The card was easy to install and configure.
I'm using the card in a Win2K system. I tried using it in Win98SE and it consistently crashed the system after a few minutes of connecting. With Win2k, I've experienced no crashes at all.

This is my first wireless card so I don't have anything to compare to.

So the $100k question is:
"Yes, but *which* DWL-650 did *you* get?"
Was it the H/W revA or B card?
The revH?
The revP (or P1? Depends on whether you
check the box or the card or the CIS tuples!).
The PCCARD one or the CARDBUS one (they both exist, by the way)?

And this all leaves out the "+" model.

Our good friends at D-Link, as at LinkSys and SMC, seem to
take a liberal view of what a model number now means.

In fact, there are 32-bit Cardbus and 16-bit PCCARD type II
variants. I've seen them shelved together at a store and
the boxes distinguish them. Though the box will say "PCCARD" or
"CARDBUS", many of the DWL-650 variants are packaged
the same save for a small sticker on the lower left corner
of the back of the box. Go to the web site, and the overall page
says these are all Cardbus, go look at the particular RevP
card information and you get a different story.

Give D-Link this much credit: some other makers have completely
changed chip-sets and not announced any changes; they just tweak
the drivers. Some of the new
wireless chip-sets in the cut-rate variants of these previously
decent cards are of rather uneven quality.

The problem is that it's not just one product. It's something like
4 to 6 products labelled the same or nearly identically. The same
sleazy engineers who brought us winmodems and external
controllerless modems attached over USB have gone to work for
WiFi card makers and are engaging in the
age old tricks of supporting only MS Windows OS variants, and
trying to win the race to the bottom for cost by swapping out
chips, tweaking their drivers, and not telling anyone what's in
their hardware.

Want a reliable card with a known good chipset? By something
with an Intersil PRISM chipset... this is why you see
people saying "go get a Netgear card" or "go get an Orinoco
Gold". Like me, many of these people have poked at these cards
from FreeBSD or Linux and noticed the hardware changes as a
result. The PRISM chipset worked pretty well and had good,
driver support, even in freeware OSes where it was based on
drivers that had been written to the Wavelan's Hermes.

I've recently been to a store 3 times for
PCI wireless cards. The third one I bought I kept. It's
a Netgear MA311. At least _someone_ doesn't jack around with
what's in the box without changing the model number in
an obvious manner. The first two cards had changed chip sets
and didn't do what I wanted at all. In the second case, the
packaging was perfectly identical to the previous internally
very different card. I'm stuck with my DWL-650 because I got
rid of the box.

For those seeking PRISM card here's a partially reliable rule
of thumb based on the Netgear packaging: look all over the
box and look for a station firmware revision. Lots of PRISM2
and 2.5 cards ship with station firmware 1.3.6. Some have
1.4.9 and 1.5.6 reportedly exists. This at least might be a clue
when in doubt, though probably unreliable.

Best bet? Buy a Netgear card, or buy online and check
technical specs. at time of purchase. Some sites actually
list the chipset in the card, since some manufacturers tell,
though the big box stores don't seem to have them.

Finally, save yourself some trouble if you want a good,
reliable card: don't buy the cheapest thing on the shelf.
Spend the $50-$80 for a known quantity. You'll be happier
when the first one is a keeper. Don't be surprised though if you
end up exchanging... it's very common for unadvertised
changes to occur in these kinds of cards.

Caveat emptor.

Bottom line - I'm a computer nerd, but this is my first wireless networking attempt, and I'm overall happy with it. I think I'm going to do this from now on instead of running Cat-5 cabling all over the place. I bought a newer laptop just to take full advantage of this and so far I am not disappointed in the slightest.

The guy who had problems going from Windows 98 to XP must've done something wrong. He mentions installing the D-link CD. Well, I went from 98 to XP and never installed the cd - just plugged in the router, turned on the machine, and Windows configured everything. Never had to install any software or do anything at all to the 2 laptops that already had the cards installed (one running ME, the other XP).

This is a great product!

The range is very good compared to the Linksys WPC11 range. With a Linksys wireless router in the middle of a house and this card, I could walk at least 300 feet outside and still get enough signal to surf then net, the Linksys couldn't even get out the door with enough signal to surf the web.

Nice card at a nice price.

If an incoming email address is like abc.pqr@xyz.com and if you will reply this email (Am using Eudora) then it will crash your mail box becasue of Dot (.) between abc.pqr. I tried to talk to D-link but didin't get any Positive response. Infact, they must have to recall this Product - DWL-650.

Try to avoid D-link.

If an incoming email address is like abc.pqr@xyz.com and if you will reply this email (Am using Eudora) then it will crash your mailbox because of Dot (.) between abc.pqr. I tried to talk to D-link but didn't get any Positive response. D-link must have to recall this Product - DWL-650.

Try to avoid D-link.

Before you buy this card, note the price, and remember that you get what you pay for.

It works well, and installation was easy enough. One nuisance, though. Since I use encryption, I can't set the network to be default, but every time I turn my computer on (or come out of sleep mode), I have to go into the setup utility and press "apply" to approve the encryption key. There's no way to set a default key that would kick in every time the machine is turned on.

Good product for a low price.

Sure I'll agree their phone support is subpar, but once you get it works and it doesn't break.. then who really cares ?