Customer Reviews

Orinoco 802.11b Classic Gold PC WiFi Adapter Card 8410-WD

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

The ORiNOCO Gold Card is somewhat of a status symbol in net-stumbling and WiFi circles world wide. Manufactured by ORiNOCO Wireless, which was acquired by Proxim in August of 2002, the Lucent designed, Hermes chipset based, Gold "Classic" Card has always received high marks for it's performance and range. If you would like more information on the cards logistics and uses please visit www.pcpitbull.com The ORiNOCO Gold Card comes equipped with a small (MC Connector) jack that makes it easy to connect to an external antenna.

This is a great wireless card for Linux. I'm using it on a Compaq Presario 1270 with Slackware 10 Linux and it was autodetected on boot. The orinoco module is compiled into my 2.4.30 kernel along with wireless networking enabled. The manufacturer also puts the Linux drivers on their cd.

The range on this card is great-up to 164 feet! Right now I'm surfing on a signal that is about 125 feet away and it's very fast!

I also like the LED indicator lights on this card that visually shows me the card is online.

I've been using wired DSL on this laptop for 6 months and this is my first wireless card. I think it's as good as wired for surfing the net!

This card is based on the old Lucent/Agere chipset. When my old one burnt out, I had a difficult time getting new cards from the local electronics store to work; I exchanged them, none worked. These cards were based on newer chipsets that only worked under Windows with the drivers that came with them. If I was going to use them under my preferred Linux, I would have to participate in driver development, which I don't want to do since I'm really just an amateur. I was glad to find this card still around. It works just as well under Windows as the newer cards did (or any 802.b card will) and, most importantly, runs perfectly with the standard orinoco_cs kernel module under Linux. If you are looking for a card to use with your Linux box, you won't be disappointed with this, especially at this price.

And it sets up easily under windows too. Again, as it is a standard chipset, you probably won't have to install the driver. The software it comes with is clunky, but you don't need it. It works fine for me under the standard XP wireless control center. I don't know what the person who couldn't get it to work was doing. Maybe not *the* most user-friendly, but certainly I can't imagine having problems on that level.

While I'm currently researching why I can't get the card to see my new D-Link DIR-655 router (I'm currently connected to an open wifi-router somewhere in my neighborhood...yay, go OpenAccess go!), I thought I'd chime in here and mention that this card has workedflawlessly for me for the past 3 years in a Mac Powerbook 1400cs that was *never designed for wifi* connectivity. Its basically one of the only wifi cards that will work not only with this hardware config, but also under OS9 (a pre-OSX Apple OS). So, if you've got an old Mac notebook, running OS9, and you're looking for wifi, this card truly is 'Gold'...now if I can just figger out why it can't see my new 802.11b/g/n router, I'll be in heaven again. Cheers, and get this card while you still can!

Ok, to put it easy.
No matter how many intents to make this thing work as a normal regular card I have tryed all have failed.
Download updated drivers, updated bios, unistall drivers, reinstall them again, reinstall windows, anything have achieve to make this poor quality card work.
The site was horrible by the time I bought the card, know is a little bit better but none driver will make this card work ever.
I have windows XP pro, and the only way I have find to make this card work "a little bit acceptable" is opening the client software that comes with it and then opening an optional windows.
Only doing that the card will work...if that windows is not open it will sent/receive some bits and bytes from time to time.
the only thing this card guarantee is that you will loose your money.

Carlos Acosta