DD-WRT is pretty easy to install, I’ve had to do much more in the past to get a modified firmware up and running. Mine came pre-flashed though, it was pretty cheap on eBay, so I don’t have first hand experience, but in the past I’ve had to solder certain points and jtag the device in order to flash it. I’ve also used telnet in the past to flash, so the steps for this router seem all too familiar.

Anyway, just from playing with this router I love it. So many things I can tweak and mess with. Mostly, what I’ve done so far is setup WPA2 for my wireless encryption, MAC block, QoS, and virtual AP’s.

WPA2 is the best encryption out there right now, so I’m happy with it, I’m also blocking by MAC addresses, so only known devices can connect. QoS (Quality of Service) is rather interesting because I can set priority to certain connections, so if one program is hogging bandwidth, I’m still able to surf the web at full speed.

Virtual AP’s is another interesting feature, it makes it so I can setup different AP’s that have different types of access. For instance, one could have the internet only, the LAN only, or both LAN and internet. This could be useful for a bunch of different things.

I can also adjust the wireless mW so that can help cover more area, but after a certain point you’re going to want to get a better antenna if you need longer distance.

So far, that’s all I’ve played with, but there’s many, many more features I may or may not use in the future.

Uptime on this router is awesome, it stays up for weeks.

Statistics are also pretty interesting, I can monitor all my bandwidth, how much bandwidth other devices on the network are using, overall internet bandwidth consumed, and LAN bandwidth.

Overall, I’m pretty impressed with this router, and if you don’t have a dd-wrt capable router what are you waiting for? It’s worth every penny.