The Linksys WRT54G series of home wireless routers are remarkably flexible little devices.  With their powerful processors and Linux-based Open Source firmware, the inexpensive routers can be modified to perform functions normally present only in enterprise-class equipment that costs thousands of dollars.

I’ve replaced the stock firmware in my WRT54G with the excellent and free Tomato Firmware. Among other things, this allows me to set Quality of Service settings on my network, so that large downloads–things like BitTorrent and TiVo downloads from Amazon Unbox–don’t interfere with web browsing or, more critically, our AT&T CallVantage service. Right now, I can have an Amazon Unbox download running, while I place a call using CallVantage and browse the web all on another my laptop. This essentially fills my Comcast cable connection to capacity, but the firmware in the router is able to manage the connections so that the phone call has the highest priority, followed by web browsing, and lastly the TiVo download.

Ensuring that bandwidth and latency-sensitive applications such as VoIP and web browsing aren’t affected by large video downloads and P2P apps like BitTorrent is key to their success, and hopefully more consumer level equipment will come with these settings enabled by default.