Edimax Wireless Card EW-7718IN installation problems  

like i said just stay with broadcom and you should be fine

I have an Edimax wireless card with a Ralink chipset, using the Ralink drivers, and it worked straight away and has been faultless ever since, so I don't think this is likely to be some generic Win 7 vs Ralink problem (I'm on Win 7 Enterprise 64-bit).

I'm not sure how to precisely identify which Edimax card it is though: in the Device Manager it just says "Edimax 802.11n Wireless PCI Card."

your using PCI card the issue seems to be with the USB adapters for some reason

computersplus said:

your using PCI card the issue seems to be with the USB adapters for some reason

The OP says he is using an Edimax PCI card

clunkfish said:

computersplus said:

your using PCI card the issue seems to be with the USB adapters for some reason

The OP says he is using an Edimax PCI card

right you are I guess I overlooked that ..... I have worked on so many of these lately in my mind it's all a blur lol...and as I said most have been USB none the less obviously there does exist some issue here with the Ralink chipsets and the drivers for 7

It is an important issue to know which Edimax card you are using. I am using the 7728IN which is based on the 802.11n transmission (although it supports g). It is with this group of Edimax cards that users seem to have most problems.
I have installed, without problem, an Edimax EW-7128g onto a Win 7 OS without any problem and straight out of the box. Win 7 provided the driver automatically (in fact it is quite difficult to halt Win 7 installing drivers automatically!). But the 7128 is a standard b/g card not the new n.
Also, and I don't know if this makes any difference, I am using a 32 bit version of Win 7 and you are using 64. However, I think it is the problem with the newer 802.11n that is the real issue and causes compatibility problems with Win 7. You can find out which version of Edimax you have by looking at the Properties of the card under either the device manager or Network centre and change adapter settings.

It's a matter of comparing apples and pears.

tolmalP said:

It is an important issue to know which Edimax card you are using. I am using the 7728IN which is based on the 802.11n transmission (although it supports g). It is with this group of Edimax cards that users seem to have most problems.
I have installed, without problem, an Edimax EW-7128g onto a Win 7 OS without any problem and straight out of the box. Win 7 provided the driver automatically (in fact it is quite difficult to halt Win 7 installing drivers automatically!). But the 7128 is a standard b/g card not the new n.
Also, and I don't know if this makes any difference, I am using a 32 bit version of Win 7 and you are using 64. However, I think it is the problem with the newer 802.11n that is the real issue and causes compatibility problems with Win 7. You can find out which version of Edimax you have by looking at the Properties of the card under either the device manager or Network centre and change adapter settings.

It's a matter of comparing apples and pears.

Agreed - there are too many altered variables to get to the bottom of this with a comparison of just two set-ups.

My card, in both Properties and in the Network and Sharing Centre, is simply labelled "Edimax 802.11n Wireless PCI Card." I can't find any more detailed information about it without pulling the card - which I'm nervous to do because it's working fine

Hey,

thought I would post here as I was having issues with installing the above mentioned cards' drivers... I had tried everything I could find online - the Ralink drivers, the newest Edimax drivers (both from their respective websites) with no avail.

I found a post about using the Windows XP 64 drivers in windows 7 - unfortunately they appeared to be part and parcel of the the same driver file I had already tried from Edimax and so this did not work either - then, as a last act of desperation to get it to work I tried running the driver installation file as the administrator and in compatibility mode for Windows XP (service pack 2) and surprisingly it worked. I have now got two edimax 7728in working on windows 7 through using the same method.

Thought I would post here in case anyone else was having the same issue - I found it bloody frustrating!

Hi Mattran

Thanks for the feedback. By sheer chance I got the same result when re-installing for the nth time the latest Ralink driver and like you it was the installation of the XP SP2 compatibility mode that worked. However, the function was very poor with frequent drop outs and a very slow throughput. The driver that was installed in XP mode was a very old driver, something like 1.48.xxx whereas the one that comes with the Edimax drivers is 3.0.3.0 and with the latest Ralink is 3.0.11.0. After having partial success with the installation in XP mode I tried all the other combinations - Vista, Vista SP1, Vista SP2 etc and none of them worked. What was weird is that returning to installation in XP SP2 mode never worked again either! Despite carefully removing all the drivers between each installation the 1.48.xxx driver never got installed again but usually the 3 series drivers. So obviously Windows 7 decided I was too much an amateur and decided for me!
I decided that installing Edimax was too much like voodoo and sent the card back to Edimax with a request to 'Try harder'.

BTW I've replaced it with the Netgear WN311b card and although the installation was not as straightforward as it ought to be, in comparison it was relatively simple to install and it now works superbly with no drop outs and constant good connection to the WiFi.
Drivers are the devil itself! Glad it worked out for you though.