Folks, I was at the airport and I popped open my laptop to hop on the net and upon doing so I encountered a seriously sneaky bastard. Do you see anything wrong with the image below?

Well, hopefully you notice the little icon of a laptop beside the network entitled “Free Public WiFi”. This is NOT a free wireless access point, but instead a laptop computer that someone has configured to capture your personal data and rob you blind.
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Greg, this one’s for you!

Ok, so months ago I was talking to my buddy Greg about wireless routers, and I mentioned that you can get this upgraded firmware which will drastically improve your range and add features. Then, I totally forgot to send that information to him. But don’t worry, it’s not the only thing he’s waiting on. I still haven’t delivered a piece of art he ordered like a year ago! (Sorry Kim!)

Anyway, now that I’m done admitting my inadequacies, it’s time to redeem myself - at least partially. So, if you are the owner of a Linksys WRT54G series router (only like THE most popular router ever sold), then follow along to change it into something almost unrecognizably better than what you currently have!
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In two words, it sucks.

Now, on to the detail. First of all, I paid $179 for this router earlier this year. I had upgraded to this router primarily for two reasons: I wanted more range, and I wanted Gigabit ports for my wired LAN.

It turns out that I did get slightly better range on my Wireless G laptop than my previous Linksys wireless router, but only slightly. For example my old Linksys router wouldn’t reach from my home office to my bedroom at all, and the Netgear WNR854T did reach… but just barely. I averaged only one bar and this made surfing from bed an excruciatingly poor experience.
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