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Cisco to Acquire Linksys
forged writes "The Boston Globe is reporting that networking giant Cisco Systems plans to acquire Linksys later this year for $500M, thus entering the consumer market. Linksys also has a press release. The good news is that those who bought a Linksys access point now have a Cisco access point for 1/2 of the price ;)"
Finally Cisco is going to get some strength behind their networking products!
I mean, they (seem to me to) have a virtual monopoly on the business router market, and are now seem to be trying to extend it to the consumer market.
What do you guys think of Cisco, as a corporation? I remember seeing an article on Wired years ago about how happy the employees were about working there.
Things may have changed now, though.
tmegapscm
...on linksys routers?
The good news is that those who bought a Linksys access point now have a Cisco access point for 1/2 of the price ;)
The bad news is that those who buy Cisco access points in the future will have a Linksys access point for twice the price ;)
Well bravo. Cisco's inraods into the consumer market didn't do too well, so it's a smart move to pick up an established brand. This also puts Cisco into direct competition with companies making both client and infrastructure devices (i.e. 3Com, Intel, etc).
The good news is that those who bought a Linksys access point now have a Cisco access point for 1/2 of the price
That is, until Cisco raises the price on all the devices sold under its Linksys brand by oh, about 50 percent so that it doesn't compete with Cisco brand devices.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Is you still own a Linksys product - the market leader in low cost buggy routers, nics, etc.
And 1/4 the quality!
i see my linksys router spontaneously breaking post-acquisition and being replaced with cisco hardware...
...does this mean that Cisco's products will now start to suck total ass, or does it mean that Linksys's products will now stop sucking total ass?
The mind boggles.
- A.P.
"Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
Will require me to get CTHULHU? Cisco Training: Home User, Limited Home Use?
I've never been much of a network expert, but doesn't this just add to the Cisco certification headache? Are they going to discontinue the other products? interesting stuff!
stuff |
This is a weird story. Why is Cisco buying into the crappy LinkSys market? It'll be interesting to see what twist Cisco has up their cleeves for LinkSys. Cheaper, but higher quality networking products? Who knows!
I think Cisco should have stuck to their core business and not try to diversify. This move will only be good for those few customers that will gain a Cisco access point for 1/2 of the price right now.
In the end it will probably just help create a new MS-like giant. I've never been a fan av any kind of corporate giant.
I have no doubt that Cisco is feeling the effects on their bottom line by Linsys' low cost alternatives.. it's time to eliminate that problem...
we all know how consolidation benefits the consumer? Can Cisco succeed in making home broadband routers as painful to set up as their enterprise offerings?
Hey, why'd you all get quiet all of a sudden?
Uh, I have to go...
...whether the prices will change much at all "in the near term", since Linksys will still be using their own brand name, or if the prices will indeed skyrocket like everything else Cisco sells.
All I want is a kind word, a warm bed and unlimited power.
I like LinkSys products because they are functional and cheap. Ciscos products are functional, robust but not cheap. I guess Cisco is getting scared of the competition, and decided to crush them...
As the economy looks to ramp back up again over the next year, consolidation among hardware/software companies should accelerate in 2003. Just like IBM bought Rational recently, there are probably going to be more big acquisitions coming up. Anybody's guess as to who's next? My bet is Sun...
Stop by my site where I write about ERP systems & more
Now all the semi-enterprise linksys equipment, will be offed so not compete with Cisco gear. Gigabit ethernet will be available for Cisco gear only, Linksys won't sell more than a 4-port switch. This should be interesting.
I am sure they will continue to support all Linksys products. It's not like anyone ever buys the competition just to kill them.
Just me, the Voodoo owner... yes yes... I can and will write my own freaking drivers *grin*
I only look human.
My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
If you stold a Linksys acess point, you still paid the right price.
I don't keep a lid on my coffee so when I walk around I look busy -me
Cisco:Hard to configure, very configurable.
Linksys:Easy to configure, not very configurable
In the short term, this will probably be quite good for both Cisco and Linksys, but after a while both entities, if they still exist as separate entities, will start to regret this move.
First of all, Cisco now has a lot more to worry about, and they've have lot to worry about lately what with their stock prices fluctuating and a slowly decreasing demand for networking hardware as more and more IT firms belly up and more of the ones who stay in business consolodating their IT servies through hosting firms and the like.
The consumer hardware market is *very* low margin. There's a reason that they call this stuff 'Commodity' hardware... including networking hardware. If Cisco has to play the commodity hardware game for long, they're going to start feeling like having a company come buy them out as well.
Second, the number of players in the networking field keeps getting fewer and fewer. This seems like a good thing for the companies-- they don't have to compete as hard or do as much R&D to stay at the top. What this means for them in the long run, however, is that they become less able to deal with business crises and the advent of new tech. Just look at the way wireless is taking off right now. If you think this technology is done by a long shot or that there aren't new companies sprining up to exploit it, you should study it a little more. Sooner or later there will be a 'powerhouse' company spring up for an aspect of networking that's troublesome for Cisco, and then they'll have problems keeping up and staying competitive if they cut back right now at all.
The next Slashdot story will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and slashdot the links early!
Price Range??? ;)
Something I always liked about Linksys was their price point...I hope cisco doesn't go and jack up the prices =(
"...those who bought a Linksys access point now have a Cisco access point for 1/2 of the price ;)"
:)
Linkys will stay their own brand and product. No need to worry about that.
Does this mean I'm going to have to fork out 6 grand for a linksys cert?
-- "of course thats just my opinion, I could be wrong." --Dennis Miller
They'll now make them with IOS loaded on them, charge us some ungodly amount of money for the software, and make us pay for support contracts.
Linksys has some odd stuff that I really don't see CISCO holding on to- NAS, battery backup, KVM, etc.
Guess it will come down to if CISCO can leave Linksys alone or not.
III.IIVIVIXIIVIVIIIVVIIIIXVIIIXIIIIIIIIVIIIIVVIII
To increase usability, all CISCO routers will now come with a web interface accessible on the rarely used port 80. It will have a default username/password of: admin/password. In case the username/password are forgotten, CISCO tech support can use their back-up account that they have in all CISCO boxes to access the box and change the admin password. No one will be able to find out this secret account, we're kinda sure of that.
I would imagine that cisco wouldn't do much to change the actual linksys line. I doubt they would build on their router's OS since the whole idea in the consumer market is to have an easy to configure product. Cisco will probrably want to keep a sharp distinction between their consumer products with easy to configure web interfaces (ie the old linksys ones) and their mid to high end corporate products. I do not think that either the consumer needs to worry about products becoming hard to configure, nor do i think that corporate IT needs to worry about a decline in quality of the high end stuff. This merger is not meant to "improve" technology. Its simply meant for cisco to enter a new market. I seriously doubt anything will change pricewise. If it does it would probrably mean cheaper consumer products since cisco has much more in assets and could seem to be in a position to undercut netgear. Just think, now we can have microsoft vs cisco price wars for the home network... Soon we're going to be getting home routing equipment for free if it follow the netscape vs internet explorer model ;)
I don't think Cisco is going to kill off Linksys. I think they're buying Linksys in order to move into the home market. As it stands right now, most Cisco products have a target market of business users. They are way too expensive and robust for what the average user wants to use them for...
But if they had Linksys, then they could try to penetrate the home market and, at the same time, keep their hold on the high-end/business market..
Cisco had a consumer line not long ago (remember the 600 thru 800 series???). For under $200 you could get a consumer grade router from the other guys or pay $700 for the Cisco that was less robust than just about everything on the market.
It did have a cool looking case and lots of sparkly lights on the front tho...
Why is Sysco buying LinkSys? Do they plan on wiring up all their vending machines or something?
o o
--Jez
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
I am a blind woman. I use text-to-speech and other accessibility products to make my online experience possible. I apologize for any spelling and formatting issues in my posts.
Psionic?
Has anyone been to their site lately?
That`s right folks. Psionic is no more - Cisco got
a hold of them also.
Are they on a shopping spree for network and security monopoly?
BTW, does any one know how Psionic purchase is going to affect portsentry and logcheck?
Does this mean that they will port IOS to the cheaper Linksys stuff, or are we stuck with QOS or whatever Linksys currently uses. Not that it does a bad job, but i'm used to how IOS functions.
I think where Cisco feels a lot of pressure is in SOHO operations where people (rightly or wrongly) may decide that they get more bang/buck by buying a Linksys or other low-end product, many of which are now including some reasonable features like IPSec that Cisco wants you to pay a lot for.
By stripping out these "high end" features from low-end products, Cisco can force you to buy the much more expensive Cisco product instead.
Cisco provides outstanding quality networking and communications products for the IT sector of the enterprise. However, with the dot-bomb era of the computing industry, Cisco's shares have fallen drastically as a result of companies not actually needing to acquire Cisco equipment as much as they thought. The effect on Cisco? Over-stocked inventories required price-slashing to remain competitive. Their existing market segment is slow, sustained growth. The Linksys acquisition caters to a dynamic, expanding market.
The reason I say it's the Walmart way is because Walmart provides just about everything you can think of that is smaller than a car - some of the Walmarts where I live actually have the Walmart Appliance section. Walmart sells clothing, food, tools, etc.
Most individuals looking for high quality (cost) goods will not be purchasing their designer fashions at Walmart. Instead, they choose to go to Dillards, Parisians, Eddie Bauer, and other higher quality - smaller customer base distributors. Yet, when you look at it in the end - who makes the most money (by a huge margin)? You guessed it - Walmart.
The vast majority of consumers are middle-class to lower-class individuals. Many companies that have taken a huge beating in the market place are looking for cost cutting measures. 40 Linksys switches or 10 Cisco switches for the same cost? The "Linksys line by Cisco" would be like the "Great Value" Walmart brand. The Cisco native branded equipment, I would imagine, would be for the people who still want to shop at Eddie Bauer, etc.
Linksys is a highly popular choice for cable companies who provide their broadband service because it's extraordinarily cheap with a pretty decent track record. Cisco acquires not only Linksys, but its existing relationship with all of the companies who buy Linksys equipment in bulk. As a result, Cisco gains market share into an arena it previously untapped venture without having to invest the capital to pursue moving into an already crowded arena.
I would imagine the Linksys brand name would stay around for quite a while (much like the legacy of USRobotics when purchased by 3Com) to diversify the two segments of the company for marketing purposes.
The only caveat to this acquisition is the fact that it was a purchase of another company. Many companies which made acquisitions before the dot-bomb crash did not efficiently integrate the companies, and they ended up either being dead-weights or misused to the point of extinction. Only time will tell.
Ayup
Linksys cheap stuff that works??? - try finding the right driver for a Linksys Ethernet Card without opening the computer and comparing silk screen images.
...that you are that geek. Prepare to get a broken nose.
Once Cisco gets their grubby hands on it, I don't see that sort of black-art stuff continuing. Besides, Linksys stuff is all built on a standard chipset. What would a name like Cisco need Linksys for? It's pretty straightforward to engineer a cable router or a Wifi access point.
Whatever becomes of the LinkSys/Cisco merger I doubt customers will like it very much.
"Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
--Dr.W.Edwards Deming
You speak words of wisdom, my friend. Anyone who sends me a smilie in email will now get this text cut-and-pasted.
You don't know what 'war criminal' means, do you?
You just heard it in Saddams speech and are too stupid to question it.
Yeah I know... I can't stand what those fhqwhgads pass as humour. :-P
My journal has hot
XP detects the different cards during setup.
And Windows Update under 2000 does the same thing. I'd guess it'd work for other versions, but I haven't tried.
And I've installed from floppy the drivers for card rev 2 on a rev 4 card, and it worked fine.
They all work the same using tulip.o under linux.
I'm not exactly sure what the different revisions is about, I suspect it has to do with the boot prom, or something.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
If they decide to make an entry into a market, they will attempt their own product line to enter the market. If, within six months, they are not a market leader, they will BUY the market leader.
look at the aironet products
look at the vpn 3000 (formerly altiga)
look at the pixen
look at the catalyst series (2800 was a grand junction box)
From a general economic perspective. Lately you can't even get corporations to spend the xtra money on 2-ply toilet paper. Maybe we're seeing the begining of the end (of this krappy economic "downturn").
-- www.globaltics.net
Political discussion for a new world
Ever notice how the most geekish people usually fucking suck at CS? I mean maybe they get good grades but talk to them about something off the curriculum and that don't know squat. They just have a nervous giggle and say "ha ha microsux! vhehehe" or some "blah blah blah kazaa teeheheheh" fucking stupid shits. The biggest geeks usually don't actually know shit. Fucking posers.
Many of my SOHO customers have gotten great value from the linksys router products. I use them myself. Sure they are simple, but most people just need simple.
The single area where the linky fell apart was in supporting multiple simultaneous VPN tunnels. They have promised some new models to rectify this shortcoming. I suspect this is the stuff Cisco will kill.
The linksys stuff seemed to be on a growth pattern that indicated this cheap consumer shit was going to gain more and more functionality. Cisco stepped in to put the breaks on this trend. If they don't kill linksys entirely, they will limit its functionality to create a clear demarcation between high and low end. Linksys as an indie would continue to blur the line. Cisco will make the line crystal clear.
Read Taco's journal, he just mentioned why they removed it (2 extra queries per page, removed to ease server load).
This has been a test. Had this been a real emergency, we would have fled in terror and you would not have been informed.
Three little, two little, one little network companies, all around the world!
Cisco has been running prime-time commercials for a while now ('Cisco, the power of the network. Now'), which had me convinced they were about to push into the consumer market again.
They may maintain Linksys as a sub-brand, or a 'line' of consumer products, but I expect all their products will carry the Cisco brand prominently. Perhaps 'Ciso Inside'?
At any rate, Cisco is one of the few companies that makes the acquisition game work. They have a history of successfully digesting acquired companies, integrating them into their corporate culture, and retaining their key employees. So I don't expect Linksys to remain as an independent entity.
The real Webmaven is user ID 27463. I don't rate an imposter, because my ID is such a lame-ass high number.
Yeah, and now browsing the articles is getting really painful. Having links to subdomains was already bad enough, but now it is really bad.
I have been a long time supporter of linksys products.... hubs, switches, routers, wireless gear and even some of their USB and KVM stuffs. To me this is terrible news as Cisco will most likely kill off this "consumer" product instead of their being a good competition between companies.
Granted, Linksys has always had an issue or two with their gear, so maybe this Cisco buyout will help with that - but I really have a bad feeling that this is not "A Good Thing".
I really hope Cisco helps Linksys write better firmware. They have AWFUL, AWFUL firmware on their wireless products.
.a/.b AP from them that slows WAY down to about 15KB/sec after being on for 2 days. So I get to reset that every two days and they have NEVER updated the firmware on it since release. Their .a PCMCIA NICs don't do Turbo mode in XP...even though they don't mention that anywhere until you get to the very bottom of the FAQ included with the card. D-Link's cards do it. Why not Linksys?
.g setup on the way to replace my dualband rig. I have since replaced the firmware on my WAP11s with the hacked D-Link firmware to get more features and more stability.
My WAP11s have bridging and client mode bugs when using the latest public firmware. I had to go to a leaked firmware that was never released. I have a dualband
They suck. Suck, suck, suck. I have a D-Link
I think it'll help Cisco to open up the bottom end of the market. The two companies are in no way competing. I just deployed some Cisco 1100APs at work. We compared them to the MS wireless router and Linksys WAP11. The Cisco easily got twice the range in an office environment than the other two. So yeah, they might cost more but you definately get more. Plus we get the advantage of using LEAP.
Most likely Cisco will not port their IOS to run on Linksys hardware. They are buying Linksys because it's cutting into their small and medium business markets. No one in the right mind would spend $500 on a wireless access point from Cisco for home use if the same (and more) features can be had for $80 from Linksys.
Oh by the way, Cisco's SOHO line of routers (700 series,etc) was the gayest line ever - they didn't run a REAL cisco IOS. It was some crippled mutant that didn't share many commands with the enterprise version of routers. The only redeeming feature was that it let me connect to company's access server (also a cisco box) on demand w/o id and password. (profile of my isdn router was stored on the AS5200)
Does this mean that I can make 6 figures setting up my friends' and family's routers??
The bad news is that those who bought a Cisco access point now have a LinkSys access point for double the price ;(
We're screwed.. now the cheap and reliable Linksys products are going to become fre@king Xpensive just for having the cisco brand. :(
Wow! Does this mean I have a "LCE" to go with my CCE?
I'm glad NetGear, Belkin and others are in this space. Linksys is through. Prices are going to double and they still won't be close to anything in the Cisco space. Too bad. Their products had some issues, but they were cheap and with some fiddling, work really well.
Great...
Right now we have CatOS (set/clear), IOS (conf t), old IOS (wr mem), the 1900-series menu interface, the HORRIFIC config system from the Aironet series, CiscoWorks Campus Manager, and that Cluster thingy from the 2950's... now add to that whatever Linksys has... yeah its an exciting time to be a network admin.
Ryan Dorman, CCNA Network Communications Specialist Millersville Univesrity
Linksys is mainly (it seems to me) to be a home-use brand. Do you really think that Linksys competes in any way w/Cisco?
Home equipment and business equipment seem to compete in small businesses.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Damn, I'm glad I mirrored the tools! They'll never see the light of day again.
Sigh! Oh well!
Cisco is terrible. Very high-priced technical support, even on products that cost less than the technical support. Cisco is a huge company out of control.
Look people, Cisco has planned for YEARS to get into the home/SOHO market. Why do
you think you've seen a ramp up on Cisco commercials on TV over the last couple of years?
Linksys will remain a basically seperate company from Cisco, and Cisco will pretty much
leave it alone. Cisco wanted into the home market, so why would they raise prices and
price themself out of the market? Shit, if they wanted to they could have simply dropped the
prices on the Aironet gear down to "consumer" prices.
I seriously doubt there will be any IOS/Aironet OS type stuff done on any Linksys gear anytime
soon-- what would be the gain? The Linksys gear is NOT made to tie into corp networks, so
why go through the expense of porting software??
The price for LinkSys will go up. The corporate politics and craziness of Cisco will see to that.
Maybe this is Cisco's way to number 1, gain instant market share, and #2 to pull the Linksys 802.11g devices from the market in order to wait until the spec is finalized.
Why would Linksys develop 802.11g products when the spec isn't final? That amazes me that they (Linksys) would open themselves up to potential compatibility issues once the spec is finalized... Wierd.
Exactly. $100 for the hardware, $200 for very friendly, but stupid, Cisco support. They want more than $200 to fix bugs on a DSL router that came free with the DSL service.
Yes, but, if you want to fix the published security bugs in a Cisco 675, you have to pay $245 to Cisco support.
Maybe Cisco will push IP phones to consumers thru Linksys, at an affordable price.. Big market there!
have you been defaced today?
Call me crazy (OK, you're crazy!) but it seems to me that Cisco is getting a little more bang for their buck here then simply acquiring new market share by finally doing something that investors are conformable with. i.e. Acquisition. ;)
The biggest news here is that cisco will finally be able to enter a complete solution into the content delivery market. A company can provide online content with massive high-end cisco name brand stuff, and use the acquired linksys stuff to give them the other end of the pipeline as a complete package.
As more local telco companies are looking at providing high-speed internet access, this becomes very interesting indeed.
This tagline brought to you by 1500 monkeys in just under 17 years.
The Cisco PIX supports SSH (it needs enabled and keys generated). If you setup an SSH client on your system, and the PIX is setup to allow SSH connections, then you shouldn't have any problem.
... this improves tech support and product quality.
One can hope, can't he?
Cruising the internet on my TI-99/4A @ a whopping 300 baud!
Gee, what a burden it must be to be 100 times smarter than the rest of us. LOL.
I like the Thong song as much as the next guy, but how on earth did Sisqo ever make enough to buy a consumer electronics company?
Heisenberg might have been here.
Is there anything more effeminate?
Yes. People who refer to emoticons as smilies.
Linksys makes the best home networking equipment. I mean, just stop and forget everything you know about networking...and think about it from a n00b perspective.
You want something cheap, attractive and easy to setup and use. For those knocking Linksys quality, allow me to let you in on a little secret...they are the best. In the home networking, wireless networking business, Linksys gear rules.
Now yes, I work in wireless networking...but guess what, I don't work for Linksys or Cisco. I work for one of their competitors. Despite my strong sense of company loyalty, I'll still admit freely that Cisco equipment is the best for Corporate networks (duh) and Linksys equipment is the best for Home Networks. People with Home Networks don't care about firewalls, security, layering and routing, they just want their 3 computers online at the same time, with a high speed connection.
btw, before anyone puts words in my mouth. I tried to stress that Linksys has the best quality gear...and they do. I didn't say anything about their tech support, which is "lacking".
Craenor
The not-so-good news but more likely news is that Cisco will decide not to warranty Linksys products and will introduce new, Cisco-branded products at a much higher price.
Well, here's to hoping that Microsoft won't buy Logitech, and Sun won't try to acquire Matrox.
Have fun: Join D.N.A. (National Dyslexics Association)
The fact that cisco has a
webpage dedicated to their aquisitions really demonstrates their corporate mentality, for better or worse. It's a slippery slope for me. On the one hand, I am a huge fan of the products that Cisco has aquired and (in my opinion) improved on... take the VPN 3000 Series Concentrator line, or the AP 1200 series wireless access point. Both technologies built from aquired technology, and both have been improved in ways that only Cisco could improve them (using both corporate clout and Cisco owned technologies). I find it really comforting to know that when I have a new project at work, I only have to call my Cisco VAR and she and my regional Cisco rep show up with great ideas and help. But I find it unsettling somehow. I'm torn between wanting them to innovate, but at the same time, who really competes with Cisco. Juniper? Foundary? Certanly not 3Com anymore... The only way you can get your foot in the door against Cisco is to "pull a Juniper" and get your routers used instead of theirs on research networks like I2. Oh! The moral dilema...
This comment was not generated by Uber Elephants...
True story:
I had an Aironet 340 access point that was missing its antennae and required a damn serial cable and terminal to be configured by command line. I got sick of it, and decided to sell it on eBay. It went for $200 with multiple bids.
After that, I went and bought a D-Link 714P+ router, which had a built in switch, built in print server (works with Linux, although not supported), SPI, higher encryption (256 bit WEP), twice the speed if you use their hardware, anteannae, and Web Based administration (no shitty serial cable for me) for $170.
I actually made money by switching to a better product!
I can't imagine why anyone would buy Cisco equipment on the low end or the high end anymore, except for consistency among equipment maybe.
You can get PortSentry and Logcheck from the Debian unstable mirrors.
If you're on Red Hat, SuSE, etc, then you can use alien to convert the debs to rpm (make sure that you have the Alien::Package::* perl modules installed). You can also grab the Red Hat 7.3 PortSentry package from freshrpms.net if that's all you need.
-B
Ash and Hickory, straight-grained and true, make excellent bludgeons, dandy for the cudgeling of vegetarians.
No you do not have a Cisco AP for 1/2 the price. Cisco/Aironet AP's have a PPC processor and the best wireless cards in the industry. The origional software is by far the most advanced and has the largest feature set including the only default encryption policy I would trust on a network I admin (LEAP has never been cracked unlike straight WEP). In addition they are porting IOS to the AP's so you will soon be able to do all the IOS stuff on your 350 or 1200 series AP. Compare this to a Linksys box which has a very anemic processor, fairly crude software, a weak wireless card, etc and which does not have the horsepower to run IOS. This is Cisco trying to cover the entire product spectrum from 4 port unmanaged hubs to the big routers. The only potential problem I see with this is the same one Cisco has run into when they try to make their own cheap gear, people see the Cisco name and expect the Cisco feature set, so what starts out as a cheap simple product ends up like their home router series, a shrunk version of their big equipment with a pricetag to match.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
Now that cisco is on board, with great firmware experience, they can fix models like the BEFW11P1, which wile good hardware, and feature packed... had aweful firmware.
They'll call the new company LinkCisco
And guess what? Walmart is now branching out into selling cars in some locations. See this article. So really it's "everything thing you can think of, including cars."
People are never going to go for that. It's not like LinkSys is the only company capable of making these boxes, or even the only one that currently does. DLink has almost the exact same product line. Joe Sixport will continue to have his bridged circuit, and there's nothing anyone can do about it (nor should there be).
Cisco has been trying to break into the home market for awhile now - but hadn't figured how to do it right.
;-)
I set up a very small network for an ex-Cisco exec. Didn't know who he was at the time, and just dropped in a Netgear NAT router to handle everything. Worked great.
Chatted with him about it later, and appearantly he had a conversation with some of his old buds at Cisco and asked them why Cisco wasn't the right solution for his network (3 PC, Internet access).
So, he told me about how Cisco tried to make a product to compete in this space. They put out a router (don't know the part number) that was dumbed down, didn't have the Cisco OS, and didn't have the throughput of their bigger devices. Bunch of people bought it. All businesses. Then these businesses wondered why it DIDN'T have their OS on it, and what's up with all these limitations! Much tech-support later, they re-engineered it, brought it back to a full spec, raised the price, and no more home market.
Seems to me they figured it out. Don't put the Cisco name on it, and people won't expect it to be a Cisco product
Never never never smoke crack before geometry class!
Let's hope that Cisco doesn't apply their own website design on the Linksys site. Have you ever tried to find anything on that godawful excuse for a web presence that Cisco runs?
Maybe Cisco will be able to do IPSEC passthrough on their firewalls now. This is something Linksys have had working for a couple of years now, but Cisco have never introduced to the PIX with a whole list of excuses.
I'd like to see Cisco improve some things Linksys though:
Add PEAP support to the wireless gear - PEAP is the protocol Cisco and MS are pushing for security at the moment.
Delete the 3002 hardware VPN client and sort out the Linksys VPN access router instead - the 3002 is more expensive than just buying another PC.
The only products I can see being disappeared because of this are the rackmount Linksys switches. Cisco have always kept their cheaper ranges non-rackmount to discourage commercial use.
Simon
I mean, they (seem to me to) have a virtual monopoly on the business router market
Nothing virtual about it, the courts have ruled that they have a genuine, honest monopoly. However, there's nothing illegal about having a monopoly; what's illegal is abusing that monopoly, and so far, Cisco hasn't (or at least, not in any major way).
and are now seem to be trying to extend it to the consumer market.
It's always a matter of concern when a company with a monopoly moves into a new, related market, as that's where the greatest opportunities for abuse of the monopoly exist. I hope that the Justice Dept. will be watching this move closely. On the other hand, it's seems pretty unlikely that Cisco will do something like modifying Linksys equip to only talk to Cisco equip. They could, and that would definitely qualify as anti-competitive behavior IMO, but it doesn't seem to be their style, in general.
What do you guys think of Cisco, as a corporation?
In general, they seem remarkably sane to me. Success in the business world so often seems to require a dangerous degree of megalomania, paranoia, and sociopathy, but Cisco seems to have done pretty well without, to date.
This move scares me a little, because it seems to have serious opportunity for abuse, but Cisco's past record is pretty reassuring. I think this is something we should be concerned about, but I don't think we have any reason to actually worry. Yet. Time will tell.
Cisco needs the help that a cheap, consumer-grade prduct can bring. When I worked at Cisco, we took apart the Linksys PCMCIA wifi cards and compared them to ours, to see how things stacked up. For one thing, the antenna assembly on a Cisco card is a monstrosity. Believe me, I tested enough of the things to know that there were four layers of polycarb, copper, nylon, etc, to get misaligned, diconnected, etc. The antenna used to attach with 2 SMB connectors that never seemed to mate correctly. The RF shielding in the case of a Cisco card looks like a sculpture; almost nothing is punched from sheet metal; rather, most of the noisy parts are covered with custom-machined aluminum blocks.
In contrast, a Linksys card has no funky multilayer antenna, the whole card is on one piece of PCB, and the RF shielding is basically aluminum foil with holes. There's no screws, either. Just ultrasound welded plastic. Essentially, the thing was cheap and well-designed to be manufactured in bulk. The range sucked because of the stupidly designed antenna patch - they basically just put a patch of copper down without even trying to tune it so the mismatch was horrible. And still it worked.
Cisco can benefit greatly from using Linksys bulk sales to support their bottom line while they do what they do best - R&D. The wireless division I worked for had some of the best radio engineers I've ever met - hell, you walked into the parking lot, and every other car had a ham license plate and a 3-meter antenna.
So, yeah. This is a good thing, and will help Cisco get back on top of their shit.
'Be always mindful, even when ditch-digging.' --D. T. Suzuki
Now i have to hire a sys admin for gramama's apartment. if linksys tech support told her to debug IGRP or configure an ACL i would have to switch her to RIP! nyuk nyuk
I pray this has a chance of ending one of my prime gripes of late. If this goes through, maybe, just maybe, Linksys might come out with a CF form WLAN client that supports LEAP and works with an Aironet network. I may finally be able to connect my PDA to the company WLAN.
and if we're playing old distributions... whatever happened to Yggdrasil? :)
\\swing: everybody who tried to pronounce it got their tongue in a knot and choked
-- #Debian
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