USB to Gigabit adapter throughput?

M

MinPins

Limp Gawd
Joined
Aug 30, 2007
Messages
368
I am looking at buying an ultraportable laptop to replace my aging, heavy, slow one.
It does not have an ethernet port so I am looking at buying a USB to Gigabit dongle.

I need ethernet in environments where company networks do not allow full access via WIFI for security.

Does anyone have experience on how reliable these are and what king of throughput are you seeing?

Thanks.
 
USB 2.0 is 480Mbit/s and Gigabit is 1000Mbit/s.

You won't be able to get full gigabit speeds through a usb 2.0 adaptor, theoreritcaly without overhead you'd be able to get 480Mbit/s. Realistically I'd guess about 300Mbit/s. But I am probably way off

If it's USB 3.0 then you'd have no problem getting near Gigabit speeds. Not sure if they exist though
 
liveify said:
If it's USB 3.0 then you'd have no problem getting near Gigabit speeds. Not sure if they exist though
Click to expand...

I have not seen any that exist.

There is a Belkin USB 2.0 gigabit ethernet adapter, but you are correct about the speeds.

Even though USB 2.0 maxes out at 480Mbps (60MB/s), no single device will go much beyond 30MB/s, not counting overhead from the USB drivers which eats CPU cycles.

As for reliability, they are not reliable at all. Many of them are very flaky and delicate. The best one I've seen is the Belkin.
From personal experience I've gone through quite a few for work as well. They are good for a temporary fix, but that's about it.
The rest are all USB 1.1 and just 10/100. Good enough for basic connectivity and small file sharing, but don't expect speeds beyond 800KB/s for these.

If I were you, I would look at a good deluxe-netbook with gigabit or 10/100, you will have much better luck than an ultraportable without ethernet.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top