Best Computer Network Adapters
Using advanced Home Plug AV technology, TL-PA4010 KIT provides users with stable, high-speed data transfer rates of up to 600Mbps on a line length of up to 300 meters. POWER SAVING - Patented Power-Saving Mode automatically reduces power consumption by up to 85%.128-bit AES encryption ensures that the network is safe simply by pressing a button on paired devices.Up to 300 meter range over a home's electrical circuit for better performance through walls or across floors.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"My 14 year old daughter was throwing a stereotypical teenage girl conniption fit that her wireless kept dropping out, had a 1mbps downstream, and was generally poo."
"I've been a Network Engineer for over 10 years and ever since I've dealt with computers, cabling is one of the worst aspects of the job. When Powerline technology came out it added convenience of using existing power cabling but still was a little flaky and troublesome. When it came time to buy originally back in July 2012, I put a lot of research into looking into the latest powerline solution for my home. Despite the insane price point (currently $87.99 on Amazon - 12/13/2013; I bought these for $108 back in July 2012), the Netgear adapters worked wonderfully in my home. When multiple devices would start streaming things like Netflix and I was doing transfers from my media server to a PC, Netflix would stutter and my WiFi throughput would literally crawl slower than a snail on a salt bed. That's when I realized I needed to invest in more Powerline Adapters for certain rooms to speed up transfers as well as help reduce the load of my WiFi network. I mean after all, I had a word of mouth approval from a friend and you can't argue saving over $50 vs another set of my Netgear adapters... the result? While this normally won't matter to a lot of people, it will tell you whether you are having degraded performance within your home's electrical wiring."
"I unboxed and although the reviews and instructions say not to plug into a power strip I did anyway and on both sides. All I did was plug in the adapters, plug in the Cat5 cables, power on the DVR and the router, Push the two link buttons (not at the same time) on the adapters and I was streaming live video on my android phone."
"I was dumb and didn't read directions - you must plug into outlet (not a power strip) or the signal will degrade."
Multipoint Bluetooth connectivity: simultaneously pair your smartphone and tablet and stream music from either one. Bluetooth Audio Adapter: Makes your speakers Bluetooth for streaming music from your smartphone or tablet.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"This unit has RCA holes...that means instead of hooking up a cd player or tape deck...you hook this up to the back of your receiver...then pair it to your phone's music player and Jam!...I had a thousand dollars worth of old gear in the garage and it wasn't being used...this works great...hope this helps some old school folks that don't know you can do this...sounds so much better than most of the crappy little wireless speakers the kids are buying.."
"After trying two other products (AmazonBasics Bluetooth 4.0 Audio Receiver(ok,need line of sight and cuts out after 25ft) & HomeSpot NFC-Enabled Bluetooth Audio Receiver for Sound System(It's bad, cuts out if you are 20ft and need line of sight ) First off, this product @ $21 is MUCH better than the other two. It can safely stream line of sight or not for 25ft(line of sight cut outs started happening beyond 25ft)."
"I connected it to my whole house audio system input source and now I can play Pandora throughout my house from my smart phone."
"works almost too well, meaning that once your device (our smart phones in this case) are paired; it connects quite quickly anytime I am near the living room. this is a good thing in a way but is annoying at times when you have multiple Bluetooth devices that your phone connects too in the house."
"(The Logitech is the 2nd Bluetooth audio adapter I've tried - I got it to try to get a better connection because the TP-LINK is glitchy and drops out, but wow even so the TP-LINK still sounds much better!)."
"PRO: - It was very easy to setup. - Easily pair with my iphone, ipad, and Itouch with no problems. - Worked very well with my new Logitech speaker system and my old Kenwood A/V system. CON. - .No off function."
Esinkin Bluetooth receiver for non-bluetooth speakers or sound system. Bluetooth connectivity and listen music wireless. Now you can listen music on your smart phone or tablet. by plugging this adapter into your speakers, and make. Long range. This adapter can receive music from. Listen music wireless:Stream your audio entertainment from your smart phone or table.Listen music through your perfect sound system from your smart phone or tablet with perfect sound quality.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Plugged the devices power supply into the switched outlet of the amp and now whenever I want my pc audio to play through a "real" system I just turn on the amp like old times and the Floyd never sounded so good. Best of all when I turn off the amp the device is also off so my pc reverts to the default audio output device."
"It's easy to use, the sound quality is fine, the range is more than adequate: largely determined by the range of the phone, the quality of construction and packaging are great, and the price is right."
"Because with this bad boy connected to my Stereo, I don't NEED to use those sorry apps and I can simply stream from my phone, tablet, or whatever device I choose. Easily one of the best upgrades I made to my home stereo, and one of the easiest ways to stream audio from your mobile devices to your home stereo."
"Works well.connecting my Alexa dot to my stereo to stream music from Alexa to my stereo."
"I like that I can plug its AC power into the switched AC outlet on the back of my stereo receiver and it turns on and off with the rest of the gear."
"The description lists a lot of different devices that should pair with this Bluetooth adapter, but evidently failed to include my 40 year old Kenwood hi/fi surround sound amplifier."
"The plug-in for the transformer on the unit works intermittently, once plugged in and the light comes on you have to be careful or it will disconnect internally. It's sad that the manufacturers of the new TVs don not provide a convenient audio out put for head phones instead they have poor speakers that require one to purchase a sound bar which will only connect using bluetooth or optical, forcing people like me to try and find converters which don't work."
Best Bluetooth Computer Network Adapters
Adds Bluetooth support to Windows 10, 8.1, 8, 7, or Linux PCs that don't already have it. Supports Bluetooth speakers, headphones, headsets, keyboards, mice, and more. Some audio devices, such as the Bose QuietComfort 35, require downloading specific drivers to function in Windows 7.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"I have a great Bluetooth headphones (Satechi Aluminum Bluetooth Wireless Headphones) that I wanted to use at my work computer so I would not distract my other co-workers. The Plugable Technologies allows any non Bluetooth accessible computer or laptop to have Bluetooth capabilities to use with Bluetooth headphones, mice, speakers, keyboards, etc."
"To test it out, I took out my PS4 Bluetooth controller, held down the pairing buttons(briefing holding down the Playstation button while the Share button was held down), and in about 30 seconds total, Windows 10 had finished the process of pairing and connecting my controller via Bluetooth - simple, quick, and magnificent."
"After the initial pairing, connecting it after turning it off is quite quick, and it works with DS4 windows so you can change aspects like the controller light bar color, remap buttons (for emulating a xbox 360 controller in some pc games), or turn off rumble."
"After several hours spent installing, uninstalling drivers, chatting with Microsoft (zero help there...cookie cutter answers that said nothing + made me diagnostic tool that also found nothing) I was dead in the water with wireless bluetooth headphones that worked before the MS update and now only worked with a wire."
"I really like the products from Plugable."
"This works fairly well with my wireless headphones."
"Bought this for my work computer to connect my blue tooth head phones (Skull Candy Grind wireless: LOVE!)."
Best Laptop Computer Network Adapters
Do More Convenience with your WiFi USB Adapter: With AC600 wireless AC adapter, you can shift between 2.4GHz and 5GHz WiFi bands to avoid interference and have optimal WiFi Internet connection for your PC,laptop or Mac. High Speed: Up to 600Mbps Wi-Fi speeds on 5GHz (433Mbps) or 2.4GHz (150Mbps) bands: Performance to reduce freezing and lags when streaming and gaming.Ultra-fast AC600 wireless adapter speed with 802.11ac.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"I bought 4 of these, and everyone was simple to install on different aged, and different manufactured computers all with different operating systems."
"I like that it has a standard antenna 'pigtail' connector."
"Best thing I have bought for my laptop. The wifi adapter built into my laptop only worked on the 2.4 band. I added this USB adapter."
"For those who are interested in technical details, the chipset used is "Realtek RTL8811AU Wireless LAN 802.11ac". The following is snippet of dmesg from Linux: [11256968.529081] usb 1-1.2: new high-speed USB device number 69 using ehci-pci. [11256968.622105] usb 1-1.2: New USB device found, idVendor=0bda, idProduct=a811. [11256968.622111] usb 1-1.2: New USB device strings: Mfr=1, Product=2, SerialNumber=3. [11256968.622114] usb 1-1.2: Product: 802.11ac WLAN Adapter. [11256968.622116] usb 1-1.2: Manufacturer: Realtek. [11256968.622118] usb 1-1.2: SerialNumber: 00e04c000001. Antenna is detachable and can be replaced with a higher dB antenna for better reception, but the one comes with is pretty good enough!"
"My second notebook had used an old version wireless card to connect router, after my Internet Service Provider (ISP) upgraded its software, the notebook couldn’t connect the router using the old version wireless card."
"My room in the further end of the house and isn't really close to the internet modem, but this product has proven to help quite a bit."
"This WiFi adapter was shipped to my house in 2 days and is about as simple as you can get for setup."
"Mini CD included with the adapter, easy installation and the device is small and doesn't get in the way."
Best Powerline Computer Network Adapters
Those terms are used on this product solely to indicate its compatibility with other “AV2000” or “2000Mbps” PowerLine devices. Actual data speeds vary and are limited by the product’s Ethernet port and other network conditions such as data traffic, electrical noise, and wiring issues. 2x2 MIMO with Beam forming establishes multiple simultaneous connections for you to enjoy higher power line speeds and greater stability.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"These work great as long as you know what to expect."
"To give some rough numbers for speeds: - I have a 75Mbps/75Mbps internet connection. - No matter how far apart I put these devices, internet speed tests at the furthest device never dropped below 75/75. - Computer-to-computer speeds with my old AV600 powerline adapters were roughly 70-80Mbps. - Computer-to-computer speeds with these AV1200 devices are roughly 110-120Mbps, so about a 50% improvement. I have a pair of the 500Mbps adapters, a pair of the 600Mbps ones, and now these 1200Mbps adapters, and they all work together seamlessly."
"An absolutely great product, I used them to extend my home network to my detached garage and works flawlessly."
"Was looking forward to this, however after receiving the item and trying to plug it in, I noticed it would not plug into my outlet due to the fact that the adapter is a bit too tall to leave space for the outlet below to plug in."
"This made my WiFi soar in speed! Thank you for letting us finally utilize our WiFi."
"The connection provided by the TP-Link unit is as stable as a traditional wired connection and the Apex is able to reconnect automatically after power outages."
"I use 4 of these around the house, especially where WiFi signal strength keeps dropping off and they provide highly reliable connections even for streaming."
"I have desktop and NAS storage on the first floor and WiFi router upstairs, desktop had reasonable WiFi connection speed but Synology NAS was dropping connection and was very slow even with 5G WiFi."
Best USB Computer Network Adapters
Do More Convenience with your WiFi USB Adapter: With AC600 wireless AC adapter, you can shift between 2.4GHz and 5GHz WiFi bands to avoid interference and have optimal WiFi Internet connection for your PC,laptop or Mac. High Speed: Up to 600Mbps Wi-Fi speeds on 5GHz (433Mbps) or 2.4GHz (150Mbps) bands: Performance to reduce freezing and lags when streaming and gaming.Ultra-fast AC600 wireless adapter speed with 802.11ac.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"I bought 4 of these, and everyone was simple to install on different aged, and different manufactured computers all with different operating systems."
"I like that it has a standard antenna 'pigtail' connector."
"Best thing I have bought for my laptop. The wifi adapter built into my laptop only worked on the 2.4 band. I added this USB adapter."
"For those who are interested in technical details, the chipset used is "Realtek RTL8811AU Wireless LAN 802.11ac". The following is snippet of dmesg from Linux: [11256968.529081] usb 1-1.2: new high-speed USB device number 69 using ehci-pci. [11256968.622105] usb 1-1.2: New USB device found, idVendor=0bda, idProduct=a811. [11256968.622111] usb 1-1.2: New USB device strings: Mfr=1, Product=2, SerialNumber=3. [11256968.622114] usb 1-1.2: Product: 802.11ac WLAN Adapter. [11256968.622116] usb 1-1.2: Manufacturer: Realtek. [11256968.622118] usb 1-1.2: SerialNumber: 00e04c000001. Antenna is detachable and can be replaced with a higher dB antenna for better reception, but the one comes with is pretty good enough!"
"The only issue I had was if this became unplugged that it would have a hard time reconnecting after it was plugged back in."
"My room in the further end of the house and isn't really close to the internet modem, but this product has proven to help quite a bit."
"update: I bought 1 one of these and I assumed that I was the reason why it broke. Just know that it's only a matter of time before the thing suddenly stops working while you're in the middle of something."
"The adapter works well to this day. It’s definitely not a computer issue as the other adapters work fine in the computers, and these bad adapters fail in 3 different computers."
Best Internal FireWire Port Cards
Each posted write data queue and completion data queue can store up to 8K bytes of data. Fully Interoperable with FireWire, iLink, and SB1394 Implementation of IEEE 1394 Standard.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"I bought this for the sole purpose of connecting a Focusrite Saffire Pro 40 DAW interface and it works perfectly."
"Haven't done any extended captures yet bu a five minute capture went smoothly, no sign of lagging or dropped frames. If you open Power Director and then try to capture it won't work. -. I have not tried to load the software that came with the card since so many other reviewers have said they had problems when they did. I have described the environment it's working in as most of the questions I have seen about it are looking to know if the card will work with a specific PC, OS or editing software."
"This card was recognized by my Windows 7 PC, but it was not recognized by my Tascam DM 4800 mixer's Firewire card."
"Attached the Satellite Duo to one of the FW800 ports on the card and the UAD-2 control panel now show the satellite running a full FW speed."
"I sometimes think there is a little gnome down inside Firewire cards and drivers that just looks for opportunities to cause problems."
"After rebooting the drive and computer a couple times, it would eventually kick back in and be fine for a day or so. After multiple reboots and restarting the drive as Drobo recommended, I decided to just give USB a try as a last ditch resort. Upon taking out the PCIe Firewire card, I discovered that one of the 1394b ports essentially broke out of its solder joints."
Best Computer Network Adapters
POWER SAVING - Patented Power-Saving Mode automatically reduces power consumption by up to 85%.128-bit AES encryption ensures that the network is safe simply by pressing a button on paired devices.Up to 300 meter range over a home's electrical circuit for better performance through walls or across floors.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"My 14 year old daughter was throwing a stereotypical teenage girl conniption fit that her wireless kept dropping out, had a 1mbps downstream, and was generally poo."
"I've been a Network Engineer for over 10 years and ever since I've dealt with computers, cabling is one of the worst aspects of the job. When Powerline technology came out it added convenience of using existing power cabling but still was a little flaky and troublesome. When it came time to buy originally back in July 2012, I put a lot of research into looking into the latest powerline solution for my home. Despite the insane price point (currently $87.99 on Amazon - 12/13/2013; I bought these for $108 back in July 2012), the Netgear adapters worked wonderfully in my home. When multiple devices would start streaming things like Netflix and I was doing transfers from my media server to a PC, Netflix would stutter and my WiFi throughput would literally crawl slower than a snail on a salt bed. That's when I realized I needed to invest in more Powerline Adapters for certain rooms to speed up transfers as well as help reduce the load of my WiFi network. I mean after all, I had a word of mouth approval from a friend and you can't argue saving over $50 vs another set of my Netgear adapters... the result? While this normally won't matter to a lot of people, it will tell you whether you are having degraded performance within your home's electrical wiring."
"I was dumb and didn't read directions - you must plug into outlet (not a power strip) or the signal will degrade."
"I unboxed and although the reviews and instructions say not to plug into a power strip I did anyway and on both sides. All I did was plug in the adapters, plug in the Cat5 cables, power on the DVR and the router, Push the two link buttons (not at the same time) on the adapters and I was streaming live video on my android phone."
Best Parallel Port Cards
This high performance SPP/EPP/ECP parallel card adds one DB25 parallel port, perfect for connecting printers, scanners, CD-R/RW drives, memory card readers, bar code scanners and more. With the added convenience of plug and play capability, installing the parallel adapter card is hassle-free!The PCIe Parallel Adapter card includes both standard and half-height/low profile mounting brackets and is backed by a StarTech.com two year warranty and free lifetime technical support. Use existing parallel devices such as printers, scanners, CD-R/RWs, Zip drives and memory card readers with PCI Express systems, saving the cost and hassle of upgrading peripherals to work with newer systems.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Every StarTech product I've purchase has lived up to my performance expectations. I expect nothing less than an easy install letting Windows 7. load any needed drivers. Always had good luck with StarTech products and given them 5 star ratings. Don't purchase this card and install it in a computer with Windows 7/64 bit OS unless you want alot of frustration. They suggested doing the following: Below are the steps that need to be taken to install the drivers from our website on a Windows 7 64bit machine: Please download the drivers for your product using this link: [...]. When you download files, Windows usually saves them in the Downloads folder which is located under your user name in the users folder on the drive where Windows is installed (for example C:\users\your name\downloads). To open Device Manager: o Press Windows Key + R. o Type - devmgmt.msc. o Click OK. Driver Installation. 1. Select "Let me pick from a list of device drivers on my computer." If a list of hardware types appears leave it set to show all and click Next. Repeat steps 1-5 for each serial port that appears after the OxMf or OxPCIeMf driver is installed, this time choosing "OxPCIeSer." Note: To check your System Type, click Start > right-click Computer > Properties. Since I already downloaded the .zip file I knew where to look for the drivers. Sent an email back to StarTech Tech Support suggestion they get the installation instructions updated and make mention of checking Port connection."
"The other version is the exact opposite: The half-height bracket is already installed, with a full-height bracket also included in the package."
"I installed this on a new HP Envy 750 64 bit Windows 10 computer with no problems."
"I have to give it 5 stars because everything is pretty-much how I'd like with a port card like this."
"I like this HP printer and really didn't want to replace. The parallel to USB adapters will not work with this particular HP."
"My system recognized the card but I needed to manually install the drivers which were on the supplied CD (it had versions for Win7 32-64, Vista 32-64 and earlier). Software & port lock all happy now and running fine (your mileage may vary depending on application/dongle type)."
"But since this computer never had a parallel port, it also had no LPT1."