This article is part of a group review of six voice-enabled Wi-Fi routers

This is a box of surprises. At first sight it looks like a somewhat limited internet gateway, but we rapidly realised it is a lot more than that. While the other boxes in this review allow SIP clients to be installed, the IX68 includes a full SIP server. It can actually be used as a telephony provider for a small company, allowing employees on multiple sites to phone each other for free. It can register to an internet telephony service provider (ITSP) for cheap connections to the PSTN. It has two phone ports, and can support multiple SIP phones as well as SIP-enabled mobile handsets using Wi-Fi.

In this mode, it can handle around 30 simultaneous phone calls, and support an office of about 50 users, Intertex says. In this group test, the IX68 is overkill – indeed, for individual home users or small offices, it performs less well than some of the other boxes. It only allows one SIP name and provider per port, it requires a fixed code to dial out on the PSTN, and waits for four seconds to dial out, unless users press #.

Despite its many functions, the box is just six inches square and comes with a warning to stand it upright to dissipate heat correctly. Its unconventional LED display shows the security status of the firewall as “Hi”, “ Lo”, “AC” (custom) or “blo” (blocked). There is a button on the front of the box that changes this status, which strikes us as a bad and risky idea. In fact the “Lo” setting is more or less as strong as usual firewall rules, so the actual danger is of someone disabling the whole internet connection, or blocking IM by setting the firewall to “Hi”.

The user interface takes a bit of getting used to and there is also a somewhat fiddly option on Ethernet Port 4 to convert it into an uplink. Two negative points: the device has no USB port, which may not be too much of an inconvenience; and there is no documentation CD, which is something a device this complex should definitely ship with.

Next review: Thomson SpeedTouch 780WL