Best Home VPN Router – Making Information Secure Yet Accessible

Best Home VPN Router – Making Information Secure Yet Accessible

You feel empowered as you are determining the direction in which you want your business to go.

What does a VPN router, or a virtual private network router, have to do with working from home? Well, a lot, possibly. We’ll explore two reasons why a home office needs a VPN router, which is making your business and home information more secure, and second, making your information accessible. But first, let us define a VPN router!

What is a VPN router?

If you have more than one computer in your home office or home then you likely have a home network set up. And the first thing that attaches to your cable modem or DSL modem is a wired or wireless router. The router’s main purpose is to allow all the computers attached to your home office network to access the internet independently, so the internet connection can be shared. The second most important function of the router is that it actually creates the home network, that is, it makes home network computers accessible from each others. A more advanced concept would be to attach a home network storage to the router, and have shared disk space available to everyone.

So why would you need a small office VPN router or a VPN wireless router? A VPN, Virtual Private Network, router is a router that allows not only computers on the home network to share the internet connection, but also allows authenticated users on the internet (think yourself at the Starbucks with a laptop or iPhone) access your home network through a secure connection over the shared, public internet. It is like building a secret tunnel directly from your home network to your browser on your laptop outside home. All you need is internet access, your VPN password and a small piece of VPN software for your laptop. Then, you can access your home network from anywhere securely and no one else will know about that.

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VPN through router makes your private information more accessible

By allowing authenticated, strong password protected incoming connections to your home VPN router and your home network, you suddenly have access to your home network from anywhere you are. Document files, your videos, music mp3 files, even the programs that you normally run at home, are suddenly available to you seamlessly. Be it at the local Starbucks, at the client’s office, at a friend’s house, you will have a connection and access to your data any time, as long as you provide a secure password.

VPN router makes your information more secure

Sure, you say, but I use a laptop anyways for my business, and I can take it anywhere with me. True. But, consider the downside. All your software, all your data, is there with you, in public places, in the car. These are all the places where your laptop and your valuable information can easily be stolen if you leave them unattended even just for a minute. So you either need to exercise an extreme level of caution when roaming outside your home, or… get a secure VPN router and leave ALL the important information securely stored in house, and access it securely from wherever you are.

For more information on how exactly VPN routers could work for your home office, see this site VPN solution. You can also find VPN router brands and models reviews on this site http://VPNrouters.org.

 

Is Wireless-N Secure?

Article by Rachel Ted

Yes. Linksys Wireless-N products use today’s most robust security methods like WPA (Wi-Fi Protected Access) encryption along with SPI/NAT firewalls to keep your network safe and data protected from unauthorized access.

The Wireless-N standard has the speed, range and capacity to support today’s most bandwidth-hungry applications.

What are the claims being put forward by various producers of 802.11 draft n products?

Apple claim that due to multiple input multiple output (MIMO) technology, 802.11n can perform up to five times faster and up to twice the range of 802.11g. There is of course the small print stating that actual performance may vary based on range, site conditions, and other factors.

Netgear quote the maximum speed of up to 300Mbps with the small print stating that this figure is derived from IEEE standard 802.11n specifications and actually throughput may vary. Netgear refrain from making any claims about increased range over 802.11g, simply saying that its ‘Rangemax Next’ product line provides maximum coverage and bandwidth. Another feature of Netgear’s 802.11n range of routers is their ‘Steady-Stream’ technology, which is claimed to offer a stable, constant connection perfect for streaming media applications. No more interruptions and freezes?

Belkin’s N1 range of wireless products are described as a breakthrough solution for larger homes or offices that have a wide area to cover and want to run high bandwidth applications. Belkin claim that speeds and range are greatly increased over 802.11g, but they do also say (in the small print) that the quoted rate is the physical data rate and that actually throughput will be lower. I think it’s pretty good of them to come right out with this rather than saying ‘may be’ or ‘could be’ lower.

Realistically, the theoretical throughput of 802.11n devices would be no more than 100Mbps which is still a considerable improvement over the 25Mbps of 802.11g. For a more in depth analysis of 802.11n’s capabilities, I would recommend taking a look at this paper by James M. Wilson of Intel I found it a worthwhile read.

So all of the big names in wireless networking are making the same claims-four to five times the speed of 802.11g devices with greater coverage and increased range. How do these claims stand up in the real world-real world conditions, which are always far from ‘ideal’ with a mixture of hardware from different manufacturers?

Click for more information and Wireless-N router review