Medialink - Wireless G USB Adapter - 802.11g - 54Mbps - 2.4ghz - Windows 2000 / XP / Vista 32-Bit / Vista 64-Bit / Windows 7 Compatible

by Mediabridge

Product Details

• Item Weight: 8 ounces
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces
• ASIN: B001DKBNMA
• Item model number: MWN-USB54G
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (164 customer reviews)
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes
• Date first available at Amazon.com: July 31, 2008

Product Description

Offering the ultimate in simplified Wi-Fi installation, Medialink's 54Mbps Wireless G USB Adapter works with any manufacturer's 802.11B or 802.11G wi-fi router and offers a simplified one click installation. Insert the CD, click "install software" and the utility will auto-detect your operating system and install the appropriate drivers. Simply plug in your adapter and enjoy the convenience of your wifi network. Surprisingly, many wifi adapters on the market are not Microsoft WHQL certified to ensure trouble-free compatibility with Microsoft's operating systems. To provide our customers with ultimate confidence in our products, all Medialink adapters are Microsoft WHQL certified. In addition, this adapter features internationally recognized standards-based security features including WPA/WPA2, IEEE802.1X as well as 64/128/152-bit WEP for the ultimate in sucurity. MAC filtering is also available. With these enhanced security features, you can feel confident that you have state of the art wifi security options.. This USB adapter includes a Medialink Wireless Client Utility to auto-detect available wireless networks for quick connection. The utility also conveniently allows you to create and save detailed connectivity profiles for different accessed networks. The Medialink Wireless Client Utility also provides a number of tools to display current diagnostics and status information so that you can easily diagnose and resolve connection problems. Offering excellent wireless performance and network security, the Medialink 54Mbps Wireless G USB Adapter is an excellent choice for adding wireless connectivity to your desktop or notebook PC. CD includes drivers for Windows 2000, XP, Vista 32-Bit, Vista 64-Bit.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

42 of 42 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Works better than I had expected!, June 13, 2009

By 

Marty Gillis (Los Angeles, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Medialink - Wireless G USB Adapter - 802.11g - 54Mbps - 2.4ghz - Windows 2000 / XP / Vista 32-Bit / Vista 64-Bit / Windows 7 Compatible (Electronics)

I am using this with an old Celeron Compaq situated on the opposite end of our large home. Our router is the dreaded Actiontec supplied with my Fios service and I wasn't expecting a very good connection or speed. WRONG! After a very quick install the thing just worked! At first all I could get was a "poor" on signal strength and a "weak" signal status. I added a short USB extension to the cable they already supply and sent it up my wall about 7 feet. THAT was all it needed. I now have a "very good" signal and a 'normal' status and am consistently hitting the speed limit of the device. I was very pleasantly surprised. I hope it keeps working.

UPDATE: I have had the dongle for about 2 weeks now and after moving the router about 1 room closer to me I now get an "Excellent" signal strength and it maintains a steady 54 mpbs. More than good enough to stream Hulu with no glitches. It dropped the connection occasionally on startup before moving the router, but now it is right there at all times with no drop offs. It does get hot though.

38 of 42 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Weird Compatibility, October 11, 2009

By 

Christopher Holm (Silicon Valley, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Medialink - Wireless G USB Adapter - 802.11g - 54Mbps - 2.4ghz - Windows 2000 / XP / Vista 32-Bit / Vista 64-Bit / Windows 7 Compatible (Electronics)

Unfortunately I've experienced a similar problem to a couple of other reviewers. For the longest time I just could not get the unit to work on my system. There were two main problems:
1) My wireless network is found easily enough, but when I connect, it disconnects within seconds, and goes into an intermittent connect-disconnect loop, being only connected for a few seconds.
I worked at length with their friendly tech support to no success. As a former phone support person, I know that there's an infinite number of PC configurations 'out there.' This XP machine had never had wireless. I isolated the problem to something unknown on my system (by returning the adapter, which then worked perfectly at the factory; but of course the replacement had the same problem in my home). OK, it wasn't the hardware, it was my personal problem.
I consulted a network professional, who said he had seen similar problems with other wireless adapters. His workaround was to test by turning off security on my router. That fixed it! Then by changing my security to WEP from WPA-PSK, the connection problem was solved. Yea!
2) I now have a 26 character WEP alpha-numeric security code (I'm unwilling to run the network wide open with no security). But the code is not 'sticky' in the software. This means that every time I want to connect, I have to enter the code. I have not yet resolved this problem. It may be related to an XP problem of not all items appearing in the system tray at boot time. If I log off and log back on, all items appear. A Microsoft tech bulletin acknowledges this system tray problem on some machines, but offers no solution. I'll update this review if I get it fixed!

35 of 39 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Simple Plug and Play for Windows RC7 Install, June 10, 2009

By 

R. Neal (Bloomingdale, IL USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Medialink - Wireless G USB Adapter - 802.11g - 54Mbps - 2.4ghz - Windows 2000 / XP / Vista 32-Bit / Vista 64-Bit / Windows 7 Compatible (Electronics)

Recently installed Windows 7 RC (release candidate) on my PC. Found that my wireless network adapters I had were not supported. So I went on a search for inexpensive yet functional adapter.

This adapter is perfect fit, Windows 7 RC has drivers for this adapter. I didn't need to install anything from the CD included with the adapter. I simply plugged the adapter in, Windows 7 recognized it immediately. The info on the device manager was different than displayed, but just assuming the internals for this adapter are "borrowed" from another adapter and repackaged under this manufacturer.

I only had to set-up my wireless info (WPA2 password) and my PC was connected once again to the web. Connection was very good, my router is on third floor, my experimental PC is in my workshop in basement, had 3 out of 5 bars on connection (router is DLink DIR-655) with solid throughput so far.