In a recent article, the beta version of the Skydog router was reviewed.
http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wirel...-beta-reviewed
Is it just me or does the whole concept behind that router seems like a bad idea?
The router immediately shows some of it's issues, Many of it's monitoring tools are offered on free 3rd party firmware which do not require any 3rd party servers. (with the exception of a select few features that are more or less gimmicks)
Linking the function of a product to the cloud means that you are gambling on the servers staying up for as long as you will want to use the product.
The 3 year claim means nothing because there is no guarantee that they will be in business a year from now, or even a trillionth of a nanosecond from now.
It is just as bas as online DRM used by many games. if if the DRM server dies, then your games get dragged down to hell with the servers.
Furthermore unless the company is willing to give out all source code involved on both the router level and server side, there is no way to build any sort of trust with them. No security is perfect and imagine if they get hacked and everyone gets their router settings changed to use a malicious DRM server, then communications to the cloud crap gets blocked at the router level to prevent them from fixing it?
Giving a 3rd party full control over your network requires a lot of trust, and their current business model does not qualify any trust. Their policies only cover them self when things go bad.
Furthermore in looking at the images of the PCB, the router is clearly built to a low cost (similar to what you will find in a lesser brand (eg rosewill and other uncommon/ cheap brands)
The caps are cheap 85C ones
very few components to handle noise
design looks largely autorouted with very little human aftethought (as if a company provided them with a generic cheap router for them to slap a name tag on)
transmit power is very low for a modern router (closer to what was available with early 802.11n routers)
Overall the item seems to be targeted at having the highest profit margin possible, and then further increase profits by collecting fees for the cloud service.
It has some interesting features but none of them should require cloud crap, modern routers are more than enough powerful to do statistics and monitoring locally, and graphics can be done using ajax like with tomato.
FCCID page https://fcc.io/U2M/-WBR4200AGN
http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wirel...-beta-reviewed
Is it just me or does the whole concept behind that router seems like a bad idea?
The router immediately shows some of it's issues, Many of it's monitoring tools are offered on free 3rd party firmware which do not require any 3rd party servers. (with the exception of a select few features that are more or less gimmicks)
Linking the function of a product to the cloud means that you are gambling on the servers staying up for as long as you will want to use the product.
The 3 year claim means nothing because there is no guarantee that they will be in business a year from now, or even a trillionth of a nanosecond from now.
It is just as bas as online DRM used by many games. if if the DRM server dies, then your games get dragged down to hell with the servers.
Furthermore unless the company is willing to give out all source code involved on both the router level and server side, there is no way to build any sort of trust with them. No security is perfect and imagine if they get hacked and everyone gets their router settings changed to use a malicious DRM server, then communications to the cloud crap gets blocked at the router level to prevent them from fixing it?
Giving a 3rd party full control over your network requires a lot of trust, and their current business model does not qualify any trust. Their policies only cover them self when things go bad.
Furthermore in looking at the images of the PCB, the router is clearly built to a low cost (similar to what you will find in a lesser brand (eg rosewill and other uncommon/ cheap brands)
The caps are cheap 85C ones
very few components to handle noise
design looks largely autorouted with very little human aftethought (as if a company provided them with a generic cheap router for them to slap a name tag on)
transmit power is very low for a modern router (closer to what was available with early 802.11n routers)
Overall the item seems to be targeted at having the highest profit margin possible, and then further increase profits by collecting fees for the cloud service.
It has some interesting features but none of them should require cloud crap, modern routers are more than enough powerful to do statistics and monitoring locally, and graphics can be done using ajax like with tomato.
FCCID page https://fcc.io/U2M/-WBR4200AGN