Routers have come a very very long way. Gone are the little square boxes designed to be shoved in the corner of a desk, the new age of Modems and Routers includes design and functionality as core to the sales pitch. D-Link’s Viper ticks those boxes.
Taking a leaf out of the book of some of the biggest tech companies in the world, D-Link have started at face-value with the Viper – a beautiful packaging design will catch your eye in-store.
It doesn’t open like most tech boxes, the lid of the box opens like a chest to reveal the Viper inside. It really is impressive from the perspective of perceived purchase value.
Priced between $299 and $350 depending on where you look, it’s not cheap, but comes packed with a bunch of features everyone should expect these days.
Dual band WiFi, and SmartBeam technology should create solid range and connection speeds, while the USB ports mean easy sharing across your network.
I found setup to be as described on the box “Easy” with a refreshing setup wizard guiding you through the process.
It’s clearly designed to be on the desktop, or even in an area of the home that’s more visible than one might have expected of a router in years gone by.
The design of the unit is excellent, let down only by the intensely plastic feel to the device. In the hand and looking at it in the flesh it doesn’t have the same magnificence as perhaps the box portrays.
That said, the range I was seeing when installed was on-par with similar AC routers, and when it comes to speed the fact is your devices influence the speed of your network more than the router itself.
Pricey, but for real AC WiFi performance you will need to pay that price. Well worth a look.
[schema type=”review” rev_name=”D-Link VIPER AC Router” rev_body=”A great looking unit, with top speeds and features – priced high, not amazing quality” author=”Trevor Long” pubdate=”2015-02-16″ user_review=”3.9″ min_review=”0″ max_review=”5″ ]
