sweetness on :
My Toshiba has a built-in Atheros card. Yes, the range, sensitivity, and power are awesome! Many linksys blockheads blather about Broadcom superiority but I haven't seen it yet.
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Friday, November 5. 2004Atheros Wireless
Yesterday I've upgraded the wireless card in my laptop from the basic Intel Centrino Wireless capable for B/G to an Atheros 5004 based card. While I had seen this card work on a friend's laptop I was non the less seriously impressed by it's performance. First of all Atheros implements something called Super A/G, which allows the card to reach 108mbit speeds on A or G protocols. This allows the card to use more then one channel when communicating with the routers, effectively doubling the “pipe” capacity. Additionally the card also pumps more power then Centrino Wireless, for B/G it's maximum transmit power is 100mw (that's milli not mega
 ), which you can reduce via the driver when battery life needs to be preserved. The card also has something called eXtended Range (XR) technology that supposedly makes the card more sensitive. Normally I would skeptical towards techno-bable of this nature, but I can now pickup and use my neighbors open MSN wireless access point, which is at least 60 meters away. With Centrino I couldn't even see it other then an occasional blip on Network Stumbler.As far as the transfer speed, which what I was seeking to improve with this upgrade, I went from 1.7-2.0megs/sec on Centrino to 4.2-5 megs/sec on Atheros. As you can imagine I am quite happy with this $60 (USD) upgrade and would recommend this card to anyone looking to improve performance of their wireless. Even on a regular G networks where the router does not support super G, this card averages 500-700 kb/sec faster transfer rates then a regular Centrino. As far as drivers go they are bit hard to find but they are available and the card is supported on both Linux and FreeBSD and unlike the centrino driver which is a wrapper around an Intel binary actually contains source code  .You can get the drivers here: http://www.phoenixnetworks.net/atheros.php Trackbacks
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Sachin Gorde on :
I have this toshiba sattellite a75-s206 with the built in atheros, yes it performs really well compare to others. I have one question that i couldn't get ther answer for, is it possible to access internet using this card with the cisco accesspoint which need to have aironet cards or centrino chips. They have some security protocol that only allows only those clients.
If you happen to know please let meknow, sachin Jay on :
Atheros kicks ass. I had it, yes. Had. Then my laptops power regulator went byebye. But what a ride, with no antenna or linear amplifier I got signals just as good as I do now with a buffalo g54 thats attatched to a 15db antenna
Scott on :
I have an A75-S206 and I can't get my Atheros back up. It seemed to have stopped working after I installed Windows XP SP 2. I've tried downloading drivers for it but it just doesn't act like it is there. the little light comes on but I'm thinking it is fried or something. Can anyone help me? Please reply here or preferably e-mail. Thanks, Scott
Gerardo Arias on :
I have a ATHEROS AR5005G and now my ACER PC says that the switch of the modem is off. How can I turn it ON????
Fernando on :
Hello, Que tal Gerardo.
I wish to know if you could solve the problem of the radio turned off in your Acer, i have the same problem in my Acer. Thanks |
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