Difference between Dell and Intel wireless?

I read a post somewhere here where someone said that they have found that the Dell wireless has slightly better range than Intel.

I will give you a first hand report on that perhaps as soon as tomorrow. I currently have a 8600 with 1.7 centrino with an Intel wireless (Intel 2100)- its an October 2003 laptop.

I should receive anyday a new 9200 with the Dell wireless. It drives me nuts that my wireless goes in and out in our bedroom from a weak signal, even tho I have a repeater antennae.

If the 9200 performs better, I will chalk it up to the Dell wireless since otherwise the set uo will be identical.., I'll lt u know

oh i dont think either has bluetooth built in...

The 1350 can be used with WEP cracking utilities.

Actually my friend has a 700M with an Intel® PRO/Wireless 2200 Internal Wireless (802.11 b/g, 54Mbps) and his disconnects from the network alot of times, now he only connects to the internet only by ethernet because he isn't able to go one sitting without it disconnecting. I don't know if it's just his but he called dells techs and they were unable to fix his problem. this happends even if hes right next to his wireless router. I use to have the first XPS and I traded it in and got the new xps 2 but I had Dells 1350, and had lots of range on it and it never disconnects, so from experience I would say get Dells.

i think the disconnect problems are occuring because of the interaction between centrino and intel wireless cards, in which the power management functions decrease power output of the wirless card which would result in dropped signals.

no one makes a bluetooth combo mini-pci card, yet

you don't get centrino sticker if you get the dell. but who cares

i ran speedswitchxp on my 700m, but i wasn't getting the battery life i was expecting. when bios A02 came out i uninstalled speedswitchxp and it resulted in my 700m getting battery life to what i expected. also, i had noticed that speedswitchxp would override power management functions under the wireless properties...so there are three things working against each other: speedswitchxp, windows (the lappie), and the wireless card. now since the lappie and the wireless card are supposed to work harmoniously b/c of centrino, i think speedswitchxp was interfering. bios A01 did badly in power management of the battery, and i got better performance out of speedswitchxp, but that changed with bios A02.

at least for the i700m, i don't think it will matter which one. if there is a range difference, it is minimal and i would be hard pressed to see if anyone really can tell...with my 2200 i can get signals from the coffee shop two blocks away when it is raining.

as far as signal drops, i haven't had problems with signal drops with my 2200bg.

but if people are having signal drop problem, i would look into conflicting power management things as the biggest culprit if all else is working well.

I heard the Intel wireless was a bit flakey and didn't know much about the Dell one so i didn't purchase one. I have a Linksys Wireless G Speedboster PC card that I plan to use instead - it worked fantastic in my old laptop, picked up signals almost a block away.

I have the Intel wireless, and not only is the range impressive - the stability is very nice too.

here's my 2 cents..

if you use DELL wireless chip you can't call your system a centrino...

Intel Centrino system is only achived by having 3 things:
1) an intel chipset motherboard
2) intel pentium M processor
3) Intel PRO/Wireless chip

That's the basic difference.

I have the intel and had an issue with no connection after boot and disconnects. I changed the drivers to the generic intel drivers and have the intel app manage the wireless, not XP, and have not had one disconnect yet.

I also have the Intel 2200 and have no complaints. It never drops and gets great range. I don't have another 700m with the Dell card to compare it with, but my 700m gets a much better signal than my wife's IBM T40 with the Intel 2100 card. There are some places where she will have a "Poor" signal and mine says "Very good."

How is linux support of the Dell VS Intel wireless adaptor ?

Meh, I wasn't too impressed with the range. I've had my Ipaq pda for awhile, and was disapointed in the range of my 8600 when I got it, the pda has a much stronger signal. Sitting in my room right now, the pda is picking up 3 wireless signals. My laptop displays only the one from my house.

My 8600 has the Intel 2200.

i have intel abg (29**) and it works perfectly

Confirmed Dell Better Range

My 9200 arrived today. I am typing this on the 9200 with the Dell wireless in my bedroom where the wireless always drops out on the Intel. So far it has better range.

I have both my Inspiron 8600 and the 9200 side by side, both on. 8600 has the intel. 9200 the dell wireless.

The 8600 Intel has dropped the signal twice while the 9200 Dell has maintained the signal. The 9200 also shows one extra bar.

I will being using this over the weekend, but the first results seem to show the Dell has better range....

i don't think that there would be any differenec between them

it is just a wireless card what the heck

just like a gigabit ethernet what is the big deal