720 wifi options

Hello,
I am looking to get a different card for my 720, and am trying to decide which to buy. I know which ones will work according to the HCL, but what about a pro/cons section? I thought maybe we could use this for one. Questions off the top of my head-
1) Cmonex (I believe) stated that CF w/adapter would be the better choice over PCMCIA. Why?
2) Any bugs/glitches you have had with a certain card?
3) Anything that sticks out in your mind as a selling point for a particular card?
4) Support 128 bit?
5) Support "profiles" including wifi keys?
6) Work with Ministumbler?
7) External antenna port/jack?

Thanks for the help in deciding which card to buy.

I am looking for: (answers to above)
1)?
2)None hopefully
3)?
4)yes
5)yes
6)yes, but not a deal breaker if it doesn't
7)would like

Top of my list is compatibility. That places Prism based cards up front. You're bound to find a driver package that does all you ask.

Secondly is power consumption. A greedy card is foolish IMO. Your card should complement your hpc, not kill it. IIRC, Cisco 350 sucks 500Ma during transmit. That's absurd. You should be able to xmit overseas with that power draw.

Third is all the rest, cost, availability, track record.

For CF my favorite is the Dlink DCF-660. Low power draw, great performance.

For PCMCIA I like the first version Belkin F5D6020, good performance, moderate power draw, lifetime warranty (no bill required to obtain replacements, best service in the industry)

For a completely different offering the CF Symbol Spectrum 24 is an extremely low power draw card with OK performance. It's very small and unobtrusive. However, forget war driving programs. None work with the 24 AFAIK.

I hope this helps. I'm sure others will have different opinions than me but my choices work really well with minimal fuss in all of my fleet.

Actually, its 600. And I love it.

-Who cares about power when you can get a signal further than you would ever expect?

doesnt it work even with pocketwinc?
i remember a symbol wifi working with pocketwinc.

actually its sensitivity is not as great as some other card's. sorry to disappoint you!

I am very partial to the Orinoco Gold cards. They have very sensitive receivers and have both an integrated antenna as well as a connector for hooking the card up to an external antenna. I currently use a Socket CF Wifi card and like it for its low power use and small size. Both cards work well with Mini-stumbler (The version of Netstumbler for CE).

you mean socket works with ministumbler? wow.

hey, no offense meant towards the Cisco card. I gather it does some things (VPN?) that other cards can't do well? But as a ham will tell you, on the right day and in the right band you *can* transmit around the world on 500mw.

I never bothered with pocketwinc after a quick trial. I didn't like it. I stick to warrior and stumbler. Stumbler is better, it sees hidden ssids, warrior doesn't.

oh why didn't you like pocketwinc. it has so many nice features ip renew, and a few other things i can1t remember now... oh and it shows AP's so much more quickly than ministumbler, right after launching the app.

I can't find PocketwinC in my MIPS archives so that's probably why I don't use it, it's ARM only. I like to run the same programs if I can across my platforms. Well, not all programs but I like to keep the core apps and utilities consistent.

IIRC, I didn't like the WinC interface. It was too busy and needed an overhaul. That and all my stuff is Prism which is properly supported by stumbler.

Maybe I'll give WinC another shot on my 720/SL4 platforms. I do like the simplicity of Stumbler though. Elegant and informative, the hallmarks of a great program.

Orinoco, on the flavour you desire for a given encription (bronze=none, silver=64bit, gold=128 bit)

1) i think she said so because CF cards *usually* draw less power than pcmcia ones
2) none
3) it has big range and there are several driver version. (i like the avaya ones)
4) gold one does
5) as far as i recall they do
6) dunno, never used ministumbler
7) it has.

http://www.senao.com/english/product/product_wireless01_outdoor_1.asp?tp1id=02&tp2id=07&proid=000033

How about this one? It uses the Prism 2.5 chipset so it should work right? It is also showing on the HCL with a driver download, so I should try that driver first right?

Moe

yes and when i bought the sig3, i could use wifi in it right away

dunno, i have the SL2511-CF, and that works fine with that driver, except that the CE 3.0 driver is ppc, but that's no problem, it is just a standard prism chipset so will work with many other (hpc) drivers.

Personally I go for an ORiNOCO card.
Cheap (free in my case)
Always works (until my PC Card slot appears to be dead...no cards work at all )
Works with Ministumbler (for sure)
The WaveLAN Silvers can be firmware modded to WaveLAN Gold cards
Has an external jack for other antennas.

It's a very common card and is supported under most OSs (linux and windows, what else?) and I'm pretty sure will be supported if JLime (linux) ever gets going on the 720.