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This adapter worked perfectly in my old Dell laptop. Configuring it was simple, and I used it in conjunction with LINKSYS Wireless-G 2.4 GHz Router attached to cable modem and desktop computer.
not so. All adapter cards were then able to establish an association with the router and access the internet. I bought this to replace my original Linksys WPC54G adapter that gave up the ghost. Error message is " Cannot associate with the access point". Oh, and I'm running windows XP Professional SP2 and I have not found any XP fixes on the MS Update web page that matches this problem. Original card was version 1.3, this one is version 3.2 and the newer driver has to be used, I found that a complete uninstall of the old card and Linksys monitor software & driver needed to be done and a "ground up" install of the new card performed to get it properly installed. Long story short, after sloughing through the Linksys support web page and not finding an answer, I decided to try a power off/on reset of the WRT54G wireless router.
No other firmware updates are available for the version of the WRT54G wireless router that I have, and I'm contemplating replacing it with a newer version, but as long as the old one works after doing the reset, we'll see how things go. I thought it would be just a simple matter of taking the old WPC54G card out of the PCMCIA slot and slapping this one in. Each time that this has happened, the fix has been to reset the WRT54G router, and it looks like it intermittently gets hung when the newer version WPC54G tries to connect. For reasons yet unknown, occasionally after booting up, my wireless connection does not connect with my Linksys WRT54G wireless router, which is a version 2.1, upgraded to the latest firmware v41.1. Whenever this happens, I discovered that other PC's (laptop & desktop) in the household with Linksys wireless adapters also would not connect with the router on boot up or if they were up while my laptop booted up, their connections would drop. but it's an annoyance I'd rather not have. Bottom line, the adapter works fine whenever it connects, but I occasionally still need to reset the router.
My older model laptop was just not picking up a signal from the router a few rooms away. Now I can go up 3 stories and still get a very strong signal. This was a great purchase.
I ordered this item to replace my previous one of 4 years (which I broke from dropping the laptop on it). These units are sturdy and efficient. Word of suggestion to reduce conflicts with XP: instead of following Linksys installation directions (CD software first then hardware) install the adapter first, let XP install wizard start-up and tell you when to run the CD. That way you install the drivers without installing all the proprietary software that can cause conflicts if you change wifi locations often.The seller described item correctly, it would not have been apparent that this was V2 instead V4 like I had previously.
I have the v3.0 version of this card. Maybe they don't have desktop PCs with PCMCIA cards in India (where the tech support guy was) but they are sold around the world. At least that was reliable.Also, the included software is garbage. So I switched back to my trusty old D-Link 802.11b card. Several calls to tech support helped me update the firmware but even after a firmware update, the signal quality was unusually poor. I was replacing a D-Link card that was 802.11b only and thought this would possibly give me better data rates and I would also be able to switch the 11b compatibility off of my Linksys wireless router which could also improve performance.Wrong on both counts.
My data rates actually dropped after moving to this card. Even though my PC (which is not portable) is located less than 20 feet away from the router/Access point, I consistently get a poor signal as reported by the included software. This card is terrible. Word of advice to Linksys. He insisted that I could not be putting this in a desktop PC and only laptop PCs have PC cards. Anyway, after the useless tech support incident and pointlessly attempting to update firmware I still have poor signal and terrible data rates. fire the guys who write this crappy software and put that money into better customer support and improved compatibility with your own products.I have two other PCs and a cell phone that can connect and use the router with no issues.
(I don't like when tech support makes me do that but sometimes you just have to give them tough love). I bought it for a Gateway All-in-one PC that didn't come with wireless networking built in. If you can, just forget about installing it. Furthermore Linksys technical support was very rude on the phone thus making me rude on the phone as well. When I explained that I was adding this card to a desktop PC, it nearly fried the guy's brain. If you use Windows XP or Vista, the Windows wireless LAN manager works quite well (as well as it can with such crappy hardware) with this card making the Linksys crappy software completely unnecessary. Both PCs have Intel Centrino technology which works quite well.
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