Wireless network card..

[vpwin7]

At the moment I have a USB wireless adapter and it is extremely annoying at times. The thing falls out, or just doesn't enable during bootup. I should mention this is on WinXP, I am upgrading my desktop parts and the operating system to Windows7.

My question is, are wireless PCI adapters just as good if not better than USB ones? I was looking at: Newegg.com - Shell Shocker Deal. Exclusive Jaw Dropping Savings on PC Components and Electronics. -- my current USB adapter isn't that special, a netgear one I got from walmart for 40.00$, WG111V2


Also as a side note: I'm looking at Kingston memory and 4GB DDR3 blocks are about the same price as two 2GB blocks, if anyone knows if there a risk to taking bigger blocks, or performance downgrade that would be good to know. The motherboard is an ASUS so it can handle up to 16GB of memory, 4 slots.

 

[Morph666]

When you've upgraded the wireless adapter might actually work better, due to better hardware support provided by windows 7.

I've used usb wireless adapters for years, and had best results when combining wireless routers with usb adapters of the same brands. My best results were with brands like Sitecom (fairly cheap) and Thomson (kind of expensive - specially the usb adapters - but very stable in my experience).

As for your memory question, I will leave that to someone with more RAM knowledge.

 

[vpwin7]

I think I will be getting the card merely so I can put the USB in storage. Also the card should have a much greater range meaning more wifis to borrow if I need to.

 

[brianzion]

hi there
tp-link i swear by for wireless usb/pci cards. the pci card is 100% better than usb in my opinion and experience. here are my top pci and usb adapters.

Adapter TL-WN822N 300Mbps High Gain Wireless USB >>> Welcome to TP-LINK

What This Product Does
The TL-WN822N High Gain USB Adapter is a 300Mbps wireless client, which allows users to connect a desktop or notebook computer to a wireless network and access a high-speed Internet connection. It is fully interoperable with IEEE 802.11 b/g/n wireless devices, delivering speedy 11n speeds and reliable signal for lag-free online gaming, Internet calls or even HD video streaming.

TL-WN951N 300Mbps Wireless N PCI Adapter >>> Welcome to TP-LINK

What This Product Does

Wireless N PCI Adapter TL-WN951N allows you to connect a desktop computer to a wireless network and access high-speed Internet connection. Comply with IEEE 802.11n, they provide wireless speed up to 300Mbps, which is beneficial for the online gaming or even HD video streaming.

 

[brianzion]

the Kingston memory is a good choice reliable and well built most memory modules are at a good price this year across the world. Its advisable to buy the same type by the same manufacturer best not mix and match. here is a good program for seeing details of your ram called rammon LINK >>> PassMark RAMMon - Identify RAM type, speed & memory timings (IF YOU DECIDE TO DOWNLOAD MAKE SURE YOU CHOOSE THE 64 BIT VERSION FOR YOUR MACHINE)

RAMMon is an easy to use Windows based application that allows users to quickly retrieve the Serial Presence Detect (SPD) data from their RAM modules. It will allow users to identify a multitude of attributes, of which, includes the manufacturer, the clockspeed and other data of their DDR2, DDR3, XMP and EPP memory devices and even some older memory types. It uses SysInfo DLL SDK to gather the SPD attributes from RAM devices. This information provides a snapshot of the available data for each RAM module installed on the system.

 

[vpwin7]

Thanks for the advice. I ended up buying two 2GB blocks of performance GSkill memory. I was looking at Kingston but the only decent one with heat spreaders that I could find was HyperX which is more so for Intel than AMD. As far as the wireless card, the one that was on sale went back to normal price an hour before I could buy it ... so I'm waiting on that part for now.