Belkin 54g USB Wireless Adapter

For some reason that is beyond me now, about a year and a half ago I decided to purchase a bargain-basement Dell notebook, the model B120, that has no built-in wireless. The computer is what I expected for $500 dollars and it performs decently enough, for what it is. As of late, however, I have become annoyed at the fact that it has no built-in wireless, and I am regretting not adding it to the original purchase. Now I am in a situation where I actually need the wireless connection, and in the interest of time and saving money, I decided to try out the Belkin 54g USB adapter.

I knew that the USB adapter would work in Windows, which was what I would be using most frequently, but I was very skeptical about it working in Linux. Fortunately, from the Kodak camera incident a few months ago, I learned an important lesson: Just Plug it in And Try It!!!

At first, there was nothing, not even an indication that Mandriva had recognized a piece of new hardware. Before getting too frustrated, however, I decided to look at the hardware information applet in the control center.

Listed right under the network adapter section was the Belikn 54g. Thinking it was working, I opened Firefox, though I did not expect much, because I had not configured the adapter yet. I was correct, there was the standard "page not found" message.

My next move was to open the network applet in the control center. i noticed that the USB wlan was disabled. After enabling the adapter, and connecting to the wireless router, it worked like a charm. Upon reboot, the network was automatically connected.

Compared to how the Belkin works in Windows, its performance in Linux is very hassle-free. In windows, Belkin includes its own program to connect with access points. That program does not do a very good job at maintaining a connection, and if you choose to use the built-in zero configuration program of Windows, the Belkin program tends to interfere with the connection and it must be shutdown.

So, in conclusion, once again, with Linux, if it is recognized, the hardware just works... No problems...