[GLLUG] Wireless Cards

[STeve Andre']

On Monday 04 February 2008 22:32:33 Chick Tower wrote:
> I'm in the market for a wireless networking PCMCIA card, now that I've
> gotten my laptop running.  I understand that 802.11g is supposed to
> handle 54mbps and 802.11b maxes out at 11mbps, but what do people really
> see for speed at public wireless hotspots?  Is it worth the extra money
> for an 802.11g card?  I'm going to buy a used one, to save even more
> money, but I could save a few bucks more on an 802.11b card.
>
>                                 Chick

Most wireless systems are horridly run it seems, such that the speed
difference between and b and g card isn't noticeable.  'a' cards which
run at 5GHz are definitely faster, but not many places use them.

A *lot* of cards are horribly made, too.  Digital companies typically
do not spend a lot of time on the RF engineering side of things.  The
two are almost polar opposites, RF and digital; what you want to
optimize on for one, really isn't what you want for the other.

Its been a while since I've tried having a shoot-out with wireless
cards, but the Orinoco Gold card was really heads up better than the
other cards I played with a few years ago.  I still have one, and just
recently used it to get a signal at a hotel when other cards weren't
working.

There is also the political to consider: Atheros isn't exactly forthcoming
with data on their newest cards.  OpenBSD doesn't really work with
the AR5212 b/g/a card, because no one has actual specs to figure out
all the things it does.  Because of this, I'm using a really cheap Ralink
USB card which actually works pretty well.  The ralink people handed
out doc and hardware to people for development.  Really cool, and
they aren't bad.

So the wireless world is something of a mess, with gaps in chipsets
because the hardware manufacturers think they're better off some
how in not telling people how their stuff works (sigh).

My advice would be to get a cheap card and see how it runs, or
perhaps wander around on ebay and find an Orinoco card.  I think
the prices on cardbus cards have fallen now that all laptops have
them built in, and USB cards seem to be taking over.

--STeve Andre'