Power and/ Highlights or
Increased Antenna Gain
Highlights
Adapter
about the advantages of
online discount retailers (I got
having a removable
mine from Amazon.com), and
antenna, see "Extending
it's even sold in some truck
your range," later in
stop c-stores for about the
this chapter.
same price.
Hawking HWC54D
One of the most innova-
Reports and reviews indicate
tive adapters on the
this card has the ability to
PC card
market today, the outer
connect with a hotspot at two
end of the card, which
to three times the distance of
802.11g standard
sticks out a couple inches, a standard `g' card or inte-
is a 6dBi, directional,
grated `b' solution. Make sure
high-gain antenna that
that, if you decide to buy this
flips up and rotates
adapter, you get version 2.0
toward the signal source. because it includes some
(I talk about antennas in
really cool (and useful) LED
"Extending your range,"
signal-strength indicator
later in this chapter.)
lights.
Hawking HWU54D
Like its PC-card cousin,
The big advantage this USB
uses a 6 dBi high-gain
adapter offers is the high-gain
USB
directional antenna that
directional antenna that sig-
can be aimed toward
nificantly increases signal
802.11g
the signal source to
strength.
increase the strength of
a connection.
Netgate EUB-362 (EXT) This is the only high-
Claiming to be completely
power-output USB
compatible with the 802.11b/g
USB
adapter (at least that I
standard, the adapter is built
know of) on the market
to the proprietary Super G
802.11b/g
today. With this version,
(108 Mbps) standard. Of
you can remove the stan-
course this is a
theoretical
dard antenna and easily
data-transfer rate (see
add an external antenna
Chapter 2), and the highest
of your choice (that's
actual transfer rates would
what the EXT is all about). only be achieved within a
Super G network. When it's
operating in an 802.11b or g
network, the power output is
rated at 200mW (23 dBm).
Chapter 3: Gearing Up
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