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Internal Details
Figure 4 is my own photo of the WRT120N's main board, which I took because the FCC ID photos didn't let me see all the components. Where Belkin went with Ralink for its N150 router, Cisco has tapped Atheros and produced the first product that I have seen using their Align single-stream chipset.
Figure 4: WRT120N Main board
Specifically, the large chip is an AR7240 network processor SoC which includes a 5-port 10/100 Ethernet switch. Its MIPS32 24K processor core is clocked at 400 MHz and has a 16 bit DDR2 memory interface.
The smaller device surrounded by a solder footprint for an RF shield that apparently wasn't needed is an AR9285 single-stream N MAC/BB/radio. 2 MB of flash and 32 MB of RAM finish up the design.
You might notice that even though the radio has a single transmit channel, there are two antennas. When I asked Atheros about this, they said the dual antennas are used to support antenna diversity for receive, just like most 802.11b/g products.
Routing Features
The 120N implements the standard Linksys router feature set that includes:
- DHCP, Static, PPPoE, PPTP, L2TP, Telstra Cable WAN types
- Built-in Dynamic DNS clients for TZO and DynDNS
- Static and dynamic routing
- SPI firewall disable, multicast, WAN ping and IDENT filtering and Proxy, Java, ActiveX and Cooking blocking
- IPsec, PPTP and L2TP VPN passthrough (enabled by default)
- Single port forwarding and Port Range forwarding and triggered ports
- HTTPS admin access, remote management (HTTP / HTTPS) enable with IP range restriction and port setting
- Logging with support for Linksys Logviewer recording
- Access Restrictions with 10 deny or allow-based policies, each with its own list of clients and day/time schedule
- Uplink (LAN to WAN) only QoS with High, Medium, Normal or Low Priority that can be applied to specific applications (divided into Application, Online Game and Voice Device groups), physical switch ports or specific MAC addresses.
- WMM (Wireless MultiMedia) (enabled by default)
It does not have a USB port for Cisco's Storage Link USB NAS feature. If you need further functional details, check the WRT600N review and its slideshow.
Routing Performance
I tested routing performance using our standard router tests. All tests were done with the client in DMZ. The results are summarized in Table 1 below.
| Test Description | WRT120N Throughput (Mbps) |
|---|---|
| WAN - LAN |
92.5
|
| LAN - WAN |
94.1
|
| Total Simultaneous |
151.8
|
| Maximum Simultaneous Connections | 160 |
| Firmware Version |
1.0.02
|
Table 1: Routing performance summary
The IxChariot composite plot in Figure 5 shows nice steady routing, that makes pretty good use of the 10/100 Mbps WAN and switched LAN ports with 92 - 94 Mbps in each direction. Simultaneous throughput is a bit over 150 Mbps, showing that the Atheros AR7240 SoC has enough poop to handle Gigabit ports.
Figure 5: WRT120N routing performance
Try as I might, however, I couldn't get the router to max out the Simultaneous Connection test and only managed to get 160 connections.
User reviews
View all user reviewsAverage user rating from: 16 user(s)
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Questions, review comments and opinions about products not based on actual use will not be published.
Find another way to throw your money away
I need to mentioned to goods first as there's a few. User friendly and adequate features for small networks and administration. Beautiful device like a fancy cheap dvd player. That's all.
Here's some things you need to know while using this drama queen.
1- Don't expect high wireless speeds.
On my 16M broadband I can just see 12-13 on wireless and on wire I got my full speed.
2- Stay close. Like 2-3 meters. Else you wont be able to do anything that requires a little bit of reliability. Forget gaming on network after 5 meters as well as a stable VPN connection.
3-Firmware upgrades are full of hope and misery. 1.0.04 seems the most stable. However while the hardware is super junk software has limits.
4-Give a break sometimes. You wont be online at all times with this device. It gives you a break in every couple of hours in a randomly fashion.
If you need a good looking wireless device for reading newspapers online go buy it.
Worse than old models
i got a wrt54g that supports b, g speeds
it worked well and stable but since my broadband is high speed and my notebooks are new that supports n, i tried to get a lnksys 120n
to my surprise it is worse than the old router.
if i put the notebook side by side to the router, the old router may give me 12m in speedtest, whereas 120n gives me 10m at most. if i put the notebook back to my room in original location, it may not connect or if it does, only at 1mb. we wasted a lot of time trying mixed mode or n only in admin page, but i feel this new gadget only looks sleek on the surface.
linksys
sux
Piece of Junk
I hate this router. I have only had it for less than 3 weeks, and it is impossible! I had previously used D-link routers with NO problems at all. The salesman at Office Depot (I had a coupon) recommended Linksys. WAY to hard to set up the network, and I had so much trouble getting the Wii and Roku box on the network.
Both my netbook and second computer with wireless card lose the connection at least 3X a week so far. And I have to mess with it for 30 min to an hr to get it back. Twice I've had to use Live Chat. They try to be helpful. I asked why this keeps happening and was told my "router signal probably had interference". I'm not sure what that means, but it never happened with the D-Link routers.
I ordered a D-link from Amazon this morning. I hope I can hold out another week or two with this router till I get the replacement. 40 bucks and it's going in the trash. Save yourself the aggravation!!!
working and still kicking..haha
all i can say is IT'S MAGIC! :)
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