Belkin Wireless Router F5D7230-4
Link to Belkin

There have been a lot of deals on this particular router because retailers are constantly running rebates and promotions on it, so you can frequently get it for $10 or less (FAR), and sometimes you can even make money on it.

In every single hot deal thread discussing this router, I see the same questions over and over again. I got tired of this and finally decided to make a Deal Discussion thread to discuss this router, to provide links to more information at AVSForum & DSLReports etc, and to serve as a central warehouse for these questions and answers that come up on a weekly basis.

Hopefully anyone who starts a future thread on this router in Hot Deals will provide a link to this thread, to consolidate and seperate the discussion of this ROUTER from the discussion of the HOT DEAL itself.

FAQ

1. What is WDS bridging? Link to Belkin

2. How do I set up WDS bridging with (2) compatible Belkin routers? Link to Belkin

3. What equipment is compatible with the Belkin 7230-4 for WDS bridging?

Misc Information

I have had several different hardware versions of this router, and found the the original v1000 worked best, no matter what firmware version was loaded. The current model (v2000 I believe) seems to have both range issues and dropped connections on some ISP's networks.

v2000's have no range/network dropouts that I am aware of. I have heard that the v1444's do when paired together but not in a mixed network of v2000 and v1444 routers.

Well, I jumped on this deal today, and after some fidgeting and frustration, I got it to extend my Airport Extreme network, and I regained Wifi for my PS2. I had to settle for WEP, hopefully with more fidgeting I can get it to run WPA.

Thx to wfay for starting this thread, good stuff!!!!!!

I tried to change the IP to a specific number of my 2nd Belkin router (used as AP), but it locked up everytime and has to be reset. But if I let it default to a new IP xx.xx.xx.254, then it worked fine.

In any case, thank you for putting together the info.

Thanks for putting this together. Good job.

One feature that gets little discussion is the free 6 month subscribtion to web site blocking service run by BlueCoat. (Parental Controls)

When I found out that my daughter was visiting some inappropriate web sites, this service was invaluable. I was impressed with Bluecoat's customer service when I was having trouble with Napster. They responded quickly and suggested I turn off the Dynamic Real Time Rating System within Parental Controls. This worked, and Napster has been fine since.

I tried NetNanny 5.0 first, and it slowed down the machine to a crawl, making it useless. With the Belkin Parental Controls ON, I don't notice any kind of performance hit.

Thanks OP! Very usfully Info.