IOGEAR PCI to 5 Ports USB2.0 Card Model GIC251U

Pros: I am running several old Power PC Macintosh's with PCI slots and these cards work great, just plug and play. The computer automatically recognized them upon start up. I am running them in both a G5 w/ OSX 10.5, and a G4 w/ OSX 10.4. Great to add some USB 2.0 ports where in the case of the G4 there was only USB 1.1. According to my computer the card only provides .5A per slot, but I have had no problem running/charging thumb drives, external bus powered hard drives, wired keyboards and mice, ProTools interfaces, iPods/iPhones, though I haven't tried charging an iPad yet.

Cons: The 5th (internal) port did not work with my Logitec bluetooth receiver. The computer recognized it, but for some reason all devices were listed as inactive. As soon as I plugged it into the native USB port they came back.

Other Thoughts: I liked the first one so much I bought a second.

Pros: Works with non-powered, external hard drives. Slid right into my PCI slot. I didn't have to fight it. Beats the 1.1 slots my spare web server came with. A backup script I wrote used to take five minutes. Now, it finishes in under thirty seconds. Yay, team!

Cons: Getting it out of the package was pretty rough. The price is a little high. But, you get what you pay for.

Pros: My first time with Apple products, bought used G4 and found only 2 USB ports. What up with that? Looked and found this product and based on reviews I tried it, conclusion, EXCELLENT!!. My Mac had OSX 10.4 so no driver required, installed card and booted machine and card was ready for use, could not be easier. Thank you to people who take the time to post their reviews, truly one of the most helpful and selfless acts on the internet. Peace to all.

Cons: Great minds of this world, there's got to be a better solution to packaging products than clam-shell packaging, opening this package was the hardest thing about this process.

Pros: This provided usb 2.0 expansion to my Mac G4 which I was in desperate need of. Just plugged in and it worked instantly.

Cons: None that I can think of at the moment.

Pros: First tried a Rosewill USB 2.0 5-port PCI adapter, but I got no signal from monitor, no matter what slot I put it in. I decided to buy the IOGEAR model after reading the reviews, plus the price wasn't bad. Tried all exterior ports with a digital camera and an external USB hard drive and each one works.

Cons: I've tried plugging a USB keyboard to it, but on this mainboard BIOS, it says, "no keyboard detected". I've tried setting different things in the BiOS to see if it will recognize the keyboard, suck as PCI/AGP first, instead of vice-versa, but that doesn't do anything. This keyboard does work in the on-board USB 1.1 connector.

Other Thoughts: Profile of this IOGEAR PCI adapter face fully fits a conventional PCI slot. I mention this because the Rosewill unit was slightly shorter than the PCI slot near the voltage key side. You can view the Newegg pictures to see the difference.

Pros: I bought this to get USB 2.0 in my older PowerMac G4. My iPod now syncs faster, and it also added four more USB ports to the computer. If you have a tower Mac and need more USB, get this card. No driver installation was required, Mac OS X recognized it and it worked.

Cons: None.

Pros: One of my buds got this card in a B&M store after a salesdroid told him that PMac systems like his Quicksilver G4 and my MDD G4 will deep sleep properly with this card installed. El generico USB cards require disconnecting all attached devices or the system will hang when they go to sleep. I believe Apple documentation says that cards have to remove power from devices properly in order to allow sleep, and none of the cheapie cards out there do it apparently. This card does as he found out when he tried one and I decided that I needed to try it.

Cons: No cons on this card, in fact it took care of the mother of all cons with USB 2.0 cards in Pmac systems. Big whoop about not needing driver software, none of 'em do if you're using 10.2.4 and up. Not supporting deep sleep was a big PITA with all other cards that I tried in my box. I'm running 10.5.7 on it at the moment.

Other Thoughts: Said B&M chain doesn't have a store in my town with its population of 1.7 million. I traded said bud some hardware in exchange for his buying said card in said store and sending it to me. Gee if he had told me the brand I could have gotten it from the 'egg myself.

Pros: The IOGEAR USB 2.0 PCI card is great for PowerMac G4 systems. There is native support in practically all versions of OSX to natively support this card. In addition it is one of the very few cards out there with the NEC USB 2.0 chipset, which natively supports OS9 as well (if you needed to boot into OS9 for some strange reason).

Cons: Sometimes I have sleep issues. This can be a problem with all sorts of third party expansion cards on Mac systems however; Apple refuses/doesn't care to fix the problem (especially on G4 systems).

Other Thoughts: This card is great if you need to add USB 2.0 support to older PowerMac systems. I have 15 of these cards in G4 systems in our office and they work great. MUCH better than USb 1.1 for Thumbdrive use.

I suggest using the SYBA 3.5" internal USB 4 port hub as a great way to add front USB ports to a PMG4 (doesn't fit the Quicksilvers or the MDD G4's unfortunately though).

Pros: Installs easily, no problems

Cons: None

Pros: Inexpensive, easy to install and does exactly what it says. Great way of adding USB 2.0 support to old computers.

Cons: None.

Other Thoughts: Packaging could be easier to open.