Earlier this year, Cisco finally did away with the Linksys brand name on their home wireless networking gear (they had acquired Linksys all the way back in 2003). They added some swoopy industrial design, redid the configuration UI to be “easier”, renamed the product the “Cisco Valet”, and jacked up the price of a basic home wireless router from about $75 to $129.
My blog-buddy “Going Like Sixty” found himself of a new router the other day and bought one on the premise that it would be very simple to set up, but, as he tells us here, any visions of “breezing through the simple screens” quickly disappeared into that sucking morass known as “Bangalore Tech Support Madness”. He’s a little bitter about the whole thing.
Frankly, I’m having a hard time imagining why the marketeering geniuses at Cisco thought setting up a wireless router needed to be “easier”, since wireless routers have been probably the simplest bit of home computer tech ever created. In fact, they have been, to some degree, TOO easy because it has always been possible to just plug one in and have it work with very little intervention required, with the result being tons of home wireless networks being set up with nobody ever changing the default admin passwords or implementing the built-in (and equally simple-to-enable) encryption. And now most people don’t even need to bother with their own wireless router, since the cable companies wised up and built them right into their cable modems. Jacking the price and alienating the technically-disinclined doesn’t really seem like a great business plan…but, then again, we are talking about Cisco.
Hi,
There are more people like me in the world than like you! For a MS engineer this would be a piece of cake. But for guys like me, who rarely even look in the control panel setting up a router is a hassle.
eg: removing all the previous wireless networks I’ve encountered so that my network would be the “preferred” is deeply buried.
I have cable. My phone goes through the modem. Nice that there are cablecos that provide this service. I didn’t know that.
There are more people like me in the world than like you!
I hope so, that’s how I make my living! :)
You should call your cable company and see if they would swap out your cable modem for one with a built-in wireless router. In these parts, it’s the standard issue now.