you cannot use the port to attach a shared USB printer. To share your printer, you should do it manually by connecting it to the computer and configure it for sharing. Or you need to purchase a separate wireless print server. Unlike Linksys E series wireless routers which the USB port is not designed for shared printer, the Asus RT-N56U includes two USB ports you can use to host both shared storage and shared printer at the same time eliminating the requirement of purchasing a print-server.

The Linksys E3200 includes Cisco connect software to help you manage the network including the shared storage, the shared printer and security settings.

Guest Network

Guest network is a feature that let you grant internet access to the guests without the need of providing access to your local network. it’s a separate SSID with separate password rather than giving your password to your friends / guests. WRT600N doesn’t support the guest access but the new Linksys E series including the E3200 does.

All other standard features including dual firewall feature (NAT & SPI), SSID broadcast disable, VPN pass-through (not VPN natively) and wireless security encryption WPA/WPA2, the two routers support them as well.

Connection Diagram

The figure 1 shows a typical networking diagram that uses Linksys E3200 (or Linksys WRT610N) as the center of the network. USB external storage connects to the USB port of the router to share across the network. Any types of streaming media adapter such as Roku XDS, Apple TV or Boxee by D-Link can be used to stream the media from the storage or direct streaming from the internet.

Linksys WRT610N is an old generation of Linksys high performance router which has nearly the same features as the new Linksys E3200 N600 series.

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