More D-Link Duds

1/5/2008

Traditionally I bought a lot of D-Link hardware. However, I think it is time I reexamine my faith in D-Link.

About a year ago I wrote about my D-Link disaster. But I had written that off as a "one off". Since then I have had more issues with D-Link. D-Link generally makes good quality, inexpensive devices. However their support infrastructure is horrible, especially for a company of their size. I needed two WiFi devices. The two devices I purchased were the D-Link DWA-120 (USB) and D-LINK DWA-520 (PCI). I purchased D-Link with the belief that they would be supported in 64 bit. I examined both boxes, both said support for Windows XP and Vista. No mention of 64 bit, but it did not say 32 bit only either.

I took the devices home and checked the driver disks. No 64 bit drivers. I then went to the D-Link website. Unfortunately D-Link has dozens of global websites, and each website only contains models sold in their region. Finding a driver is a nightmare as you have to guess which website covers you. Not even Europe has a single website, but several. And countries like Cyprus? Greece or Middle East? I still cannot determine. Finally I find some D-Link websites that have my products listed. But no drivers. They do not even have the 32 bit drivers on their FTP in case I lose the disk! Finally in D-Link New Zealand I find drivers, but again only 32 bit.

Finally, I found out who makes the chips in the DWA-520, and from the chipset manufacturer in the Czech Republic I was able to obtain working XP 64 drivers. If these drivers are readily available, why cannot D-Link provide or at least link to them? In fact why can they not at least fill their own FTP directory with their own CD contents? If you are looking for x64 drivers for the D-Link DWA-520 by the way, they are here. Grab the drivers for chipset AR5212. That might not be the exact same chipset as in the D-Link, but Atheroz includes one unified install and it has the drivers you need. Atheros also supplies chips to 3COM, AirLancer, Avaya, Cisco, D-Link, Linksys, Netgear, Nortel, Proxim ORiNOCO, and SMC. So if you are looking for a driver and have a PCI card from one of these vendors, there is a good chance these drivers will work for you.

The DWA-120 was the same story. Dozens of websites, no drivers. I tried many chipset drivers with no luck. I finally returned it an instead bought and Asus WL-167G USB WiFi. Asus has a very good record of providing 64 bit drivers. Unfortunately for this device the XP64 drivers are missing, but the Vista 64 ones are there. Asus support says its a mistake and doesn't know why they are missing. But Asus has one global website, and allows users to leave comments in the FAQ's and has forums per product. A quick read of these led me to a link where a user posted a link to the drivers from the manufacturer of the chipsets again. So Asus made a mistake, but because of a better support infrastructure it was overcome.  In case you need them, the drivers are here.

I have bought Asus for a long time as well, especially in motherboards. But in recent years Asus has expanded into all kinds of peripherals, and now is my preferred vendor. Many years ago I used to buy Linksys as well, however after they were bought by Cisco, the prices of comparable Linksys hardware (at least where I live) rose to about double what Asus and D-Link products cost.

<< Previous Entry  Next Entry >>

Use my contact form to contact me directly.