802.11g 54g PCI cards in Deskpro EN

A tale of woe, but hopefully it will save others the hassle.

Wanting to have 11g wireless on all my PCs, I bought an access point,
a PCMCIA card, and Belkin PCI cards for my desktops, a couple of
Compaq Deskpro 6300EN machines of 1998 vintage. Although the Belkin
card is billed as working in any PCI slot, it wouldn't work in these.
A call to Belkin support revealed that they are aware of a problem, as
their first question was 'how old are the PCs?'.

So I sent the cards back as being not 'fit for purpose' and bought
some Netgear ones instead. They arrived, but on the box it said
PCI2.2, and the Deskpro is 2.1. Back to the shop with them. Being a
glutton for punishment I then bought some quite expensive Buffalo
cards, as their website specifically says they work with PCI 2.1.
Guess what, they didn't, at least not with mine. I also did a Google
search and found an entry on one of Buffalo's websites that lists
'possible' problems with Deskpro EN and also HP Pavillion and Dell PCs
with Buffalo 11b PCI cards. And HP/Compaq's website lists several
instances of problems with other types of PCI card in the Deskpro.

I finally ended up with a pair of Adaptec USB 11b adaptors.

The moral of this sorry tale? If you have a machine with proprietry
hardware, be aware that add-on cards may not work. before you buy,
search *everywhere* you can think of for detailed information, as the
retailer never has the full story. Also make sure you buy from a
supplier who understands the Sale of Goods Act.

Incidentally, the 11g access point and PCMCIA card, both from 3Com,
are great value and work flawlessly.

"FuriousMelon" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:(E-Mail Removed) om...
> A tale of woe, but hopefully it will save others the hassle.
>
> Wanting to have 11g wireless on all my PCs, I bought an access point,
> a PCMCIA card, and Belkin PCI cards for my desktops, a couple of
> Compaq Deskpro 6300EN machines of 1998 vintage. Although the Belkin
> card is billed as working in any PCI slot, it wouldn't work in these.
> A call to Belkin support revealed that they are aware of a problem, as
> their first question was 'how old are the PCs?'.
>
> So I sent the cards back as being not 'fit for purpose' and bought
> some Netgear ones instead. They arrived, but on the box it said
> PCI2.2, and the Deskpro is 2.1. Back to the shop with them. Being a
> glutton for punishment I then bought some quite expensive Buffalo
> cards, as their website specifically says they work with PCI 2.1.
> Guess what, they didn't, at least not with mine. I also did a Google
> search and found an entry on one of Buffalo's websites that lists
> 'possible' problems with Deskpro EN and also HP Pavillion and Dell PCs
> with Buffalo 11b PCI cards. And HP/Compaq's website lists several
> instances of problems with other types of PCI card in the Deskpro.
>
> I finally ended up with a pair of Adaptec USB 11b adaptors.
>
> The moral of this sorry tale? If you have a machine with proprietry
> hardware, be aware that add-on cards may not work. before you buy,
> search *everywhere* you can think of for detailed information, as the
> retailer never has the full story. Also make sure you buy from a
> supplier who understands the Sale of Goods Act.
>
> Incidentally, the 11g access point and PCMCIA card, both from 3Com,
> are great value and work flawlessly.

I have bad dyslexia so i dont really understand all your questions, but i
added a EN deskpro(cant find model# but newer than you mentioned as its a
1gig P3) and i found terrible problems with the IRQ's, could only get 3 in
BIOS< 5, 10, 11 as i needed to add a pci nic(conflicts with the o/b lan and
switch off that one) Never used wireless. I did get both nics to work same
time, just had problems when i added what little other things i could to the
PCI slots.

I worked out (while researching my latest IBM laptop) that IBM laptops do
not allow the use of any mini-PCI WiFi cards that they don't sell.. (the
laptops BIOS checks for an ID string in the rom I believe)

Al...

"FuriousMelon" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:(E-Mail Removed) om...
> A tale of woe, but hopefully it will save others the hassle.
>
> Wanting to have 11g wireless on all my PCs, I bought an access point,
> a PCMCIA card, and Belkin PCI cards for my desktops, a couple of
> Compaq Deskpro 6300EN machines of 1998 vintage. Although the Belkin
> card is billed as working in any PCI slot, it wouldn't work in these.
> A call to Belkin support revealed that they are aware of a problem, as
> their first question was 'how old are the PCs?'.
<snip>
> The moral of this sorry tale? If you have a machine with proprietry
> hardware, be aware that add-on cards may not work. before you buy,
> search *everywhere* you can think of for detailed information, as the
> retailer never has the full story. Also make sure you buy from a
> supplier who understands the Sale of Goods Act.
>

In article <vUk7b.262584$(E-Mail Removed)>,
Al Adrian <ara__@SPAMNOTwanadoo.nl> wrote:
>I worked out (while researching my latest IBM laptop) that IBM laptops do
>not allow the use of any mini-PCI WiFi cards that they don't sell.. (the
>laptops BIOS checks for an ID string in the rom I believe)
(snip)

Yes, it's a total pain. Do any of the mini-PCI WiFi cards that they
sell work with Linux? It'd be nice to be able to get around that lock
somehow; I wonder how easy it is to flash the BIOS.

-- Mark