Re: Router Rest Logic (rant)

On Wed, 07 Nov 2007 18:41:49 GMT, John Navas
<spamfilter1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Tue, 06 Nov 2007 19:02:04 -0800, Jeff Liebermann
<jeffl@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in
<f892j3p9n9err9fmao6rb4dv9u87mtpv2c@xxxxxxx>:

What could I say? He's right. It *SHOULD* work the way he expected,
but as anyone who has ever dealt with a wireless router, it usually
doesn't. In my never humble opinion, once again, the wireless
industry has screwed up on conventions[1]. Linksys had the right
idea. A short tap of the reset button just reboots the router. Longer
than about 20 seconds, resets the setting to defaults, except in the
WRT54G v8, where it vaporizes most of the firmware.

I personally think the basic problem is using a *consumer* grade product
in a *commercial* environment. I simply won't do that for my own
clients -- if they insist on foolishly cheaping out, then I refer them
to someone else.

How will installing a better grade of hardware prevent an employee
from punching the reset button? Let's see what a Sonicwall TZ150w
will do if the reset button is pushed:
<http://sonicwall.com/downloads/232-000989-00_Rev_B_SonicOS_Std_3.1.2.5_Release_Notes.pdf>
Page 14. It does the same thing as DD-WRT and resets the router to
defaults. Better hardware would have done exactly nothing.

Incidentally, what apparently (not sure) inspired the reset button
pushing and wall wart juggling was that AT&T DSL went down for a
while. There's not much that better hardware can do if the ISP goes
away.

It's about Total Cost of Ownership -- the difference in initial purchase
price for a robust commercial grade product is chump change compared to
the other costs (e.g., downtime, support) of using a cheap consumer
grade product -- "penny wise and pound foolish".

I would love to sell this client a better class of hardware. He has
currently 4 coffee shops and is growing. I have a TZ150w on the shelf
just waiting for the appropriate moment. However, none of the other
coffee shops have had a problem with blown hardware and resets. Only
this one. The others are running a mixture of Linksys, and Buffalo
hardware, some of which I inherited from his previous computer guy.
They all work just fine. The problem here is the unusual combination
of the rather non-intuitive way the reset button works, combined with
the excessively intuitive way the local university student works.

I might add that consumers aren't any better than small businesses --
they tend to buy the cheapest and easiest thing they can get, assuming
all such products are pretty much the same.

I have a great way to sell expensive quality hardware. I sell cheap
hardware and just wait for the inevitable meltdown and disaster. If
the hardware is critical to their business, they'll pay anything to
get reliability. On the initial installation and sale, they ALWAYS
demand the cheapest.

[1] The other screwup is shipping routers that are not "secure by
default".

That I agree with wholeheartedly!

Maybe we need a warning label:
"Punching the reset button may produce unexpected results".

--
# Jeff Liebermann 150 Felker St #D Santa Cruz CA 95060
# 831-336-2558 jeffl@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
# http://802.11junk.com jeffl@xxxxxxxxxx
# http://www.LearnByDestroying.com AE6KS
.