DO NOT buy this this card if you want to use it for Win2K. BTW, Linksys only supports WEP under Win2K. To get WPA you will need WinXP but that's not in any of the documentaion.

I tried this card in an older machine with an ASUS MB and Windows ME. Frequently locked up the system(despite pulling every card out of the box except video), never could get it to connect to the Linksys AP. Built another system with an MSI MB/2400+ Athlon. Still locked up regularly. Would only connect to the AP (sporadically) if the antenna was disconnected. Tech support was not good. They kept telling me the antenna must be connected, despite my explainations that I knew that, but it wouldn't work that way. Tech eventually says it sounds like the card is defective and to return it.

Returned card, replacement is no better. Tech support is again useless. Making up nonsensical things to try/problems. No solution. "Knowledge Base" on the website is hardly a knowledge base. Basically just a reproduction of the documentation that comes with the card.

Built another system with an Intel 865 based MB and Windows XP. Put card in, installed drivers and after monkeying with the channels it works fine. I was happy until I found out that there is no linux support for this card. Tried the driver loader from Linuxant.com and only had modest success. Can't connect to AP, but can talk to other machines in an ad-hoc mode.

To summarize, this card is really hit or miss. If you have the right hardware combo and run Windows, it will run fine. The wrong hardware combo and you're left with a paperweight. The unfortunate thing is there is no way to know if the card is going to work in your system before you buy it.

After a bit of research, I found the solution! XP has something called "Wireless Zero Configuration" .. and to the best of my knowledge, Linksys is simply not compatible with this. Does that mean ditch your Linksys card or USB adapter? NOPE!

Just do a quick search on the web, and it'll tell you how to disable the Wireless Zero Configuration, and all will be well again =)

I've had this card for about 4 months and have had great performance out of it, never a single problem under XP (simply installed the drivers and used XP to configure it, thats so easy who needs special config apps?!)

I've recently even managed to get it running under Linux despite the fact its built on the broadcom chipset! check out http://www.linuxant.com for details on how to do this (there is a small charge of $20 for the software to do it...)

I have the linksys wrt54g router/AP wired to my cable modem and XP machine. The wmp54g is on my Win98 PIII, Asus p3v4x m/b (Via chipset). My first attempts to use the pci card caused irq conflicts that I resolved by manually selected a non-conflicting irq for the slot in which the card was seated. But the card could still not see a signal. So I adjusted the antenna on the pci card. Bad move, as the connecter came off in my hand (a light breeze would have blown it off). After exchanging the card for one in which the connecter seemed to be better secured to the card, I tried again. Still no signal, no bars, even w/ the card and router both in the same room. After several phone calls to Linksys tech support (friendly, hardworking, and eager to help, but mostly clueless), I ran across a tech that had a useful suggestion - try the card out on my WinXp machine. The card worked on that machine. Unfortunately, tech support had no clue what to do w/ that info. Eventually, I realized that if the card was to work in the Win98SE machine, the problem would need to be resolved at the motherboard bios level. Disabling "Byte Merge" in the motherboard bios did the trick! Also, make sure that the router verification is set for "Auto" rather than "Shared Key", which will result in the same "no signal" problem. Difficult card to set up on an older pc, but it's running with a fair signal/fair link (3 to 4 bars) and 24 to 54 mbps (often 48-54) at about 50-60 ft through two floors. Hopefully, it will continue to work well.

This card is very poorly made - the antenna mount is press fit together and *very* fragile. The antenna is also a fragile construction all on its own. The lack of drivers/management utility that work well with windows XP really stinks.

The units I purchased were returned and Belkin PCI cards were purchased instead. These have a solid construction plus a driver/utility that makes reliable connections in windows XP.

Installation was a chore. On XP, it recognized the new hardware and I told the Hardware Wizard where the drivers were, but once I started to explore the settings in the device panel, things went awry. I selected 802.11b mode in the panel and everything went dead. No problem, I thought...all I needed to do was uninstall the hardware and reinstall. Nope, it kept throwing me errors about resource conflicts. I'm not much of a PC expert, so I decided not to wrestle with IRQ conflicts. I installed the card in another PCI slot and that fixed it, sort of.

Range is abysmal with the little black antenna. My access point is an Apple AirPort Extreme Basestation with a powerful external 8 dBi antenna. Where my Power Mac gets 90% signal strength with its built-in antenna, my PC only two feet away can't connect at all. It's puzzling to say the least. The antenna on the WMP54G is weeeeeaaaak.

I use XP Pro on an ASUS based system. The cards were not recognized as "Plug and Play" and Windows XP refused flat out to install them. I gave up after two sleepless nights.

I then purchased a D-link PCI card and I was surfing the net in 15 minutes flat.

I messed around with this problem for HOURS yesterday, but decided to try fresh today... I'd decided that if I didn't get it all working today, it was all going to get boxed up and sent back tomorrow! The root cause was that the router was on one channel (6 I believe), and the WMP55G cards (at least when you install the new driver) defaults to channel 11. (I may have these reversed).

In this configuration, the network SSID was visible to the client systems, but would NOT connect - at least not usually - they actually connected once or twice briefly with the channels mismatched, but with everything in close proximity.

The WRT54G's channel number (assuming you're using the linksys router) is on the "setup" tab on it's web interface. (I had a PC hardwired to the router to do this - that's a good idea if you're having RF problems as I was). It's down near the bottom of the screen in the "Wireless" section. Remember to hit "APPLY" after changing it, so that it takes effect.

The WMP54G's channel number (Windows XP - SP1 with the latest driver, anyway) is on the "Wireless G Notebook Adapter Properties" window under the "Advanced" tab. It's labeled "IBSS Channel Number". You must hit the "OK" for it to take effect.

I THINK I tried changing the channel on the router yesterday, but failed to hit "APPLY"...

I had been seeing the same thing over and over... the network was visible to the client computers, but wouldn't connect... Interestingly enough, my portable WOULD connect, but the two PCI cards would not. Once I got all the channels synced up, it was fine.

You would expect that if the card and router were on different channels (especially as far apart as 6 and 11), that the network would not be visible from the cards, but that's not the case! They are visible, but just will not connect - usually anyway.

I believe that any sort of RF problem might cause a similar symptom... a bad antenna connector, an interfering wireless phone, (another network next door?) or what have you.

The first thing I did today was to disconnect all the wireless phones in the house BEFORE starting to troubleshoot. The next thing was to turn SSID transmit back on, and security off. Once we got the channels synced up, both PCI cards synced up right away... then I turned SSID transmit off, verified that it was OK, then put in a WEP key, verified again, then went in and restricted the mac addresses to those of my client computers. It's all working reliably now.

3-4 hours of trouble shooting and researching their web site with no luck so I decided to call tech support. We spent an hour and a half (I must say they were willing to try lots of things and were patient). We tried everything:
- uninstall/re-install
- switch PCI slots
- change channels
- reset router
- upgrade firmware on router
- dance a jig around the computer (just seeing if you're still reading)
- Changing multitude of settings (with/without WEP, MAC address, modes, etc.)

Still no connection! The tech guy's was not even able to conclude if the problem was with the router or the card. I don't know what to do and am tempted to just send it all back. I even bought a Linksys PC card for the laptop that I'm expecting in a week. Maybe I will see if that works with the router. If so, maybe it is just the card at fault.

These comments are very interesting since some people don't seem to have any problems at all and others like me struggle for hours. If anyone out there has had this problem, please contact me with a solution (david@ideadirect.com).