wireless adapters

got a call from friends yesterday saying that they were having problems connecting the new pc that their parents had brought for their lad. so went round to have a look, turns out that there is now wireless adapter in it only g-lan.......they freely admit to not knowing the insides or bits of a pc. now as i didn't have tools i couldn't open it up to check what slots were available on the mobo, it's a medion something or other.........didn't even have a label on (had the windows coa but nowt else). now they want to get it up and running as soon as.

so i'm gonna get an adapter for them, now question is - is there much in it between usb and pci wireless adapters? as i'm not overly confidant of the internals of this thing so a usb adapter might be the easiest way to go.

Wireless g is a standard and should be compatible with most current wireless routers

In my experience n is usually the one that can cause the most issues as the majority of devices are the older n-draft and so can have compatibility issues. (we had a massive issue with dropped packets with a load of toshiba laptops because they are n-draft, we had to drop them back down to g to get reliable connection)

Did you check to router to see what the wireless settings are on it (or if the wireless is even on)
The simple solution is of course to run some cat5 cable. ;)

edit: one thing I have found issues with with wireless is drivers, you need the correct drivers for the correct revision of the wireless card, newer drivers can be for newer revisions of the same card and are incompatible with the older revision, but once the newer incompatible drivers have been installed it's almost impossible to get windows to give them up and use the older correct drivers.
Even if you uninstall the old drivers, install the correct drivers and manually point windows at them, it still pull the newer drivers out of it's cache and tries to use them.

At which point a new wireless card or usb is a workable option.

my experience of card vs usb has been pretty even, a lot depends on the card/usb used.
I've found both belkin and D-link generally good

Quote:

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Originally Posted by SuicidaL

turns out that there is now wireless adapter in it only g-lan.......

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That won't be the problem. Drivers possibly, but most likely it's just setup.

But back to the actual question, I much prefer cards to USB. In my experience they're just much more stable. The hardware is identical, it's just the USB interface always seems flakier.

Hiya,

I think the OP was meaning gigabit-LAN by g-lan (ie cabled), not wireless at all. Also, now was a typo of NO.

ie, to re-phrase:

"turns out that there is no wireless adapter in it only gigabit lan......."

As far as USB vs PCI cards - USB are fine, work great, and if you want to make sure your computer isn't on-line (security, don't want to go over bandwidth limit etc.), you just whip it out. Sorted. Also can be got for £5 from most e-tailers.

Cheers!

Hi, most/lots of Medion PC's have WiFi, have you checked in Device Manager > Network Adapters > 802.11 WLAN etc . Its normally a USB adapter, PCB, located behind front panel, connected to mobo via a cable.
Drivers for the PC are normally located on App & Support Disc supplied, in RECOVER partition of HDD, also on Medion UK site (obtained by entering MSN No, Model No MDxxxx, or first 7 numbers of Serial No. In a lot of cases label with details on, is on underside of PC). WLAN Driver prob Ralink.
Mobo normally MSI one, Everest etc normally finds model No etc.
This a good site for quirks, limitations, info etc of Medion PC's etc:-

http://www.medionsupport.com/phpbb2/portal.php , have to sign up to view, due to Spam problems.


Cheers BOB