Joey Adams Dot Net

Today I received the Linksys DMA-2100. I already had my Vista PC setup with a tuner card and media center, so I was ready to get the DMA2100, which I’ll call the extender for the rest of this article, hooked up to the plasma in the living room.

Setup was very easy, just connect power and A/V cables, then go through on-screen GUI on the extender and media PC and you’re done.

Here is my review, which I’ll explain:

Pros:

1. Easy Installation
2. Does what it says it does
3. No Monthly fees
4. Stunning interface
5. Connections for all devices.

Cons:

1. Wireless Network graph is horrible, when PC and Extender are but 10 ft apart, room to room.
2. Wide-screen, but does not fill the 46″ Plasma.
3. Composite on my unit does not work.
4. The network issue makes the unit unusable.
5. Some buttons on remote do not work.

WAIT! Some of these issues are addressed farther down, do not stop reading if you are considering this product.

As the review says, The unit is awesome, it works how its supposed to, just like media center, Linksys front-end config is very seamless and is very easy. The Remote control is also very nice, with a lot of commonly used buttons.

 Here is where we talk about the cons.

Networking:

When I first set up the extender, it was located in the living room. The wireless AP is located in the room neighboring the living room, so the extender was against the outside of the wall, and the AP was on the inside of the wall across the room. The distance in total is around 10 feet, even though it is not line of sight, I would have expected more.

When I checked network performance, the bar graph barely tips into the acceptable range for regular TV ( there are 2 levels, 1 for regular TV, 1 for hd). I did not expect wonders from wireless and I have basic cable so I decided to try it out.

It worked, but it didn’t, the connection was intermittent, and trying to watch online content or fast forward was impossible. Menu speed was horribly slow, lagging on simple actions, and if you hold down a button, god forbid, you end up waiting minutes for it to stop scrolling. This is without tuning, so keep reading.

So wireless out, plug in the wire. Well in my defense I did not have much time after the gym and before work, but I grabbed a 14ft cat6 and ran it from the hub in my server cabinet through the TV slot in the closet which connects to the living room (hard to explain, but basically the AP connected to the hub in the server cabinet,  then the hub to the extender).

Wired had worse, not even acceptable for regular tv. As I said above, I did not have much time, so I completely forgot I was patching in on a hub, and not a switch, if you don’t know the difference then Google it. So I isolated the network to just the media PC and a direct patch from the AP to the extender.

This time the extender passed with flying colors, there was no lagging on live TV, menus, or Internet content. This thing is awesome. So I am thinking, OK I eliminated the hub, but what about all the traffic caused by the server cabinet, and my brother’s PC, lets plug those back in and see what we get.

With it all plugged in normally, and a direct patch from AP to extender, it was the same as when it was isolated, the performance was full bars (acceptable for HD) the picture quality was great, menus were fast, everything was awesome.

This will require further testing once I get off work.

Remote:

Easy, not all buttons (volume mute etc) do not work on remote, however it might be a universal remote that works with the actual TV (I hope) and needs to be programmed, I will check when I get home.

Wide-screen:

This issue is odd, I have the correct settings in the Linksys interface, and the interface on BOTH the linksys start up and media center menus are full-screen on the 46″ plasma. However, when I play TV or recorded shows, the video size is shrunk into a square, not cool. I just got the thing so I personally think it’s a configuration that needs to be set in media center itself, I will check on this also when I get home.

Composite:

I attempted to hook the extender up in the computer room, and via composite to the TV in that room. There was audio, yet no video, even when I tried composite again in the living room TV. The guide says composite video should always be present, but it may be config options, and if I try to use composite again I will try to reset the device first.

Future Testing:

I have plans for some tests to undertake when I get home, in hopes to find that perfect setup.

Wired:

I will succumb to wired networking if I have to, so I will test different topologies and load the network to see how they effect performance on the extender.

Wireless:

Here is the fun. I will try attaching some higher gain antennas I  have around to the extender, test the device, then try attaching the antennas to the AP, then test again. I also will try increasing power on the AP. I know wireless is very touchy, but if it works then I’ll be overzealous.

 Well, I will post again today once I finish my tests, probably around 10AM.

 The price for the extender was steep so if my tests do not justify the price to me, I will package up and RMA the hell out of everything, and explore other options like “eek” TiVo, or local digital programming with added DVR.