Ethernet Card Question

[Zapages]

Currently I am connected onto the internet through USB, the ones that came with the old P3 motherboard computer... Some of my friends are suggesting me to get ethernet card for my computer... I know how to place it in and everything... I am just wondering would I see significant difference in the downloading/uploading speed with my old P3 733 MHz, 64 MB Ram, and Windows XP computer...

If so, does anyone know where to buy one which good and can be bought under $20.00....

Thank You

Zapages

[Kane]

Well a 10/100 PCI network card costs around £10. What kind of internet connection? ADSL? If so you'd need to by a network ADSL router, setting you back around £80

[Zapages]

I have Cable...

[Esturk]

Just buy a PCI Ethernet card. You can get a decent one for 20 or 30 dollars. So you say your Cable modem is connected to your computer via USB? If so then you might want to get an 10/100 Ethernet card. I don't know if you will see a speed increase but get one anyways.

[Zapages]

Yes, right now it is connected to my usb.

So would it load a web page faster, dowload/upload better... Are there going to be any improvements... I don't want to wast $15-$30 on card that I don't get any improvements on my connection...

[Esturk]

Originally posted by Zapages
Yes, right now it is connected to my usb.

So would it load a web page faster, dowload/upload better... Are there going to be any improvements... I don't want to wast $15-$30 on card that I don't get any improvements on my connection...

I doubt it. When your Cable internet was installed did they set it up with the USB connection? Or did you set it up?

[Zapages]

I did set up my cable modem, the modem came with 2 slots, one for ethernet and the other one for usb... I just used the usb slot and connected it with my computer.... But when I heard you get more speed I got interested in upgrading...

[yakumo fujii]

If you use NIC then you can add more computers to the network. Also I think CAT5e cables are faster than USB, since they can transfer at 10/100 mbp/s. USBs also eats CPU.

[Kane]

USB will slow down your machine (In my experience), You're probs better off with a Network connection. The actual speed won't really be an issue tho. USB 1 is limited to far less than 100MBit (USB 1 network cards are 10MBit afairs), but considering the connection is 512Kbit normally (0.5MBit)....

[Zapages]

I checked my cable modem for maximum speed it told me that it has 10 mb... But when I check my user manual for my cable modem it tells me that the maximum speed is 100 mb...

[Kane]

Cable will not be more than 1 Megabit in my experience.

[Zapages]

I know Kane, in actualilty it's around 15 kbps to 150 kbps... While my friend gets around 200 kbps to 700 kbps and he leaves next door, but he has an ethernet card pre-installed with his computer...

[Mr Urt]

Originally posted by Kane
Cable will not be more than 1 Megabit in my experience.

AFAIK, in the USA the usual is 1.5Mb, but the speed of your connection has so many variables, it's really a moot point. anyways, you can buy ethernet cards for $10. whether or not you want to get the ethernet card is ultimatley up to you, but if you're looking for some fix that will magically make everything work a lot better, you're not gonna find it here. anyways some pros to using the ethernet card are it's a table and mature technology, it's rather efficient, and flexible too. the only real con to ethernet is that you need the card. the pro to keeping USB is that you won't have to buy anything. the cons with using USB are it's operation can be unreliable/problematic and it isn't very efficient (it puts considerable load on your comp). If you haven't been experiancing any problems with your connection, you might just be waisting your time by getting an ethernet card, but, then again you might not. again, if you decide to go with ethernet, don't expect everything to magically work better, cuz it won't. you may notice small improvements, but probably not anything too dirastic. however, if you've been experiancing a lot of problems with your connection, it might not be a bad idea to check into getting an ethernet card.

[Esturk]

Here's a chart of different Port speeds for your reference.