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Summary: A clarification...
Review: Just a note: the current shipping revision of the FA310TX is 'D1'; this revision no longer uses the DEC Tulip chip but instead uses the Lite-On PNIC chip.
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Summary: Save your money...
Review: Just buy the cheapest you can find. They work the best, becuase they have less bells and whistles.
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Summary: Save your money...
Review: Just buy the cheapest you can find. They work the best, becuase they have less bells and whistles.
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Summary: NetGear is TOPS with Me!
Review: Like the others who have reviewed this item, I am an MCSE, MCP+I and am/have been a network administrator in very large enterprise environments. I have a home network which is 100% NetGear equipment (ISDN router, 10/100 hub, FA310TX NICs).The NetGear by Bay Networks is a simple, cost effective NIC. You plug them in and they work. Simple. They are also Win2000 compliant (so Win2K will find them automatically). Sure, they cannot be remotely managed, but then again, I have never had cause to remotely manage a NIC (a switch port, yes...) I wholeheartedly recommend the FA310-TX. The most bang for your buck! I'm buying more right now!
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Summary: All around BEST bang for the buck
Review: MCP+i, CCNA, CNA, A+, Network+ certified. I have a small LAN at home (~8 computers). In EVERY single one I use the Netgear FA310TX. I have two in my NT Server which is acting as a router. I have NEVER had any problems with the card. Always reliable. High performance. Offers full duplex for high speed two way transmission. One feature I really like are the many LEDs (lights) on the back of the card. It will tell you if it is at 100Mbps, Full Duplex, Link, Collision, Transmitting. I have tried many others - DLink, SMC, SOHO, to name a few of the inexpensive popular ones - but in my opinion they don't compare to the reliability or ease of use (and installation!). Remember, lifetime warranty! If you need Wake On Lan (WOL) capability, I would go with the FA312 card. If you find a good deal on the FA311 card, you may want to consider that. Pretty much, the difference between the FA310 and the FA311 is that the FA311 supports the future PCI 3.3v voltage AND the 5v voltage. Personally, I wouldn't worry too much about finding a FA311 unless you just happen to have the opportunity at a decent price... Hope this has been helpful. One word of advice: -=* DO NOT BUY A CHEAP, UNPROVEN NETWORK CARD! YOU **WILL** REGRET IT *=- Last but not least, I have heard rumors that this card is 'unstable' and 'very sensitive'. In all of my experience, both firsthand and secondhand, I have never witnessed or heard of any of these cards failing in respect to 'hightened sensitivity'...
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Summary: Easier install driver than the Netgear 311 but...
Review: Netgear packaged the wrong software driver disk with my 310 (they send me the 311 driver disk). I figured if they included the 311 driver there must be a good reason but that turned out to be a poor assumption. After wasting sometime with the wrong driver I got the 310 driver from their site and install was pretty easy from there.
It works very well.. I just wish Netgear was a little more careful.
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Summary: Easier install driver than the Netgear 311 but...
Review: Netgear packaged the wrong software driver disk with my 310 (they send me the 311 driver disk). I figured if they included the 311 driver there must be a good reason but that turned out to be a poor assumption. After wasting sometime with the wrong driver I got the 310 driver from their site and install was pretty easy from there.
It works very well.. I just wish Netgear was a little more careful.
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Summary: Why not pay less for something that is going to "just" work?
Review: Ok...the fellow that reviewed several before me made a good point. You don't want to use this in an enterprise environment...DUH! I'm an MCSE and I wouldn't recommend this card to any company, BUT, for the home there is absolutely nothing wrong with this card. It works and you can get 2 or 3 at the price of one of those big dog names. Do those work 2-3 times better? No, they don't. I have 3 PC's of my own at home...6 altogether in there and all have different NIC cards. NetGear performs just as well as the others and I wouldn't complain if I had one of their cards in every one of those machines. So, in short, setting up a corporate LAN/WAN? Then don't pick up one of these cards. Got a couple of computers or just one and want to play network games with friends...save a few bucks and go buy one of these and use what you saved on something else.
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Summary: Worked fine for me
Review: Others have written about poor manuals and shoddy components. This might be true. I'm not a beginner with network software or hardware but I'm hardly a pro either. I had zero problems installing this (manual seemed fine to me) and haven't had any problems using it since. BTW I use it to hook into my DSL connection. If it didn't work I'd just send it back (Amazon's always been great about this). And the price is just too hard to pass up.
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Summary: Simple, Cheap and Effective
Review: Simply put, the Netgear FA310TX works. It is an extremely simple card, but not much is required in a ethernet card. Those of you needing WOL support (why?!) should not purchase this card, as it does not support it. The speed and throughput is consistant with more expensive cards, my LAN does not require speeds up to 100Mbps anyway, but it is good to know it is there. The cards are good priced, so it will not cost much to outfit a small network with these cards, I have one in every desktop in our LAN. They work, what more could you ask?
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