Rating: Summary: Good Product - Exceptionally Poor Documentation Review: The speed and range of this 22 Mbps PC card is very good once you get it up and running. Surprisingly, the WEP encryption does not slow it down noticably. Unfortunately, it does not install cleanly in Windows XP home edition. It's no wonder this product is not XP certified by Microsoft. A good deal of the information in the exceptionally skimpy installation booklet was written for earlier Windows versions and many of the known quirks of the XP installation are simply ignored in the instructions. D-Link is well aware of these problems, but has chosen not to update the installation software, prefering instead to have the customer search their website to download patches for the XP install. There is also an incompatability issue with an older BIOS in Toshiba and some Dell laptops. A link to a patch for that is also available on the support site. There are a lot of FAQ's on the website that are helpful, but the customer should not have to work this hard to address XP issues in a product that advertises that it is XP compatable.
Rating: Summary: better with a rebate Review: This product works ok most of the time. I would be happier if DLink would send my rebate but after speaking with them several times and sending most of the box, they still refused to send my rebate. I'd sell it if I could get a $1 for it and go with LinkSys.
Rating: Summary: The Perfect Wireless Card. Review: Literally this card is perfect. I haven't exactly tried other cards, but I have had no problems what so ever with this card the whole time I've had it. Site survey is a great feature, actually the whole configuration software is just what is needed, nothing that isn't and it takes up very little memory/CPU power to have on. I've connected to multiple different vendors' access points and I always get good speeds and a reliable connection, unless of course I am out of range. I have no complaints and am happy to give it 5 stars.
Rating: Summary: Works great with D-link APs Review: When I'm at home with my D-Link 614 AP, I love this card. When I am other places, with other APs I'm not always as lucky. I've had several occasions where I can't maintain a signal with a linksys or cisco AP. What's funny about it, is that with two linksys AP's-configured identically-I was able to maintain a connection with one and not the other. A similar situation occurred with Cisco. All in all for the money, the card works well enough. If you have a D-link AP that you'll primarily be connecting to, this would be the card to get. However, if you plan on connecting to many different APs, I would recommend a Cisco Aironet card.
Rating: Summary: Works fine, if you can get past the initial frustrations. Review: I installed the software first (as directed), which appeared to be successful. However, no icons were installed on my desktop, and I couldn't find the config utility even when I searched my hard drive. The installation guide was useless - no mention of anything like this. Support on the website was only slightly better, but did manage to figure it out eventually: First I had to upgrade my BIOS (I've only had my Dell laptop for a month!), then I had to download updated drivers for the card (geez! they just shipped it last week!), then I downloaded the updated firmware for my DI-614+ router (this wasn't required, but I wanted to match the latest drivers for the PC card). Finally - voila! But what a pain!
Rating: Summary: Good speed, bad range Review: The speed of the card is very fast, at 22Mbps, which means that on my 10Mbps wireless LAN, it is always at top speed. The card has very good 256bit encryption and it is very easy to install especially under Windows XP (you just put the card in.) It is fully windows XP compatable (Home and Pro editions.) The only problem with this card is the range is very bad. I have a Dell TrueMoble wireless card and when I use my other card and my friend uses his D-Link in his laptop (exact same brand, model, and OS as mine) I will have excellent range, and his will be poor or sometimes it will lose the connection. D-Link is on the cheap end of wireless cards, in terms of price, and it shows in the product. I would recomend spending a bit extra to get a mid or high end product, such as a Netgear or Cisco systems wireless card.
Rating: Summary: Succeeds Review: I got a wireless card because I wanted to have more productive time in Starbucks. I chose this one because I wanted to eventually have wireless at home, too, so I wanted at least a possibility of a faster connection. I installed it in a Starbucks and it worked great right off. I feel as though it really tries to make a connection and make it a good connection. WHen I got the router for my home (614+) it connected to it as soon as it could. It tries, and it succeeds.
Rating: Summary: excellent speed, easy to setup Review: This card is great, I set it up on both windows 2000 and windows xp OS without any problem.
Rating: Summary: Good when it works. Review: This card is great when it works (once you get the drivers and firmware up to date, anyway), but seems to be prone to problems. I bought two of these cards originally, for two different laptops (one a Gateway, the other an IBM, both running Windows XP). All of a sudden, one laptop started rebooting spontaneously sometimes, then sometimes locking as Windows XP restarted, and sometimes it wouldn't turn back on at all. I was baffled by it until in desperation I tried popping the card out, and all of a sudden no more problems. I swapped the card with the other one and the exact same problems migrated to the other laptop. I called D-Link and they cross-shipped a replacement card (though it took most of a month to get it), which worked fine for a month and now seems to be causing the same problems again. I won't be buying another one of these.
Rating: Summary: Works great and is very easy to use Review: I am more than happy with the DWL-650+ and feel that it is as easy to use as it is to setup and install. It is basically a plug and play procedure and warrents a recommendation for just being so easy. Also when coupled with a DI-614+ or other "Enhanced" 802.11b+ wireless product from D-Link I get better speeds than just regular 802.11b.
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