USB Wifi or PCI Adapter.

[SImoHayha]

So am troubled on what to do lately.  You see I have this USB Belkin N150 WiFi attached to my PC right now and am wondering if that is better compared to this old Linksys Wireless-G 2.4 Ghz PCI Model: WMP54G.   Am just really wondering which is better between the two so that I can place the other in the storage for another build or something.  Also Sorry if i placed this in the wrong section I was thinking troubleshooting however that didn't seem to the be the case as this is somewhat networking.

[xmx1024]

The belkin is wireless N and is capable of 150Mb transfer speeds. The Linksys is wireless g (shorter range) and is capable of 54Mbps. The Linksys could be put in storage imo

[TheKDub]

I'd stick with the USB for now, it can do up to 150Mb/s, while the PCI card can only do up to 54Mb/s

[Aniallation]

So am troubled on what to do lately.  You see I have this USB Belkin N150 WiFi attached to my PC right now and am wondering if that is better compared to this old Linksys Wireless-G 2.4 Ghz PCI Model: WMP54G.   Am just really wondering which is better between the two so that I can place the other in the storage for another build or something.  Also Sorry if i placed this in the wrong section I was thinking troubleshooting however that didn't seem to the be the case as this is somewhat networking.

I've always had better luck with PCI WiFi adapters then USB ones in terms of reliability, but Wireless N today is much further ahead then Wireless G. Also, with many wireless routers, connecting one Wireless G device to the network will bog down the entire WiFi network and every other device on it to Wireless G speed, so unless you have a separate router for Wireless G devices, don't use a G device on a network with other N devices.

[SImoHayha]

I've always had better luck with PCI WiFi adapters then USB ones in terms of reliability, but Wireless N today is much further ahead then Wireless G. Also, with many wireless routers, connecting one Wireless G device to the network will bog down the entire WiFi network and every other device on it to Wireless G speed, so unless you have a separate router for Wireless G devices, don't use a G device on a network with other N devices.

Well my router has a setting to accept all different types wireless devices as N/G/B would that make a difference and my wifi speeds aren't all that great only 5 mbps. So does it matter that one has a higher data transfer rate ?

[Aniallation]

Well my router has a setting to accept all different types wireless devices as N/G/B would that make a difference and my wifi speeds aren't all that great only 5 mbps. So does it matter that one has a higher data transfer rate ?

If it's your internet speed that's 5mbps, it won't really be bottlenecked by Wireless G, but it's more of the transfer speed and latency between devices on your network that's heavily impacted by having it be G instead of N bandwidth. 

 

Your router being N/G/B just means that it will accept connections by N, G, or B devices. However connecting a G or B device to the network will cause the network to no longer be N and turn to G or B, depending on what the slowest device uses.

 

I connected a PSP (Wireless B) to my WiFi today to download a patch, and oh my god my entire network slowed to a crawl (Wireless B is only 11mbps). Wireless G impact will be worse, but it's still recommended to use N if all your other devices are N.

[skywake]

I'll also add that USB in general won't be a bottleneck even with a lot of AC class adapters. Smallnetbuilder recently did a piece where they benchmarked a pile of those tiny adapters all of them "AC600" which unlike N600 gets most of its performance from the 5Ghz band. The worst one (Linsys) for DL sat at ~120Mbps on 5Ghz and ~50Mbps on 2.4Ghz. Every single other adapter they tested did ~180/60Mbps. You can grab those things for like $40 or so and I'd assume that the jump to AC1200 would push it up further.

 

Given the best performing AC1200 router does 300Mbps @ 5G/90Mbps @ 2.4G? I really, really doubt that USB even USB 2.0 will be an actual limiting factor for wireless adapters. Unless you're really pushing towards the high end at which point how good the antennae is will probably be the bigger concern.