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Ricardo Bilton & Gloria Sin

Linksys Wireless-N Dual-Band Entertainment Bridge for your home entertainment gear, $130

By | July 19, 2011, 12:49pm PDT

Summary: Linksys’ new Entertainment Bridge works on both the 2.4 and 5 GHz bands to avoid interference, and features one-button pairing with your Wi-Fi network.

With everything from your HDTV, Nintendo Wii, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Slingbox, Blu-ray player, DVR, HTPC all requiring Internet access, managing your Wi-Fi network can be a huge headache — and that’s just in your living room. Linksys’ new Wireless-N Dual-Band Entertainment Bridge (WES610N) is designed to hook your entertainment gear up to your Wi-Fi network quickly, so you can spend more time enjoying the content and less on getting things to work.

The bridge features a high-speed wireless connection (up to 300 Mbps), has multiple antennas so it should have “superior range,” and four Ethernet ports so the devices that need the most stable connections can be wired in. Most importantly, the WES610N can operate in either the 2.4 or 5 GHz band so it can avoid interference with other devices and even other Wi-Fi networks you’re running.

According to Linkysys, the bridge is also designed to prioritize traffic for smoother video viewing, music streaming and gaming with its built-in Quality of Service (QoS) software. (I wonder how well the QoS will respond when all these activities are happening concurrently on one network.)

Like most other Wi-Fi routers, the Linksys Entertainment Bridge offers WPA 2 Security, and pairs with a Wi-Fi network with just one button.

The four-port WES610N Entertainment Bridge is available in stores now for $129.99, while the one-port version (WET610N) will retail for $99.99.

[Source: Linksys press release]

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Gloria Sin is a freelance journalist based in New York City.

Disclosure

Gloria Sin

I have no stocks or investments in any companies or interests which may lead to a conflict of interest in my coverage.

Biography

Gloria Sin

Gloria Sin is a New York-based freelance journalist who writes about the tech toys that you can't live without for ZDNet. She has little patience for poorly designed user experiences, and is not afraid of opening the guts of her own machines for repair or hacking her gadgets for new uses.

She has written for FastCompany.com, Popular Science, Olympic News Service; she currently covers the startup scene in the Tri-State area for NYConvergence.com.

Prior to ZDNet, Gloria was the online editor for Dance International, and dabbled in web design and social media consulting. When she is offline, you will find her at an ice rink living out her figure skating dreams. Follow her on Twitter.

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RE: Linksys Wireless-N Dual-Band Entertainment Bridge for your home entertainment gear, $130
bc3tech 20th Jul
I do not understand why companies make 300mbps Wireless N products with 100mbps ethernet ports on them. Seriously, how does that make ANY sense? This thing is not "high speed up to 300mbps" because you won't be pushing 300mbps thru the Ethernet Ports!
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corton Updated - 24th Jul
Looks just like the Linksys EPIC FAIL Access Point WAP610N.

Google it and you'll see that Linksys/Cisco can't fix fundimental problems with that device after more than 2 years and a couple of firmware updates.

I'm sure that this device will work just as well as the WAP610N.

It's no wonder that they are laying off thousands of employees.

Buyer Beware.
I do not understand why companies make 300mbps Wireless N products with 100mbps ethernet ports on them. Seriously, how does that make ANY sense? This thing is not "high speed up to 300mbps" because you won't be pushing 300mbps thru the Ethernet Ports!

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