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 Cheapest or Smallest or Both? By Eric Griffith
August 14, 2002
Computer motherboard maker PC Wave of Fremont, CA, entered the WLAN business this week. The company launched its Wireless Networking Division by announcing the WU-221, a wireless USB adapter they claim is the world's smallest. The $59.95 WU-221 measures 5.5x3.1x0.7 inches and weighs about one ounce. It also has a small plastic antenna that must be flipped up. By contrast, SMC's latest small USB WLAN adapter, the EZ Connect SMC26664W, which we recently reviewed, is slightly smaller at 2.25 x 3.25 x 1 inches; it also weighs over an ounce, and has an integrated antenna. But it's also almost twice the price at $110. The WU-221 will support the usual litany of features of a 802.11b product: 64- and 128-bit wired equivalent privacy (WEP) encryption, ad-hoc and infrastructure modes, DSSS modulation, plus it sports a range of up to 1000 feet out doors and 265 feet indoors. The adapter uses USB 1.1, and is supported by Windows 98/ME/2000/XP. PC Wave says it will be rolling out a PC Card, access point, and broadband router in the near future. PC Wave is shooting for value, pricing wireless products, as they say, for "mass adoption." The WU-221 will also be sold to OEMs in mass quantities for $49.95.
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