Do I need an antenna or a new card?

I own a Netgear WGT624 108Mbps router. I have been using it with my T42 Thinkpad onboard wifi fore the past year or so.

I recently bought a new PC which sits about 10m away from my router. At that spot, my laptop has "very good" signal and connects at 54mbps without any problems. The new PC has a Netgear WG311 PCI card, but connects at anything less than 12Mbps and has a "low" to "very low" signal. Its sometimes even 1Mbps and is dead slow!

Since my laptop picks up a good signal at that spot, I assume there is plenty signal in that spot.

My question is.....Is my PCI card just a bad one or does it need an external antenna (5/6db) of some sort? Should I just get another brand altogether?

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

I'd be a little suspect of a card that performs like that! Perhaps it's worth taking it back and exchanging it for another under warranty to see if there is a fault?

First though, make sure the computer case it is installed in isn't obstructing the signal from the router. If this proves to be the problem and it is difficult to permanently locate the PC accordingly, purchasing a small external antenna that you can connect via a short pigtail lead may help with reception as it will easier to locate.

Regarding your last question about brand, that particular model of card appears to come based on either an Atheros or Marvell chipset. This means although the two variants share the same model name, they are in fact two entirely different types of card and will probably perform quite differently from each other. Many other manufacturers also play the same trick. Because of this, changing to another brand of card won't necessarily mean you get a different card; it pays to check on the actual chipset used before replacing with another model.

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Jeremy

Marlborough WiFi Project

Thanks for the response NZLamb.... I am thinking of taking it back....but here in S.Africa, vendors are reluctant to change good as "it is working"....Most vendors are noobs anyway...

Nevertheless, I'll take it back and see what they can do for me.

Thanks again