Best wireless pc card?

[OlympusXP]

My sister is moving to her college next week and we've bought a computer for her, got everything else done ok.
However, the dorm she is moving into to is wireless internet and I'm unsure of what she needs or which is the best card for her.

I went to compusa and looked around, and from the looks of it she needs a wireless pci card or a wireless usb adapter.
The USB adapters are $100 and the PCI cards are $50.
The available choices are d-link, linksys, netgear, and siemens.

First question is, which is better, the wireless adapter or the wireless pci card?
Second, which brand of the above should I get?
I've heard bad things about both linksys and d-link and siemens or netgear seem to be the better choice.


Thanks

 

[SteelCityFan]

I would get PCI unless she has a laptop or something she could use it on as well.

As for brand... not sure, but you might choose the Linksys because of their 24/7 tech support (although I waited on hold with them for over an hour the other night... hung up because my phone went dead).

 

[John]

Wow, a college dorm with full wireless lan? The college might have a wireless ISP, but the lan is wired.

Have you verified that you need a true WiFi card and not a simple RJ45 10/100 nic?

 

[OlympusXP]

yep, very wireless isp.
her dorm actually has no connections at all for regular rj45, no wires in there or anything.
it's in charleston, SC.
it's a 5ghz 72mbps wireless connection through some isp, not sure who it is.
you can pay $200 for a 5ghz pc card and get 72mbps (not sure if they cap you?), but we'll just stick with a 11mbps pci card.
it's a desktop.........if it were a notebook i'd know exactly what to get (the PCMCIA)

 

[John]

Sounds like a nice setup over there. The actual ISP is probably only providing <5Mbps so the only way you benefit from the 5GHz WiFi card is for file sharing w/ other pc's. The 5GHz band will probably not be heavily populated where you are at, so you have "less risk for interference", but you do lose some range compared to 802.11B. I use a lot of Linksys products, and have never really encountered any problems. You should pick up a WMP11 if it will work with the dorm equipment.

 

[shawnman]

If it really is 5 a GHz system, then a 802.11b card that you would buy at compusa, best buy, etc... won't work. 802.11b works on the 2.4 GHz band.