Home > Consumer Reviews > Cisco RV016 16-port 10/100 VPN Router - Multi WAN

I see a lot of negative reviews and I think they are somewhat unfair. First off, you should always upgrade the firmware to the latest version before placing in a production environment. Perhaps in the early days the firmware was unstable and thus bugs resulted, but I've been using two of these acting as a gateway tunnel between remote offices and these things are rock solid. The gateway has been up for 257 days now without a hitch. The vpn aspect works great if you know what you are doing, and even then I think its easier to use than other relative products. One reviewer said the PPTP vpn feature (easier to setup than L2TP)just plain doesn't work and I can vouch that its absolutely not true. I have both Windows and Mac clients connecting to the vpn over PPTP and it works perfectly. You do NOT have to use the proprietary linksys vpn software if you do not want to. That piece of software is not perfect but does work and its totally optional.

I don't use all the feature sets on this thing but it has yet to crash on us. We are using all 13 ports in both offices and it handles the traffic just fine without any packet loss.

The ONLY two negatives I can find is that its not gigabit, but at this price point its expected. Secondly, you can't do aggregate linking to a server with dual ethernet ports. Not a big deal for most people. If you are looking for a solid performer with many features I highly recommend this model. You won't find a better product for the price. Just don't forget to upgrade the firmware, which at the time of this writing is 2.0.18

This is not the router for you. Although it does do a decent job at balancing two WAN's, everything else falls short.

* The 50 client VPN server it advertises needs a proprietary windows-only VPN client from Linksys. It also has a PPTP server -- that doesn't work. The PPTP option was added in a later firmware, and I have not been able to find a single person for whom it works, but plenty who are in the same situation of it disconnecting after authentication. (UPDATE: as of 2.0.13 this *finally* works)

* The manual advertises several features, like telnet access, which it doesn't have.

* It will reap idle connections before they need to be done; if you use ssh it will disconnect you within minutes if you aren't actively typing. I've reported this to tech support several times but have been told that this is how all routers behave (which is funny, because if I put a WRT54G in its place, everything works fine)

* Calling for support on any issues with your router is abysmal: thick accents which are hard to understand, and none of the support employees understand basic networking terms. I've been told by tech support several times that things I want to do with my router (like setting up 1 to 1 NAT / forwarding) is impossible not only with their model, but with *all* models. Usually when I'm told something is impossible to do with TCP I'll find a firmware update a few months later that fixes it.

* The 2.0.13 firmware has introduced a new great bug where SSH connections get a "Connection Reset by Peer" during the authentication phase for 80% of attempts.

* One day my T1 went out. This caused the Linksys router to stop forwarding *all* traffic across my other WANs until the router was physically reset to factory defaults and reconfigured from scratch.

* Any dialog in the web interface that has a large list of settings (such as IP forwards, VPN users, etc) apparently get completely and immediately wiped out clean if you hit the enter key instead of the "Save" link at the bottom of the page -- not so good if you have any production servers behind this router.


So, what are good alternatives?
* I've tried free routers, including pfSense, but even with years of Linux/BSD experience, it's still likely you won't get them running, and message board / mailing list support seldom resolves your qualms.
* In it's price class (and slightly higher), take a look at the PePLink Balancer series. If you just want 2-3 connections, it won't run you too much more.
* If you want to go one step up from there, you have to suck it up and get a Cisco router; a 1841 with modules will do what you need, but probably run in around $2,500 plus an annual support contract.

We used to have the RV082, which comes with 8 port PLUS one Internert and one DMZ. Bought this one thinking that it'll have 16 ports PLUS one internet and one DMZ. But look again... it has 16 ports including the Internet and DMZ. Lucky I only need 12 ports.

I was forced to get three of these. Each one was used on a hotel with people coming and going. All had firmware upgraded. During dead seasons, the product would work fine. This is when 5-10 people per day were using it. When 50 or more people were using it, EVERYONE ONE OF THEM WOULD FAIL, AND REQUIRE REBOOTING, often multiple times per day. Linksys support TOLD me that if more than 10 people were on it at a time, it would fail miserably. They all did. If you don't mind rebooting in a crowded enviroment, or only have 5-10 people who need this at a time, and simply need a redundant form of internet access, this will work fine. If your requirements are bigger, choose peplink.

We purchased this on recommendation from Linksys sales support that it would accomodate 14 downlink ports. As supplied the RV016 is a 13 port router with 1 dedicated DMZ port and 2 WAN ports (5 of the other 13 ports can be reconfigured for additional WANs). Further discussion with Linksys technicial support indicates that this device has stability issues and does not work well with Linksys switchs. It locks up periodically and requires a systemwide reset. Do not expect any support if you buy this product. My calls were directed to India and the Philipines and I was asked questions including "what color are your cables?"