Rating: 
Summary: DO NOT BUY THIS CARD
Review: The WG511 is excellent when working. However, whenever one disables the connection it is impossible to reconnect without rebooting the computer. I run this with XP Home and a notebook that I know works perfectly. Netgear support is as usual helpless, from technicians that can barely speak English to long holds to being told to install the new firmware (which didnt help). If you dont want a headache and countless frustration then buy a different card. Netgear deserves the bad publicity which is why I am posting this.
Rating: 
Summary: easiest installation ever!!!
Review: I bought the netgear router and cards based on the easy installation
IT WAS ALL TRUE!!
easy install and it works great all around the house
Rating:
Summary: Easy installation and works great with matching router
Review: I bought this along with the NETGEAR 802.11g router to connect my Win98 laptop to my Verizon DSL modem. It worked great right out of the box. Quick and easy installation with the CD under Win98. I have the router in the 3nd floor bedroom and I get 60% signal in the backyard. I haven't tried connecting to legacy devices. My only issue is the antenna on the card which sticks out of the pc slot about 2". I worry that it will break off, but it seems to be made of pretty sturdy metal. It looks cool too!
Rating:
Summary: Nice performance, easy to install and use!
Review: The range on this card is suitable for most home applications provided the access point is located near the center of the house or you don't have an extremely large home. I run my network in a 2300 sq ft. home. The included utilities can monitor connection speeds and signal strength. I consistently run at high speeds and stay above 65% signal strength anywhere in my home.Transfer speeds are very good. I am able to move large files including Power Point presentations, database backups and images around with no trouble at all. The encryption is easy to configure and the scan utilities will allow you to detect other wireless access points in your area. Nice product.
Rating: 
Summary: Poor service, poor quality and dishonest tactic in selling
Review: Netgear is not honest with customer about their problem on the WG511. I bought the first WG511 for my Dell Lattitude and the card works well. When I bought for my son the new Compaq Presario 2100 us about 2 months ago, I start knowing all about code 10 error that WG511 will not work will many kind of laptops, and they still sell WG511 for the unsuspecting customers despite there was plenty indications that something is not right with the card. The current beta driver on Netgear site still not work with my son's laptop and he still uses the first wobbling version. If your WG511 works with your laptop, consider that you are lucky as I was before buying the 2nd one. And you might not be as lucky again as I am now. For anyone want to buy WG511, use Google to search whether your laptop modem having problem with WG511. Don't ever believe that the new driver will fix the code 10 problem unless you have tried it out first. But then who is that insane to buy a product with such uncertainty?
Rating:
Summary: problems
Review: I had the same problem someone else mentioned. My Compaq laptop went into hibernate and ever since then the WG511T card does not work - code 10 error on the device manager. It worked for 2 weeks and suddenly just quit working. I have spent hours unloading software,reinstalling, rebooting, doing system restores, and nothing helps. I contacted the support site and they told me to put the card in another slot - I only have 1 slot!!!!! I am going to give this card to someone else to see if it works for them and warn them about the computer going to sleep. It's a wash - don't buy it online. Get it from a store where you can return it.
Rating:
Summary: Netgear Equals Superb Service
Review: This holiday season I was a good santa and purchased numerous wireless networking products for my various family members. Sure it was partially a selfish act as I wanted to be able to easily connect when I went to visit, but for the most part it was just an act of giving. I purchased mainly G products and they varied from routers to USB adapters to PC Card adapters. I did also purchase a couple of B products for those in the family that already had some wireless networking products (yes, I know they are backwards compatible but I didn't want to take any chances).
Only two members of the family had installation problems (considering my family is very non-technical I was quite impressed) and those two people both had yet to upgrade to Windows XP SP2. The rest of the family members were up and running within minutes.
As for the couple of family members that did have problems, well they called me first (of course) and I told them to just run back through the installation procedure again. This solved the problem for Uncle Dennis but Grandma Joyce still couldn't get it to work properly. I reluctantly told her to call Netgear's technical support (hey the reviews on Amazon haven't been too pretty for their tech support). I however was quite pleased when an hour later I got an email from Grandma Joyce thanking me for the great gift. I called her back and she told me that after fiddling with the settings with the Netgear people she was up and running within 30 minutes.
Overall, I consider this the ultimate test of product quality and support and I would give Netgear two thumbs up.
I hope this review was helpful to you in putting your mind at ease regarding ease of setup and trust of technical support if needed.
Rating: 
Summary: another good quality Netgear product
Review: The product works very well, once you got it setup properly.
i won't bother with the details specs of the product, you should be able to find it somewhere else. just to share few tips of the installation, hope that will help you. (for Windows only, sorry Mac fans.)
[...]
2. if you are running Windows XP, should install SP2 already. the SP2 wireless wizard gives you painless setup.
3. after you download the driver, install it first WITHOUT put in the card. the driver will also install Netgear's wireless wizard software that helps your installation. i didn't use it, cause unnecessary.
4. plug in the card, the Windows will go through the "find new hardware" just click through. By the end of this step, you will have you wireless card up and running.
5. set up WPA. just to be general, log on your wireless router, enable wireless encryption. type in a long phrase, like, "i ate a big roast beef today." you can use the Windows wireless wizard or the Netgear wizard to setup the card. type in the same phrase.
the card will try to connect it again, then you will have a very fast connection established when you see the green light on the card becomes solid.
good range, i roamed around the house, in the bathroom, living room, back yard, etc. my wireless router is in the corner of the study room, not the best place, but seems no problem. the lowest signal i got is very weak, but still at 6MB speed, enough for surfing the web.
design: 4
performance: 4
setup: 4 (easy)
wizard software: 3
overall: 4 (highly recommended)
one problem i had is with the Netgear wizard. if your computer has different user, then i found i couldn't save a wireless profile when log on as user. the wizard asked me everytime to re enter the WPA phrase. here is what i did to get around,
1. unplug the card.
2. find where the netgear installed the software on your computer.
3. in the folder, there is a folder "driver", copy the whole folder.
4. uninstall the netgear wizard.
5. create a netgear folder as before your uninstallation. copy the driver folder.
6. put in the card again.
7. use only Windows XP SP2 to configure your wireless network.
Rating:
Summary: Fast, inexpesive, easy setup, and multiple language support!
Review: I just purchased the Netgear WG511 wireless adapter card for my wife's PC. Overall, I am very happy with this purchase, and recommend this card. However, there are a couple of points I would like to touch on in this review:
1) Although the initial installation of the Netgear software was very easy (on a Sony VAIO laptop running WindowsME), enabling WEP encryption presented what appeared to be issues. Once WEP was enabled, the Netgear card did not seem to be able to connect to my Linksys access point. But, in reality, this was not the case -- It turned out that the Netgear card just needed a little time to communicate the encryption data with the access point, after which it was recognized just fine.
2) This card is installed on a PC running WindowsME Japanese. Let's just say I was very (happily!) surprised to find that the software recognized the language of the OS and automatically installed the correct language version of the software. It would be nice, however, if Netgear stated that multiple languages were supported by the card and its software somewhere on the packaging or in the manual, as this would have saved me the trouble of first attempting to download and use the software from the Netgear Japan web site (which didn't work). But, once I installed the software from the installation CD, everything went without a hitch.
3) Back to an issue implied by point number 1, above: when you boot a PC with this card installed (unless you are using XP's network management software), it takes a minute after boot for the card to connect to the access point. This is likely because the Netgear software has to fully load before it can connect, but it makes it seem that the card is not working after the computer starts. In fact, the card is working just fine, if you wait a minute and let the software find and communicate with the access point. (This is not an issue unless you have WEP enabled.)
And, for users of WindowsXP: If you do not disable XP's network management software, you will have compatibility issues with the Netgear software. This is the source of many user's issues noted in the reviews on this web site.
So, be aware that you should turn the XP software *off* if you intend to use the Netgear network manager. Or, if you want to use the XP software, just install the card's drivers and skip the installation of the Netgear management utility.
In summary, this is a fine card with well-written, intuitive software that should be considered by anyone who wants to connect a laptop PC via wireless. Although using WEP does seem to impact performance on boot up, there is no apparent degradation of connection speed once online. If WEP is not used, the card connects instantly, with no noticable lag.
I highly recommend this card to anyone who wants to connect quickly, easily, and for far less money than they might spend on other name-brand cards.
Rating:
Summary: WG511v2
Review: My WG511 has been working fine. When I started thinking about buying another one, I noticed Netgear released WG511v2 already. I recommended you to make sure you purchase the latest.
|
