08-29-2003, 02:24 PM

i need to know if i can put a usual wireless lan card in my mac. its simply a pcmcia card and i don not want to spend much money for a airport card. cant i just use this ethernet stuff? its cheaper.

because i need to buy a station for about 99€ and if it works a usual wireless card for 35€ that would be ideal, so? do i have to buy special mac card??`?`





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ok u answered it myself, yes it works

08-31-2003, 12:09 PM

The problem with this, is that you need a Mac driver for your pcmcia card. Also depending on the machine you have, Apple has made the space available for the card only big enough for the Airport cards. Most 802.11b/g cards out there have the antenna built into the card itself. Apple's machines have the antenna built into the display, usually.

So you are stuck with Airport, I am afraid. Because of drivers and form factor.

But I can tell you this. I have an iBook with an Airpot and a Compaq with a USR PCMCIA card, and the airport out-performs the USR anyday. Also, you will notice that if you use a microwave, you usually drop the wireless connection. The Airport card does NOT drop the wireless connection when my microwave is in use, and the USR does. With the laptop in the same identical place. So Airport isn't such a bad thing, although a bit pricey.