Netgear WGR614v6 wireless access can’t be enabled by manual configuration
This morning I started to configure yet another Netgear WGR614v6 wireless router (WAP) for a customer site. As experienced as I am with Netgear wireless routers, I opt to run neither the installation CD nor the setup wizard. I hooked up my laptop to one of the four RJ-45 ports on the router, then pointed Firefox to “www.routerlogin.net/start.htm”.
Everything works fine except:
- I had to power cycle the unit when I changed the subnet for the LAN. simple “ipconfig /renew” on the laptop picked up old subnet range.
- wireless radio is disabled and no obvious way to turn it on. The check-box was shadowed. Wireless options can be configured just fine, such as SSID/WPA-PSK/channel.
Two weeks ago, I experienced similar problem on a different WGR614v6 wireless router when I configured it manually. However, that time, I managed to unshadow the checkbox (or enable wireless access) by moving the WAN cable from the separate Internet port to one of the LAN ports on the unit. It went in bridge mode instead of router mode. Today the same move didn’t do the trick, even after power cycling the unit.I had plenty sleep last night, so I reasoned with some simple logic 
The wizard mode must have worked, otherwise the disabled wireless router would have generated tons of technical support calls to their support centers in India. As the last ditch, I clicked on the ’setup wizard’ link on the top left corner of the administration GUI. It walked me through the steps and pulled WAN/LAN/wireless settings I already entered using manual mode. Once I finished the wizard, the wireless LED on the front panel of the WGR614v6 unit suddenly turned green. Vola!
Needless to say I am glad now my test blackberry 7270 can get online again, with WPA-PSK for link security. However, any sane logic behind to have the check-box shadowed out?! I can understand why a vendor would choose not to enable it by default due to liability concerns. But, disabling the wireless access and ruling it out as a option totally? Worse, for a product branded as a ‘wireless router’?!
To prove I am not kidding, here is a little screenshot.
One more gripe about this router is the saved settings. The WGR614v6 model couldn’t use setting backup for a different unit of the same model. “restore settings” using backup settings saved on another unit will give you “please select correct configuration file”. Netgear.cfg, the saved settings, was a binary file, with MAC addresses of the unit embedded. So, if you have a RMAed unit or simply want to replicate settings across multiple units, you can’t. How silly. The setting backups for other models can be edited directly with Notepad or vi.
More gripes when I configured yet another WGR614v6 today (2007/02/22)
- The set-up wizard detected my WAN port as static IP port twice in row. Sinec I knew for sure it was a DHCP port, I click on ‘back’, then retried till I see ‘DHCP detected’.
- After enabling WIFI as described above, my WI-FI Blackberries (Blackberry 7270) couldn’t get online. Since the WLAN profile was pushed down to the 7270 from my own BES server via IT policy, I knew the SSID and PSK key are correct on the blackberries. I copy+paste the key from a saved text file when I configured the WGR614v6 unit in manual mode followed by a wizard, so I don’t think I made a typo or anything. pretty weird. Without much to troubleshoot, I re-entered the PSK key in the ‘wireless setting’ section for the unit again. All of the sudden these Blackberries started to have five bars in signal and got online soon after. weird…
