If you are looking for an extender Dell has a 2 day special on the DMA 2100.

$59.99 (after $60 instant savings) - offer ends 12/4 at 6:59am

Pretty good price with no rebate forms to mess with.

http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/products/productdetail.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=dhs&cs=19&sku=A1309966

Great Deal. Just bought one and got free shipping too!!

Thank you for sharing. 

I'm not a fan of this extender and think this rapid price drop is the writing on the wall however I still ordered 2 of them because that price is to hard to beat. I checked out using a dell preferred account bringing the total to $116.38 shipped. 

I wouldn't waste your money.  There is clearly a problem with these extenders that is beyond a firmware update.  I have two of these extenders, and they both suffer from a number of reliability issues.  One of my units has an odd issue when it comes out of sleep where the screen is zoomed in off to the side of the tv.  The only way to fix it is to reset the extender, which usually results in the unit not responding to the remote until I unplug it and plug it back in. (Ummmm, where is the power switch on this thing??)  I just recently setup my server with a second network card running to a dedicated switch for just the extenders, because they constantly had a bandwidth warning coming up.  There is a way to make the message not appear, but usually after a week or so the extenders seem to forget that they are attached to a MCE machine and require me to go through the setup all over again.

I think all the rebates and deals are a sign that they're being dumped.  Pretty soon there will be NO support at all.  There has only been one firmware update that I'm aware of, and I doubt there will be any in the future.  I'm hoping there is going to be some sort of offer coming from Linksys to get a trade-in value on these units for the next generation if and when they ever come out, because these have been cloe to unusable for me.  In an effort to be fair, the units work "ok" when they work, but having to reset the unit EVERY night to get it working is NOT what I consider a functioning device.

jeonunh:

I wouldn't waste your money.  There is clearly a problem with these extenders that is beyond a firmware update.  I have two of these extenders, and they both suffer from a number of reliability issues.  One of my units has an odd issue when it comes out of sleep where the screen is zoomed in off to the side of the tv.  The only way to fix it is to reset the extender, which usually results in the unit not responding to the remote until I unplug it and plug it back in. (Ummmm, where is the power switch on this thing??)  I just recently setup my server with a second network card running to a dedicated switch for just the extenders, because they constantly had a bandwidth warning coming up.  There is a way to make the message not appear, but usually after a week or so the extenders seem to forget that they are attached to a MCE machine and require me to go through the setup all over again.

I think all the rebates and deals are a sign that they're being dumped.  Pretty soon there will be NO support at all.  There has only been one firmware update that I'm aware of, and I doubt there will be any in the future.  I'm hoping there is going to be some sort of offer coming from Linksys to get a trade-in value on these units for the next generation if and when they ever come out, because these have been cloe to unusable for me.  In an effort to be fair, the units work "ok" when they work, but having to reset the unit EVERY night to get it working is NOT what I consider a functioning device.

I couldn't agree more for any newer display.  These are great for standard analog tvs, ok for 720p displays and completely useless for 1080p displays.  I bought a couple for testing purposes only.   If you have a 720p or less display, $60.00 is a hard price to turn down for a extender even if it is at the end of its life.. It works with the Windows 7 build 6801, so all is not lost.. 

The sad part about these things is I paid $299.00 for the first one... now that was a waist of money.

jeonunh:

I wouldn't waste your money.  There is clearly a problem with these extenders that is beyond a firmware update.  I have two of these extenders, and they both suffer from a number of reliability issues.  One of my units has an odd issue when it comes out of sleep where the screen is zoomed in off to the side of the tv.  The only way to fix it is to reset the extender, which usually results in the unit not responding to the remote until I unplug it and plug it back in. (Ummmm, where is the power switch on this thing??)  I just recently setup my server with a second network card running to a dedicated switch for just the extenders, because they constantly had a bandwidth warning coming up.  There is a way to make the message not appear, but usually after a week or so the extenders seem to forget that they are attached to a MCE machine and require me to go through the setup all over again.

I think all the rebates and deals are a sign that they're being dumped.  Pretty soon there will be NO support at all.  There has only been one firmware update that I'm aware of, and I doubt there will be any in the future.  I'm hoping there is going to be some sort of offer coming from Linksys to get a trade-in value on these units for the next generation if and when they ever come out, because these have been cloe to unusable for me.  In an effort to be fair, the units work "ok" when they work, but having to reset the unit EVERY night to get it working is NOT what I consider a functioning device.

I have 2 - a 2100 in the garage, and a 2200 in  the living room.  All I can say is that I have not experienced any problems using them. 

I just ordered 2 more 2100's.

I haven't had any issues either.  I turn them off after use and I reboot my PC they are connected to once a week. 

I use my over a Wireless N 5Ghz network.

I paid nearly full price when they came out as well.  I think they were worth the money at the original price for my needs.

I just ordered three more 2100s from Dell.  Paid $149 for my first one, $99 for my second one and now $59 for the next three.  I use my current two (along with my XBox360) pretty heavily as extenders and haven't had many issues.  Occasionally power cycle them, but for what I bought them for, they do work.

 

I'm really curious why I'm having the issues when others seem to be fine.  I just ordered all new hardware to upgrade my server that should be arriving today.  I hope it solves the problems, but if not I guess I'll have to call Linksys and see if they can give me some advice.  My current setup is a dual core Opteron 165 with 2gigs of ram, 1 500 gb hdd, 2 1tb hdd's, and an ATI 2600xt.  I have a Q6600, 4gigs of ram, and a Asus mb with the P45 chipset coming.  I'll post my results when everything is up and running.

jeonunh:

I'm really curious why I'm having the issues when others seem to be fine.  I just ordered all new hardware to upgrade my server that should be arriving today.  I hope it solves the problems, but if not I guess I'll have to call Linksys and see if they can give me some advice.  My current setup is a dual core Opteron 165 with 2gigs of ram, 1 500 gb hdd, 2 1tb hdd's, and an ATI 2600xt.  I have a Q6600, 4gigs of ram, and a Asus mb with the P45 chipset coming.  I'll post my results when everything is up and running.

FWIW, I had relatively frequent stuttering on HD recorded and live TV on my DMA-2200 using a wired network.  It would stutter for 10 seconds or so every few minutes along with a "network issue" message.   The two network cards that I had available both produced similar results (one was gigabit).  I bought a new gigabit card at Newegg for $24 and all my problems are gone.  Video is perfect. 

Though, startup still takes forever, the UI is still extremely laggy and the overall user experience is somewhat poor.  Overall the thing does its job, but I wouldn't ever claim that it does it with any kind of style!

Aaron

PS:  I'm mentioning the DMA-2200 because I think it has very few differences with the 2100.  Could be wrong though.

I have five of these and just bought my sixth. All I can say is that they work and at $60 and compatible with Windows 7, you can't go wrong. 

aaronp:

the UI is still extremely laggy and the overall user experience is somewhat poor.

When this device first came out, I saw this comment a lot. But Vista SP1 and the last Firmware update came out at about the same time, and, as far as I can tell, since then most people dpn't have this problem. I have a DMA2100 and a DMA2200, and I know that both of them are almost as responsive as running Media Centre directly on the PC - sub-second response times to key presses as I navigate through the 10-foot interface. This makes this unit a great way to look at your digital photos on the big screen, because you can flick through them as fast as you can on the PC.

Ripwave:

aaronp:

the UI is still extremely laggy and the overall user experience is somewhat poor.

When this device first came out, I saw this comment a lot. But Vista SP1 and the last Firmware update came out at about the same time, and, as far as I can tell, since then most people dpn't have this problem. I have a DMA2100 and a DMA2200, and I know that both of them are almost as responsive as running Media Centre directly on the PC - sub-second response times to key presses as I navigate through the 10-foot interface. This makes this unit a great way to look at your digital photos on the big screen, because you can flick through them as fast as you can on the PC.

From my experience, the people that are ok with the Linksys have them connected to a 720p or less display.  While I have heard people say they can use them with a 1080p display, I have never seen it  and believe me when I say this.. I have tried every type of hardware you can think of.

Everything about a extender is second rate when compared side by side with a PC however its the only way to seamlessly extend the whole solution right now so we are are stuck with them.

$60.00 is a hard price to turn down though and probably why I ordered 2 more. 

I couldn't get a friend to buy another one though.  Here is what he said when I told him about the deal  "I would rather buy a round of drinks at a crappy bar for my worst enemy's then donate anymore money to this type of device"   These are not my words.  He only has 1080p displays.. We had to set his linksys to 720p to get it work correctly.

 

It would be nice if these prices were available here in the UK - when I checked the UK Dell website, its showing for over £260, thats around $520!!!

And they say the UK doesn't have extortionate prices

Tony

Tony_Park:

It would be nice if these prices were available here in the UK - when I checked the UK Dell website, its showing for over £260, thats around $520!!!

And they say the UK doesn't have extortionate prices

Tony

Linksys DMA2100 for £97.86

http://thedigitallifestyle.com/cs/blogs/ian/archive/2008/12/01/linksys-dma2100-for-163-97-86.aspx