I'm a sucker for tipping points, and seeing technical products packaged in clear plastic and hanging on racks screams mainstream acceptance. True, you need a hatchet to get through the plastic, but in the case of US Robotics Wireless 54Mbps Starter Kit , it's worth the hacking.

Retailing at $99, the Wireless Kit includes a USR5462 Wireless Router and one USR5422 USB Wireless Adapter. I commend US Robotics for including multiple advanced features in a consumer product still easy enough for any Best Buy or Circuit City customer to install and use.

The router, slightly larger than a paperback book, has two antennas and provides good range. The wireless router reached farther in my house than any others I’ve tried except specialized high-gain units. From the office in one corner of the first floor, I still received a weak but usable signal in the kid's playroom in the far corner of the second floor. No other general wireless router/card combo has done that, especially with security enabled.

The equipment supports WiFi Protected Access (WPA) as well as the now disgraced Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP ). WPA options include pre-shared key, pre-shared passphrase (the easiest for consumers) and 802.1x for connecting back to the office. USR also disables Universal Plug and Play peer-to-peer networking from Microsoft by default, increasing security considerably. The firewall is enabled by default, and includes intrusion-detection settings such as Stateful Packet Inspection and ping rejection to raise the hacking level of difficulty two big steps.

The manual says to plug the router into a regular broadband modem for DSL or cable, and never mentions using it linked into another router.

This little detail didn't stop me from ignoring the manual (short but fairly complete) and test the unit while traveling. Some companies make specialized wireless routers for use in hotel rooms and meeting rooms, but they charge you extra in the form of a “small and mobile" tax. The US Robotics unit isn't quite as small as the specialized routers, but costs far less and easily fits into briefcases.

Instead of plugging the router into the DSL or cable modem as usual, I plugged it into a Xincom XC-DPG502 dual-WAN router that automatically assigns IP addresses, just like the Ethernet connection in a hotel room. The US Robotics box took an address, assigned my client notebook a hidden, private address, and connected to the Internet without hesitation. This unit can become a travel unit easily and also includes four Ethernet ports for local devices to augment the wireless access option.