Cisco-Linksys WMP54GS Wireless-G PCI Card with SpeedBooster

I installed this card on a Dell Dimension 8200 desktop PC. I am running a network using equipment from various manufacturers. The router is made by Netgear, that is compatible with both 802.11b and 802.11g standards. In all, I have four dekstop PCs and one laptop sharing a DSL connection. My intention is to eventually upgrade to a router with higher speed. Most likely the Linksys with Speedbooster.The installation itself was quite easy. My only complaint is that the long antenna of this adapter gets tangled with all of the other wires/cables that are connected on the back of my computer. Perhaps the best installation technique is to put this adapter on the top-most PCI slot. That way, all of the other wires and cables will be underneath the unit and will not tangle with the antenna above the adapter.This PC is the farthest one from the router. Therefore, it receives the weakest signal. This adapter is no better than my older D-Link 520 adapters at receiving the signal. With a weak signal, the adapter is running at 5.5 Mbps. However, when it is getting good signal, it does run at the highest speed that "standard" 802.11g is capable of. With a router upgrade, that speed should increase.For your information, my computer system has a Pentium 4 processor, 512MB of RDRAM, and Windows XP Pro. The device driver that came with the adapter is working fine with this system. Users with Windows XP and Windows 2000 will get the most benefit from this adapter. The Speedbooster capability is only available to those using these operating systems. Soon, I will upgrade my router to a Linksys unit with the Speedbooster ability.

I installed this into my pc using a slot that was 3 slots away form my dvi slot (digital lcd monitor connection) and it caused horrible interference that whenever I would reboot the pc the monitor would go out for most of the reboot and blink and then eventually come back on. I tried moving the supplied antenna around and no luck. The reception was not that great either and I ended up having to buy a separate external antenna. With the external antenna it finally doesnt make my monitor go out but all in all i ended up spending very close to $100 dollars to make my desktop wireless. As far as the speedboost I dont have anything to compare it to because I upgraded my whole network from a wireless b to the g and anything is better than the b. Also, my router is a linksys srx and it has higher reception and works at 108 mbps standard so the network is fast to begin with. I only purchased this device because the srx version was out of stock. Once the srx version comes back into stock this device will be a spare for customers pcs in the shop to connect to the wireless lan.

I bought this device expecting to receive the same service I would have received if I had bought it in a store. The CD does not contain a driver for Vista, and the computer wouldn't recognize the device. I called customer service for help, and I was told that the warranty expired already on the device even though it was new and had never been used. Beware of buying this from an online retailer other than a big-box company, or you won't be able to get tech support.It took me about three hours of research to determine the driver I needed (version 1.0). If you are a 32-bit Vista system, you can use this device. If you are a 64-bit, forget it. I did manage to finally download the driver. DO NOT INSTALL THE PCI CARD UNTIL YOU HAVE DOWNLOADED THE DRIVER! I ended up having to uninstall the device and driver I should not have installed and to restart my computer 6 times during the three hour period. I got frustrated and was very short with the tech person, who was "very sorry" about all my difficulties, but could do nothing to help me unless I wanted to purchase another device from her over the phone and upgrade.Linksys clearly will not stand by their product if you haven't bought it from the right retailer. The web page was not very helpful, and I got better advice from independent forums than from the Linksys site.That said, now that the device is installed, it is working beautifully. It is about thirty feet from the computer and I had no difficulty streaming Hulu. The wireless is connected to a 54G router, and it's plenty fast enough. If you are an average browser of the Internet, you do not need an N or N+, and I recommend that you do not spend the extra money on the router or wireless.To update: This has now been working perfectly for over two years. I got slammed in a comment for being a dunce about discovering what I needed to do - this was my first experience with installing wireless, and this particular piece of equipment was the only piece I had trouble with. I had no issue with the product, or even with having to struggle a little to get it to work; my issue was with the lack of available service from Linksys for a new product from the company, and a lack of instructions in the product itself. And it is still working beautifully - even with the Vista operating system.