[iPAQ] 802.11 adapter advice for handhelds?

I just ordered PCMCIA sleeve, and I know I'm going to wait for at least
half a month. I think I have plenty of time to figure out informed
purchase of 802.11 card for it.

There are two realistic options for me: Lucent ORiNOCO (formely WaveLAN
Turbo 11 Mb) and Compaq WL100.

Lucent cards are the only ones I've seen on the campus this far, and
people have pretty good knowledge of them (they're used on MARTnodes, our
research boxes for Dynamics, Linux Mobile IP implementation). They're
known to perform better than average when measuring transfer speeds.
Nobody (whom I would know) has used those on handhelds, though, and I'm
wondering how much these cards consume energy.

Compaq card would seem ideal for a Compaq handheld, and at least according
to marketing information, it consumes considerably less energy than Lucent
card. Sadly a quick look to the Web revealed several reviews describing
transfer rate being "disappointing", and some complaints about
the operational range. Transfer rate isn't everything, but, well...

So, I'm eager to hear of real-world experiences or measurements of power
usage of these devices. It seems that in marketing information, speed is
everything, power usage and range are secondary issues...

-kirma
Received on Sat Aug 26 04:32:31 2000