[PLUG] My new wireless card...

[Michael C. Robinson]

I have an SMC EZ Connect card with a PCI to pcmcia adapter.
I thought for the price I might pick up another wireless
card if this one isn't supported.  This thing doesn't 
have an external antenna connector I can spot.  I'm 
wondering what the range etc. on it is?  I doubt it's 
something I can hook up to a coffee can antenna which
I'll need to do if I'm going to go eight miles.  One
thing I'm concerned about is what the transmission
power will cost compared to just buying another
phone line.  Well there's that concern and how fast
the coffee cans will rust out.  I'll also need to look
into making them appealing to people who will see them.

Climbing a tree, a tower can be spotted that's within
half a mile of where I want to beam to.  I don't know 
if that's close enough though.  Short of getting a 
gps unit, I wonder what I'm looking at being at about 
50 feet with a tree to use that goes up at least 
another 50 feet above sea level.  The target is 
along the road that goes between the new Burgerville 
and Winsum Staffing in St. Helens.  It's quite a ways 
from roughly where the Scappoose Fred Meyers is.  
It's a shorter distance than the O'Reilly long shot. 
In my example, my short distance is longer 
than O'Reilly's.  They had a radio tower though.  
Even if I connect two isolated machines over this 
distance with 802.11b or better, I have to add 
strong encryption.  If I lose 50% of the speed or 
even 75% of the optimal 11 mbps speed, I'm still 
beating a second phoneline and dial up server
at $23-$32 a month.

One concern I have is a sticker that said don't take the 
card out of the pcmcia adapter.  I hope this is standard 
pcmcia.  I'm after that as much as a chance to play with 
wireless.  It says it's model SMC2632W on the card front, 
but on the back I see SMC2602W under a long bar code.  
It's supposed to be 802.11b. compliant.  Is there any 
way to alter this card so that it can take an external 
antenna?

If this card doesn't work, maybe I can pick up a prism.
The adapter card has an asic that says PLX Technology
PCI9052 S 0052 T2B BR2129.1 TAIWAN.  I can't read the
other asics or they're blank.

Well, I'll see if I can get this recognized. 
The next thing will be to get a second WiFi
card and attempt a peer to peer link :-)

-- 
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Michael C. Robinson

Associates of General Studies 
PCC March 2003.
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