USB Wireless adapters? (input on them please)

theArtistFormerlyKnownAs

theArtistFormerlyKnownAs

Well-Known Member
GF wants a wireless card installed on her desktop (its a couple years old and didn't come with one) but we also looked into these USB wireless adapters and I was wondering if anyone has had any experience with them? Are the good enough for basic things like surfing the net and doing online school work? It isn't going to be used for online gaming or anything like that, so as long as they are decent, thats probably what we're going with because they appear to be cheap and even easier than buying a card (no need to take the case apart for installing, basically plug and play, maybe a driver CD).

Any reviews/input is appreciated :smile:
 
clevalley

clevalley

...
They will work fine, but if you are worried about performance go with a PCI based card.

USB 2.0 has a theoretical spec'ed data transfer of 480 MB/S, but the effective rate is around 408 MB to 320 MB for bulk rate data transfer. But the host (computer) can really only handle about 40MB/S - plus USB transfers are handled by the software on the PC, not at the hardware level like a PCI based card which does the data transfer at a lower level than the O/S...

With that said, the bottleneck of an effective 40MB/S at the USB hardware level, slow it down even further with the data transfer being handled by the O/S you do not get the performance of a PCI based card.

It all depends on what you want to do with it - data transfer and gaming performance, no. General everyday reading e-mail and web browsing, sure.
 
theArtistFormerlyKnownAs

theArtistFormerlyKnownAs

Well-Known Member
ylexot said:
I got one of these and put it on my desktop computer. Works fine and only $8 after rebate including shipping!
Newegg.com - TRENDnet TEW-424UB IEEE 802.11b/g USB 2.0 Wireless Adapter Up to 54Mbps Data Rates 64/128-bit WEP (Hex/ASCII), WPA/WPA2, WPA-PSK/WPA2-PSK - Wireless Adapters
Click to expand...

Thats exactly what we looked at last night. I was checking newegg and ran across that. I'm going to check and see what staples has.

I know, personally, I couldn't manage with a USB one because of my downloading and I at least used to game online :lmao:, but this should basically be for school work and the like, so it should be fine I'm thinkin. :yay:
 
ylexot

ylexot

Super Genius
When I checked stores (Best Buy, WalMart), the cheapest was ~$50. You can try Staples, but I doubt that they'll be any different.
 
clevalley

clevalley

...
ylexot said:
When I checked stores (Best Buy, WalMart), the cheapest was ~$50. You can try Staples, but I doubt that they'll be any different.
Click to expand...

WalMart is typically the cheapest unless you catch them on sale...

Has anyone moved to 802.11n yet?
 
theArtistFormerlyKnownAs

theArtistFormerlyKnownAs

Well-Known Member
ylexot said:
When I checked stores (Best Buy, WalMart), the cheapest was ~$50. You can try Staples, but I doubt that they'll be any different.
Click to expand...

clevalley said:
WalMart is typically the cheapest unless you catch them on sale...

Has anyone moved to 802.11n yet?
Click to expand...

Yeah. I looked around online to get an idea of what they'd have locally...nothing under $40 that I recall. We just ended up ordering that blue USB one from newegg. even if its only so-so, you can't beat 8 bucks after rebate :yay:

I didn't even know they were moving to 802.11n, never heard of it. What are the benefits?
 
itsbob

itsbob

I bowl overhand
clevalley said:
They will work fine, but if you are worried about performance go with a PCI based card.
Click to expand...
PCMCIA??

I've got one for my laptop, and it works great.

had a USB wireless and it didn't last long.. MAYBE 6 months.

PCMCIA I've had about 3 years, and have actually had it fall apart when I tried to shove the laptop into it's case with the card still in it. Put it back together, bent it back straight, and it still works.
 
clevalley

clevalley

...
itsbob said:
PCMCIA??

I've got one for my laptop, and it works great.

had a USB wireless and it didn't last long.. MAYBE 6 months.

PCMCIA I've had about 3 years, and have actually had it fall apart when I tried to shove the laptop into it's case with the card still in it. Put it back together, bent it back straight, and it still works.
Click to expand...

PCI for desktops - PCMCIA or ExpressCard for laptops. :buddies:
 
itsbob

itsbob

I bowl overhand
My boss was trying to get his aircard to work this afternoon (NMCI) and he couldn't get it to work.. I installed the software on my legacy machine and WALLA!! It worked.

Air Cards are FAST!
 
clevalley

clevalley

...
itsbob said:
My boss was trying to get his aircard to work this afternoon (NMCI) and he couldn't get it to work.. I installed the software on my legacy machine and WALLA!! It worked.

Air Cards are FAST!
Click to expand...

That is my only High Speed Internet choice where we live... No DSL, No Cable. :ohwell:

It works great, plus we can take it on travel and have Internet wherever we end up at.
 
theArtistFormerlyKnownAs

theArtistFormerlyKnownAs

Well-Known Member
ylexot said:
I got one of these and put it on my desktop computer. Works fine and only $8 after rebate including shipping!
Newegg.com - TRENDnet TEW-424UB IEEE 802.11b/g USB 2.0 Wireless Adapter Up to 54Mbps Data Rates 64/128-bit WEP (Hex/ASCII), WPA/WPA2, WPA-PSK/WPA2-PSK - Wireless Adapters
Click to expand...

Just a quick update.
Got this USB wireless adapter in yesterday, very easy to "install" (I sat back and let GF do it, just to make sure it was very user friendly :lmao:), and does the job if you just plan to be surfing the net, or even doing very light downloading :yay: Now we'll just see how long it lasts :lmao:
 
G

Gwydion

New Member
pcjohnnyb said:
Thats exactly what we looked at last night. I was checking newegg and ran across that. I'm going to check and see what staples has.

I know, personally, I couldn't manage with a USB one because of my downloading and I at least used to game online :lmao:, but this should basically be for school work and the like, so it should be fine I'm thinkin. :yay:
Click to expand...

I use a USB thumb drive for my wireless. And we both know how much I game. There is no degredation in (assume multiplayer if unstated): WoW, LotrO, CoD2, CoD4, Company of Heroes, Age of Conan, DotA, CoH/CoV, NWN, Tabula Rasa, nor SWG.

aka, they run fine.
 
theArtistFormerlyKnownAs

theArtistFormerlyKnownAs

Well-Known Member
Gwydion said:
I use a USB thumb drive for my wireless. And we both know how much I game. There is no degredation in (assume multiplayer if unstated): WoW, LotrO, CoD2, CoD4, Company of Heroes, Age of Conan, DotA, CoH/CoV, NWN, Tabula Rasa, nor SWG.

aka, they run fine.
Click to expand...

I wonder what your competitors think though?
I'd be winning if you weren't lagging, you...lagger.
:roflmao:
 
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