Customer Reviews

HQRP 802.11n MIMO Wi-Fi 300 Mb WLAN MiniPCI Card - Supports WPA (TKIP/AES), WEP, MIC, Shared Key, 802.1X

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

There are so many old laptops out there with more potential than retail box machines today. I repair laptops on my spare time and generally scour the internet for spare parts, max out RAM, hard drive (SSD or 7200rpm), and WIRELESS. It's a hard thing to find 802.11g miniPCI devices that are fully compatible across machines because so many 802.11g adapters are sold and programmed with drivers specific to the laptops they came from. Unless you are getting an adapter from Intel, TP-Link is the ONLY other manufacturer of third party adapters with EASILY downloadable drivers for any machine, 2K, XP, Vista, x64. I installed this device, simply small driver, used Windows Zero Config, and got full 300Mb with an actual throughput of about 10MB to 15MB/sec on my 802.11n draft network. If you are looking to max out your old laptop, get 802.11n for a decent price, TP-link is probably the only easy way to go - no one else does MiniPCI 802.11n. (Remember, this is MiniPCI, NOT Mini Express)

The card arrived fast, was easy to install and connect the two antenna wires, no drivers but easy to find online: http://www.tp-link.com/support/download.asp?a=1&m=TL-WN861N , drivers for vista, got 300 mbps from a Linksys WRT 350 N (same as a WRT 300 N) to the TP-Link card and good wireless distance.
Gave new life to my Dell M50 laptop. This card is much faster and more reliable than the ones commonly used now in new latops like the Intel 5100 AGN or 5300, that are supposed to but don't work with wifi N.
Thank you to the engineers of this card.

this is the first card I've put in a laptop where no matter where I went in my house, I got 5 bars and almost always a full 300 Mbps with my N router. I work on computers at my home office, so am used to N cards fluctuating from 65 to 270 Mbps, but this card picks up every network in the neighborhood and stays stable between 270 and 300 all the time. Amazing card, and certainly worth every penny . . .

Installing was easy after applying a BIOS patch for my thinkpad X40. Very fast and stable connection and it is internal so I don't have to use PCMCIA card to connect to my N-only network anymore! Highly recommend.

Used to upgrade an older Acer laptop's internal wireless card from B/G to B/G/N. Recommend you download the drivers for the new card before starting the upgrade. Physical installation was very easy on the Acer... one screw to remove a cover and you have access to the internal wireless card. The replacement card is a miniPCI form factor with two antenna connections so it was direct replacement on my Acer. You need to check to see if your laptop uses mini-PCI or mini-PCI-E as they are different! Took less than 5 minutes to swap out. On reboot, Windows XP detected the new card and I told XP where to find the driver I previous downloaded. Once the driver installed, the card immediately found my Cisco router that is set to wireless-N only. Been using for about three weeks. Consistently indicates a speed of 145Mbps or better and feels much faster during data transfers on my home network. No card can deliver 300Mbps and your results will vary. For me this was an easy, effective and low cost upgrade. Ordered a second card to upgrade an old Dell to wireless N so I can finally retire B/G at home!

Only 2.4ghz is slightly limiting (and the reason for 4 stars, rather than 5), but given the lack of mini-pci 802.11n cards, I can hardly complain. This installed without a hitch in my 5-year old Dell 700m. The drivers work fine in Windows 7 (x32), and I've got 5 bars and at least 130mb wherever I am in my house. Can't ask for much more. Well done TP-Link!

I don't have much to add to the other positive reviews. This is a fantastic upgrade to the Intel 2200 card that came in my 5 year old notebook. After a full day of working through my issues I could not be more pleased. Two important issues to consider: 1. Make sure your old antenna are long enough to reach the connectors on this card. My old card had them next together and this card has them separated at opposite corners. Mine didn't have enough antenna cable to reach the opposite side so I spent a day tearing down my notebook to replace the antenna with one from an old dead notebook; 2. The second point is to be sure to download drivers before you pull your old card! This item does not ship with drivers and will not work until they are loaded...so if you don't have another machine around you need to obtain them before the switch.

Overall, despite my specific problems...which really weren't the fault of TP-Link, this is a great upgrade to my old notebook.

This mini-PCI card was a major upgrade to my laptop. It consistently connects to the router at 300 Mbps. And gets almost triple the range that my old 802.11G band card with the same 2 antennas.

Pros: Fast, great range, affordable
Cons: only 2.4 GHz band, Does not support 5 GHz band (common for 802.11N routers). If I were to buy another card, the 5Ghz band would be a must have feature.

I ordered the wrong card size. The company gave me no hassles and gave me a refund. I recommend purchasing from them.

I got three Dell D610 laptops from a client after they were being decommissioned. The laptops needed RAM, a bigger HDD, wireless, and Bluetooth. Everything was installed into the laptop, XP Pro 32bit was installed, and I installed the TP-Link driver for this card. It seems to work fine, until your laptop goes to sleep. Once you wake it up, you will find that the CPU is being used at 50% constantly until you reboot. I tracked the problem to this card and contacted TP-Link. They had me try an alternate driver with the same issue. I then went to the chipset manufacturer (Atheros) and downloaded the driver directly from them, for their chipset. Have not had a problem since.

In other words, if you purchase this card do NOT use the TP-Link drivers, even the latest ones from their site. You WILL have problems if your laptop goes to sleep or hibernates. Just download the Atheros 9220X driver from Atheros and you will be very happy with the product.