Jackpot!! D-Link 11MB Wireless Card for laptop or desktop $49.99 after MIR CONFIRMED!

[im2smrt4u]

Does anyone know if the PCI adapter gives you a true PCMCIA slot? What I want to know is the slot hot swapable? I know the linksys one say you have to have the card in at bootup, but I was hoping that wasn't the case with this...

im2smrt4u

 

[GnatGoSplat]

Siemens and VTech 2.4GHz phones are WDCT standard so they'll work fine with 802.11b. Panasonic 2.4GHz phones on the other hand, are a different story (well, except for the one made by VTech).

Can anyone verify that the mail-ordered ones come with rebate form? If not, think the scanned one will be accepted?
I have had rebates rejected for pickier reasons than that so I have to wonder.

 

[airbus]

If anyone getting this deal doesn't need the PCI adapter... please sell it to me for cheap I need a PCMCIA to PCI adapter for my wireless card. PM with a reasonable price if you're interested

I would be very much interested in the same deal (e-mail: mjarrett@sas.upenn.edu). Thanks.

Bump for any more info on whether you can hot-swap with the PMCIA adapter and how well it works with other PCMCIA cards.

 

[Spartyguy]

<<

<< Anyone have suggestions on if this will work in a dense apartment complex, with my roomie living above me. This means no line-of-sight. I'm also worried about all of the cordless phones in the complex. >>



I belived they are operate on 2.4GHz radio frequency. No line of sight is neccessary. Since they are in the same frequency as 2.4GHz cordless phone, you might have to be careful. Some interruption might accure. >>



What kind of 'interruption' would I expect? I personally don't have a 2.4GHz phone, but that doesn't mean other apartments around us won't.....

 

[emonkey]

Edit: Corrected by wjsulliv...

Best Buy Ad 2/10 - Pg. 24
It says the DWL-650 is $89.99 (plus rebate). $89.99-$20 rebate at BB next week.

 

[sleepdragon]

HELP NEEDED..
I jumped on the deal and went to local MicroCenter in Santa Clara and bought the combo,
but I must have lost the receipt on my way back home, and I can't find it anywhere!!

Can someone please provide me with a scan or photo of their receipt so I can send in my rebate??

 

[wjsulliv]

emonkey -
1) This is not a deal for the DWL-650. It is for the DWL-500. Two distincly different products as far as Microcenter will be concerned.
2) Microcenter does not pricematch (unless you find a really nice manager)


sleepdragon -
1) Go back to Microcenter. They will reprint the reciept for you. Usually they take your name and address down in the computer the first time you buy something . I once asked them why they do this and their explination was that it was for just the reason you need an other reciept. They can look up your history and reprint the reciept.
2) Since they do this most reciepts people have, will have their name and address on the reciept, which will not help you.

 

[emonkey]

Heads up!!!! to anyone shopping at the Tustin Microcenter.

6PM on 2/7
I saw 5 DWL-500 open box marked to $79.96!!! So minus $50 rebate then its only 29.96.

I dont live near there so dont ask me to get them. But they may still be there if youre local.

BTW: What a good week for wireless.

Compaq CP-2W: 87-30rebate= 57
DLink DWL 500 : 79-50rebate= 29

Edit:
Hooked up the card. It worked first try. Its slow as hell since im used to 10/100 but it works good enough for internet.

 

[SpazzyChicken]

Someone was asking about the permormance of these cards, just thought I'd throw in my experience.

I set up a wireless network in my fraternity house (2 main floors and a basement, 20 rooms) to share a dsl line, and I decided to go with the d-link products because of their price at the time. We use the dwl-120 (usb), dwl-500's and the dwl-650's. Great products. With one AP/Router (di-713p) on the top floor, the lowest signal strength in the house is arond 65%, even get a signal in the basement. And this is through many walls with all sorts of interference (each room has cordless phones, microwaves......). Very impressed, and have yet to have a single problem.

Throughput is about 4-5mb, with no wep enabled(have mac address security on router).

We bought these cards at $150+, this is a steal!!!!

This is my first post, so I just want to thank all the Anands for the great deals!!

 

[Skaven]

D'OH!!

Looks like I'm a bit late on this one. Its not showing up on the site anymore... can anybody else find it??

Damn!

P.S. if anybody has an extra PCMCIA PCI card... I'd be more than happy to take it off their hands for the right price!

 

[chuonthis]

<< Heads up!!!! to anyone shopping at the Tustin Microcenter.

6PM on 2/7
I saw 5 DWL-500 open box marked to $79.96!!! So minus $50 rebate then its only 29.96.

I dont live near there so dont ask me to get them. But they may still be there if youre local. >>

Just picked up the last two! =)

Also got an open box SMC Barricade 7004AWBR router for $143.96 - $30 rebate. Only one there.

 

[emonkey]

<< You'll configure the wireless LAN using WinXP tools, as these appear to be drivers-only, and no client utils.

I installed mine yesterday, and according to WinXP, was getting terrible signal strength from less than 50 feet away (granted line-of-sight is not clear).

Now I'm thinking about an Orinoco Gold if it'll work in the D-Link PCI adapter. Anyone know? >>



Whats WinXP Tools? I'm upgrading my laptop to XP so i want to find what app will do the configuring.

EDIT:
I got it going. The problem was that I installed the DWL-650 configuration utility and I guess thats a no-no for XP.

 

[wjsulliv]

Right click on "My Network Places"
Right click on "Wireless Network Connection"
Then set up the perferred networks, and edit configuration for infrastructure or ad-hock ect.

 

[sleepdragon]

If anyone need a set, I have an extra one...
I went back to my local MicroCenter to get my receipt reprinted
and picked up another set when I left...was going to uses it on
my roommate's system but he decide to get his own dsl connection..

I have already send in the rebate form, so the upc code has been removed..
I paid around $110 after tax for them and with $50 rebate...
So I am just looking to get $60+shipping back...

PM me if you want it..

 

[Wooster]

Sleepdragon,

I will take it if it's still available. Please let me know where to beam you the money. You do take PayPal right?

YGPM too.

If I can get my hand on this card, I can start to experience the fun of wireless. Thanks.

 

[manly]

<<
Whats WinXP Tools? I'm upgrading my laptop to XP so i want to find what app will do the configuring. The one that comes with it didnt seem to work (wont recognize card). I have the latest drivers and everything, so it may be this "winxp tools" you mentioned. >>



What I mean is that WinXP has built-in tools to support wireless LANs. You just use those tools after installing D-Link's DWL-650 drivers for WXP.

I did notice a PRISM2 icon in Control Panel (Prism2 is the chipset). However, double-clicking on the icon doesn't open anything for me. I'm still waiting on my Orinoco Gold card to do some serious testing; it should arrive on Tuesday.

I am curious about two things:

1. What are you using to benchmark throughput?
2. What free/good software are you using for VPN under Winblows? As many know by now, WEP is considered a non-secure protocol.

 

[Wooster]

I went to Microcenter this afternoon. I end up grab the last two cards on the shelf. When walking toward the cashier, my GF found another one with open item price - $79.99.

Thanks to wjsulliv for the great deal!

 

[Skaven]

Just got in on the deal myself! No local Microcenters... so I had my friend in Chicago pick the last one they had up for me! I'll be getting it this weekend... Wohoo!!

Thanks for the great deal!

 

[emonkey]

XP Users:

Is anyone else having problems with this? It was eating tons of resources on WinME so i upgraded to XP and it ran great. But I decided to do a clean XP install and now the thing gets a bluescreen at boot and then reboots itself.

EDIT:
Okay. It was a bad card and it crapped out on me. Swapped out and works perfectly.

 

[wjsulliv]

Like it is listed further up in this thread...

XP has its own wireless netwroking software. Do not use the D-Link software, as you found out it will cause problems.

To configure your card in XP Pro (as listed previously):
1) Right click on "My network places", this will bring up the "Network connections" windows.
2) Now right click on "Wireless network connection" and select "properties".
3)Click the "Wireless Networks" tab and then either the "Configure" button a the top for "Available networks" or the "Properties" button at the bottom for preferred networks.
4)This will bring up the "Wireless Network Properties" window. Check the box next to "Data encryption (WEP enabled)", and uncheck the box next to "The key is provided for me automatically". This should give you access to the middle (initially gray) properties of this window. You can now alter the network key, WEP level, etc

 

[BooGoo]

Anyone notice that in XP it only allows 40 bit and 104bit WEP encryption, not the standard 64/128 bit?

 

[wjsulliv]

Yeah I noticed, but don't know why? My best guess is as usually microsoft will have some dumb excuse... Anybody know what that excuse is?

Additionally, upon further investigation I noticed that there is a check box that is labeled something like "Let windows manage my wireless network". If I uncheck that can I sucessfully used the D-Link software?

 

[BooGoo]

Strange thing is that XP says that I am connected when I enter in my 128bit character string, but I can't connect to the internet. However, once I disable WEP I am able to get to the net. Any way to enable 128bit WEP in XP? How about any XP compatible third party utilities?

Another strange occurrence with the DWL500 is that XP says I have good connection one room away from the router/AP. But when I try to download a large file, I always get disconnected/reconnected midway through the download. Anyone experience this? Any workaround? This does not happen when I'm using the DWL650 on my laptop in the same room as the AP/router. It would be interesting to see the amount of lost/drop/colllision packets. I'm using the Compaq CP-2W as my router/AP. Maybe adding another AP somewhere close by would help?

 

[manly]

<< Anyone notice that in XP it only allows 40 bit and 104bit WEP encryption, not the standard 64/128 bit? >>



These are the same. 24-bits are auto-generated or something like that. If what I just wrote is unclear,

40-bit == 64-bit WEP
104-bit == 128-bit WEP

Has anyone tried sticking a PC card besides the D-Link DWL-650 into the PCI adapter? Or have any clues for my previous questions?

As far as signal quality, I'm experiencing *very* sporadic behavior w/ the DWL-650 from a room away. Most times, WXP reports the signal strength as "low" or "very low," but sometimes the signal appears to drop completely. In WXP, this results in annoying connect/disconnect status messages appearing the System Tray. This is from one room away, or less than 50 feet (although the line of sight is not clear).

I need to do some serious testing, but so far, the DWL-650 has seemed disappointing. YMMV.

 

[kermalou]

i just got this and am worried that it's not going to live up to the hype. will this work or won't it work in XP?

shawn