NETGEAR FVG318 ProSafe 802.11G Wireless VPN Firewall 8

This is a fine wireless router, well above average. It has a few shortcomings that I'll get to in a moment.The good stuff: It's got lots of features -- wired ports, WiFi, VPN. It's pretty easy to configure, especially if you're familiar with networking.The not-so-good stuff: The Web-based configuration utility is fine, but somewhat strangely laid out, especially for content filtering. The screens all work, but they are somewhat confusing. The content filtering works well, but it's not as flexible as I had hoped.I bought this to keep the kids away from video games. The content filtering is sort of ok for that, but it's inflexible. You can permit access by time of day, and you can deny access to certain Web sites, but you can't deny access to certain sites at specific times of day. It's all or nothing. The content filtering works well, but if you have more than a few words you're trying to filter out, you'll find that Web pages load more slowly because the router has to scan them for your blocked words.So in summary, for the price paid I'm happy. I wish it did a bit more for content filtering, but for the price this is a pretty good deal.

I too had a poor experience with this device. There are a LOT of updates and fixes available for the problems described by the other reviewer, but unfortunately they are only available for the "V2" device. Amazon shares part of the blame for the problem since I ordered my device WELL after the V2 released but Amazon sent me one of the "old stock" V1 devices.After performing all possible V1 updates, tuning, tweaks, etc. I was ready to return the device. I decided that I would give the V2 firmware a try (yes, it may void your warranty, but if the device is an absolute piece of trash anyway...)The "good news" is that the V2 firmware loaded just fine and performs "as advertised" - just no warranty. DDNS actually works for me with the V2 firmware, and all my VPN tunnels also all work without any issues. My device is used in a light business / heavy home user environment with 5 persistent VPN tunnels and I have not noticed any performance related issues, random resets, or dropped connections after the V2 flash upgrade.Shame on Netgear for not offering an upgrade path from V1 to V2 (partial credit or something).Shame on Netgear for not supporting the V2 software on the V1 device (since the V2 software is the only thing that makes the device usable).Shame on Amazon for not returning all their old stock to Netgear and offering their customers the latest version of the product - my main complaint here is that if I purchase a book that has multiple revisions, at least I am told, and therfore able to select which revision of the book I would like to purchase. This was not the case with my purchase of the firewall.CM

Inexpensive purchased used so no support, outdated but all you need to do is just upgrade the firmware, great value and great security. I wanted more security and on a budget so I purchased this for the main router, I don't use WIFI but other do so I needed it. So friends and Chrome-Cast, un-trusted devices, phones for guests ect ect all on first router. I never use WIFI on my phone bc it's just to unsafe period I think. This product is All in one device but this is my first line of defense and I have the Netgear ac1200 behind it which is new and still supported device. The log on the new device has almost no activity other than legitimate from time to time that shows up so this router has blocked all the unwanted scanning of my new router and shows that it is doing a great job.

Purchased this device with another Netgear device(same type just without wireless) to perform a site to site vpn as well as manage my network. I had some stability issues with this device as well as the VPN would almost always drop. Most of the time I had recycle the device to get it back. I eventually had to replace these devices as they where not meeting my needs. I had contacted netgear support there response was to reapply the same firmware and test again. Eventually gave up and purchased Zywall's to replace these and am extremely pleased with them.

While researching this product, I found many, many negative reviews. But, in the end, being able to get a Netgear VPN, firewall, router and wireless capability for 100 dollars less than buying the VPN and wireless access point separately was too much to pass up. As I have often found with networking (especially wireless) products, the underlying issue of the large number of negative reviews is people's lack of understanding of networking and/or inability to properly configure the device. In the case of this device, the configuration issue did turn out to be quite a headache, but the persistence was well worth it. If you are having trouble getting it configured, especially the part of upgrading the firmware, check out some of the reviews on NewEgg-- it made the difference for me. Once I got the firmware upgraded, the rest of the configuration was very similar to all the other Netgear products I own, and it has been a very solid performer for over a month now.

simple, on time, did the trick!