Works well, HARD to Setup for Mac, September 19, 2012

This review is for: TRENDnet 300 Mbps Wireless N 4-Port Media Bridge TEW-640MB (Piano Black)

Okay, the good:
This device is 2 floors away on the opposite side of the house and picks up my wireless signal from the basement. I needed it to connect to a printer that has no wi-fi. I am using it as a wireless bridge/extender. Signal is rather weak at that distance but the printer works flawlessly. I’ve had it about 3 weeks now.

The bad: the setup instructions on a Mac were all wrong. The browser log in address did not work. They are not correct for an Apple Airport unit. I had to call and get instructions step by step, one of which included turning off the firewall, making my network SSID public, and changing my DNS servers to a static one temporarily. The setup took about 25 minutes with phone support. They have to do this kind of support regularly, I was told, but there is no info in the manual about this. Just a phone number. They person on the other end was patient, but very hard to understand (non-native English speaker).

I have worked with Macs since 1985, and this was one of the harder installations I’ve had to do. If the setup procedure in the manual does not work out of the box for you, I recommend you not waste your time trying to figure it out, but just call tech support from the start.