Nice concepts but poor execution

Author's Rating:

Pros: Ease of use/setup.
Price for features.
Storage link.

Cons: Buggy firmware.
No resolution to problems forthcoming

The Bottom Line: 
Storage link is handy, but problematic.  Find another alternative if possible.  If you don't need storage link, look elsewhere.

Author's Review
I have a long history of using Linksys wireless and wired products both professionally and personally.  I had a WRTP54G for home use for several years with little/no problem.  When that unit bricked, I bought the WRT350N to get the storage link support.  When I found out that it didn't support larger than 300GB USB drives, I traded it in for the WRT610N. 

As I have seen discussed in various forums, the 610N has serious firmware issues.  The first issue that I noticed was that the storage link was tempermental.  Sometimes the drive shows up as connected (in the web gui) and sometimes it does not.  This occurs whether I have my 500GB drive attached or a 2GB thumb drive.  Sometimes the drive just drops out of sight and the router needs to be rebooted for it to come back - I never found this to be related to the drive going to "sleep" as might be a defense.  I have also experienced problems in copying data to the drive.  Usually the problem is manifest as a permissions/access denied issue.  It also has problems copying data to the drive using xcopy or other command-lne based utilities.

The wireless is problematic as well.  I have experienced frequent and random wireless connection losses.  I have not experimented with N capability, I am strictly using G.  Problems exist across wireless adapter manufacturers.  The wireless capabilities of the WRTP54G were much more stable in the same environment.

Through much discussion with Linksys support on both the storage link and wireless issues, they have always concluded that the unit is defective and offer to replace it - I have had it replaced twice and the problems always persist.