Customer Reviews

2-Port USB 2.0 PCMCIA Cardbus PC Card (fully inside for Notebook)

5 star:		(74)
4 star:		(12)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(10)

 

 

If you need USB 2.0 connectivity for an old laptop this is the ideal solution. I highly recommend it.
I had an older 4 port card that finally died after a few years of ownership & thought I'd give this one a try because of the low cost & small profile.

My first concern was how they were going to fit 2 full size USB ports in this size card. It's close, but they did it. Perfect!
The nice value add is that this card does not protrude out of the laptop so you can leave it in when you carry the laptop in a briefcase or backpack.

My second concern was compatibility. I have an older laptop, Dell Inspiron 8600 with 1.6GHz Intel processor & 1GB RAM. I run Windows XP on my primary active partition & am testing Windows 7 Release Candidate on a second partition (running perfectly for a month now)
This card was recognized & installed immediately in BOTH OPERATING SYSTEMS WITHOUT THE DRIVER DISK! Perfect!

My third concern was power. The image above doesn't show that the card is powered from one of your built in ports. This is really important as most of these cards can't support the high power drain of cellphones, cameras & other devices that require power from the port. This card is powered with a supplied cable. Perfect 3 for 3 so far!

Now look at the price... looks like a 4 for 4 to me.

Needed USB 2.0 ports for a 2002 model laptop, and needed a PCMCIA card unit without a huge external protrusion. This unit fits flush into the cardbus slot and yet provides two USB 2.0 ports. At first the unit wouldn't work properly (laptop freezing on shutdown) with my old laptop and Windows 7 RC (it's my test PC) and I intended to return the unit. The manual provided on the mini-CD is the archetype for poorly written, unintelligibly illustrated driver installation instructions and nowhere indicates to the user the need to install the included driver for proper operation. One would assume the standard Windows USB drivers would suffice based on the lack of other direction, plus the installation itself seems to be installing the same Windows driver again. HOWEVER - I took a chance and installed the OWC driver and - voila! - the card operates perfectly. External hard drive, digital camera, WiFi dongle - so far I haven't thrown anything at it the card can't handle. And the laptop shuts down properly again.

This card is well worth the money, but the documentation kills a star.

I have an old Compaq laptop computer with two old USB 1.1 ports (ports are molded/framed into laptop case and not easily removable). I have quite a few USB 2.0 devices (Digital Camera, USB Flash Drives, USB 1TB Western Digital Hard Drive, Webcam, Wireless adapter, etc) that I use on my desktop computer which has USB 2.0 ports. I notice a large decrease in data transfer speed when using these same devices on my laptop with the USB 1.1 ports. So I've been wanting to upgrade my laptop to USB 2.0 ports for a while. My laptop had the type II/type III expansion bay open (unused), so after doing some research here on Amazon and reading many positive reviews here on Amazon, I decided to purchase this product to insert into the expansion bay of my laptop.

I'm very happy with this product. Reasons:
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-DIRT CHEAP here at Amazon.

-Truly does fit all the way in my Type II bay and is flush with the end of the bay, so looks good.

-Was very easy to install. I'm running Windows XP with Service Pack 3. Figured I'd try my luck and let Windows choose the drivers for this device (I NEVER installed the drivers that came on the included Driver CD). With my laptop powered off, I simply inserted the card into my type II port, then powered on my laptop. Windows immediately found the new card, automatically installed all the drivers ("Standard Enhanced PCI to USB Host Controller" and also "NEC PCI to USB Host Controller"), and told me my device was ready to use. That simple!! And I tried one of my USB Flash Drives and PRESTO! - it worked perfectly and at USB 2.0 speed!!
Couldn't believe it installed that clean and easy!!

Included in package from Amazon:
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-Laptop Card

-Driver "Setup Software" mini-CD. (Note: I never installed these drivers and my laptop card works perfectly).

-Cable. One end of this cable inserts into a slave USB port (in my case an old USB 1.1 port) and the other end inserts into the middle of the Laptop card (between the two USB 2.0 ports). Please note the cable is approx 30 inches (approx 76 cm) long, measured from tip to tip. This was *plenty* long enough for my laptop setup. Cable not needed (does not have to be connected) unless you're using your laptop card to power certain high-drain USB devices. Card worked fine (provided enough power) stand-alone to simultaneously run two (2) USB Flash Drives just fine. Cable was NOT connected when I did this setup and everything worked well.

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I've uploaded (to Amazon) three pictures I took of this product. Please see these pictures, in case they're helpful to you.

Again, i'm very happy with this product and I highly recommend it!

This card is easy to install, somewhat inexpensive. I bought it to replace the damaged usb ports on an 4 year-old HP laptop. Like mentioned before, very easy to install, just plug it in, and let Windows load the drivers. The problem I found is that delivers too little power. A mouse will work fine, but doesn't deliver power to boot a flash drive. Everytime I have tried something that doesn't have it's own power supply, the system will freeze up on me.
I wouldn't recommend this product if you have more ports available. You will need an external power supply to power up the usb ports, or drain power from another working usb port, via additional cable (which wasn't included).
I bought it, because, like I said, had no other option.

This USB adapter card arrived quickly and it was undamaged. It did NOT come with any manual, only with a pc driver cd, which DOES NOT work(unreadable), so I can't figure out how/why to use the power cord supplied. I tried looking up the manufacturer online to download ....no support whatsoever.Amazon gave me their website/email in China.....in reply to my email they DENIED even having a product like that,could not help me.Amazon offered a refund....I could print a label and send it back, however i do not own a printer and by the time i find someone to print it for me, I will have more cost in printing, than i paid for the card to begin with.

This USB cardbus adapter loads 2.0 drivers from the included CD, but connected USB 2.0 devices are unstable and frequently crash. PC is a Compaq Presario 900 notebook running Windows XP SP3. USB 2.0 devices run OK using competitor's USB cardbus adapter. The instability occurs with or without the use of the external USB power cable.

The driver loading sequence does NOT agree with the sequence shown in the adapter's manual. After device loading has completed, the PC's Device Manager's list for USB drivers does NOT agree with the adapter's manual.

I am returning the adapter for refund.

I tested this card with linux (ubuntu 9.10) and it works well so far. No need to do anything just put it into the PCMCIA slot and it works immediatly.

I kind of hoped that it would work also with my external hard drive without a power cable, but most of these cards don't so i wasn't surprise that i needed to use the provided power cable.

For me the most important thing is that it is a fully inside card so I don't need to take it off everytime I put my laptop in my bag.

Overall nice product.

First - works with Win 7 Pro straight out of the box. Did not need to use the provided drivers on the accompanying mini-CD. Standard Chip set is detected as a high speed (USB 2.0) hub.

Technically it is supposed to add two ports - in reality it is a one port upgrade. You will need to use an *existing port* on the laptop to provide the extra power, through the provided cable, required to support most devices like external HDD and - kind of unexplainable - even self-powered devices like iPhone/iTouch devices.

Flash drives, including card readers (SDHC/MMC) work fine without the supplement power cable. You will need external USB extension cable to use both ports as they are quite close together. Standard slim thumb drives can be plugged into the two ports at the same time, though I did sense a lag in detection of the second flash drive, I guess its' to do with power output again. With the external power plug, both ports work well.

The card itself seats inside the PC Card slot well and is easy to carry the laptop without having to remove it every time when moving. Have not evaluated the effects of power drain when using with battery.

So far happy with the product, but as mentioned earlier it is really a one port upgrade.

I love the way this fits into the port of my laptop. Because it does not stick out, it can be left permanently in the laptop.

I have had excellent results with this thing and the price was very reasonable.

I have given away my old Bus product that had to be removed each time I put my laptop away and then had to re recognize it each time I started up again.

Thanks for the great product.

I got this to give me a couple extra USB ports for a mouse and flash drive. Simply plugged it in and it works without any trouble on my Dell laptop running windows XP.