802.11b card to 802.11g router ?

bluetech · 11 Nov 2006 at 22:38

I would like to know if it is possible to connect an 802.11b wireless card to a 802.11g wireless router.

The reason for this is that I am pondering over the N50 with an inbuilt wireless card. Trouble is, is that it only has an802.11b card (I assume that this may be due to a higher power consumption, then again a may have assumed wrong).

If it is possible then what would the drawbacks be?

Any help will be much appreciated as this looks like a grat PDA for the price. And I know acer to be pretty damn good with the quality of their desktops so I hope that this will follow through top theier PDA's. Unless anyone could correct me here...

Thanks all!

tolien · 11 Nov 2006 at 23:17

Yes, it'll work fine.
As soon as it associates, you can expect a reduction in throughput with any other hosts (even if they're 802.11g) though.

bluetech · 16 Nov 2006 at 20:16

Could you elaborate on "redution in throughput"?

From my understanding, g refers to the wireless range rather then the speed (54Mbps / 108 Mbps). So do you mean there would be a loss in wireless coverage given by the wireless access point or a loss in speed?

Thanks for the reply!

tolien · 16 Nov 2006 at 20:56

bluetech said:
From my understanding, g refers to the wireless range rather then the speed (54Mbps / 108 Mbps).

802.11g does 54Mbps, 802.11b does 11Mbps. If you bond two channels you get 108Mbps, but that isn't in the standard. It certainly doesn't refer exclusively to the range.

As soon as an 802.11b device associated, you'd see a reduction in throughput, not range. Throughput = "speed", though a dictionary could've answered that part.

Kol · 16 Nov 2006 at 22:31

Yep, in laymans terms, basically, any device that then associates, be it B or G will only work at a max of B speeds.

tolien · 16 Nov 2006 at 23:43

It's quite often somewhere in the middle, but you'll see a reduced speed either way.

errata · 17 Nov 2006 at 13:20

One drawback may be that b devices often only support WEP encryption with smaller security keys, so if your using WPA security or WEP with a long key you may have to change.

My b devices comminicate at b speeds whilst the rest of my 108 mbps devices say they are still at full speed but actual perform better than b but slower than beofre.

Should not be an issue if your sharing internet access rather than transferring large files over your internal network and you can allways turn the N50 off.

bluetech · 22 Nov 2006 at 18:51

Exelent, thanks guys, you have all answerd my question and posed some new thoughts also. Very much appreciated!