Laptop wireless help

[Moronicus]

I have a laptop, i dont know if that is your specialty, but maybe there are some ppl here who own laptops. I want to buy a wireless device for it. Are there any suggestions? I have pretty much looked at amazon and the reviews, and most of them seem pretty expensive, but also pretty inefficient (as bad reception, or no internet connectivity, among other complaints). In Canada land, there aren't too many available at the store, mostly d-link and netgear, usb or pcmcia.. Any insight on this would be greatly appreciated. :)

[Freakitchen]

Does your laptop have a PCMCIA slot? If so, that's what you want to go for, they're much more reliable than the USB equivalent.

Linksys would be the brand to go for, I've had good experiences with Netgear too.

FK

[mairving]

What is the make and model of the laptop?

[Moronicus]

I am working right now with a Fujitsu, C series lifebook. I haven't upgraded to USB 2.0 I am also working with a netgear w-router MR814v2, with I believe a capacity of 54mbps (not a 100% certain on that one though). My OS is XPsp2.

[aquariuz]

I am just wondering if it makes any difference to look at the mbps specifications... Would it be optimal if your adapter/card's Mbps are higher than those of your router, or viceversa?

And what's this USB 2.0 thing. I remember plugging a p-drive, and it yelled at me saying something about not having USB 2.0 installed or something.

[glc]

Optimal is a card that's an exact match for your router. However, Moronicus only has a 802.11b router, which is 11 mbps. In this case, I'd buy a G-series card, it's backwards compatible and gives you the advantage of being able to hook up faster to G-series access points elsewhere.

USB 1.1 is 12 mbps, USB 2.0 is 480 mbps. It's hardware, you can't turn USB 1.1 hardware into USB 2.0 with software. XP screams whenever it doesn't see a 2.0 controller and you plug a 2.0 device into it. The 2.0 device will simply run at 1.1 speeds.

[Moronicus]

Thanks for the advice, glc!

[aquariuz]

I am thinking of buying a network card as well. Besides considering matching with the brand of your router, let's say you want to use your laptop at a wireless point other than your home. For ex: my school has a WAP, but, in the network device specifications they provide, they talk about a network interface card(NIC) that is IEEE 802.11b or g. Is a NIC the same as a pc network card? if not, would that mean that wireless pc cards wouldn't be able to access such points?

[glc]

NIC = network interface card. Most wireless NIC's are 802.11b and/or g these days. Match your router with a 802.11g PCMCIA NIC and you will be fine, you can connect to any 802.11b or g WAP with it. I use an old Linksys 802.11b PCMCIA NIC in my laptop and haven't found a hotspot yet that won't connect except for those using WPA encryption (I'm running Win2000 and I don't have the Odyssey software required to use WPA with it).