Rosewill RNX-N600UBE Wireless N600 Dual Band USB 2.0 Adapter

Pros: It works

Cons: Very slow on both 2.4 & 5, under 1MB/sec.

Overall Review: Grabbed this to replace a stubby USB adapter for my media server. Was getting 3MB/sec with that transferring large files. Was hoping to get better throughput with this on the 5GHz band. Installed fine but transfers dropped to 1MB/sec on 2.4GHz and even lower on the 5GHz. On both bands the software showed 100% signal and full 300 link. Router is in the same room about 20 feet away, no walls or anything. I just put the old adapter back in. Was transferring files to/from a wired PC on Gbit link to router. I may revisit this later but I am not sure what could be wrong since signal strength is showing full 100%. Weird.

Pros: This is my third Rosewill 802.11n adapter, and it is really in a class by itself. The 5GHz band made all the difference for me in my crowded 802.11n 2.4GHz environment (with at least 15 other signals at all times). My older RNX-N150 (a 150mbps 2.4GHz adapter) and the RNX-250 (a 300mbps 2.4GHz adapter) provided identical performance - 16mbps with an 802.11g router, about 24mpbs with a Rosewill 300n router, and 32mbps on my current router, the Asus RT-N56U router, which is a strong dual-band router. Sensing that the frequency range had become the bottleneck for the Asus, which is clearly stronger than my older routers, I took a chance on this bargain-priced 5GHz adapter. All I can say is WOW! I couldn't believe the data rates upon conducting a computer-to-computer test. It achieved a solid 150mbps in a large file transfer, which I thought was only possible in a theoretical lab setting. That's 20 MB/s, or 5x faster than the 300n 2.4Ghz adapter I'd been using previously.

Cons: The signal strength sits at around 70% on the 5GHz band, versus 100% with my 2.4GHz adapter, but as shown above, this is certainly not the determining factor in performance. Also, you'll need to download or install the driver off the mini-CD before you attach the router - Windows 7 does not have a pre-installed driver. Actually, Windows Update will find the driver for you if you plug in this adapter while still using another active Internet connection.

Overall Review: I actually like the shape of this adapter - it sits solidly on a surface, and stays in place due to the rubber feet. This is much better than the other adapters I mention above, which were either overgrown USB sticks that wouldn't stay in place on a tabletop, or unwieldy dual-antenna setups that easily toppled over. I have not tested it at the 2.4GHz frequency, but honestly, given the bottleneck I found with my older Rosewill adapters, I would not expect this model to perform better. If you don't have a dual-band router, you can safely save some money and go with a single-band 2.4GHz adapter. Maybe it's a lack of transparency in the way the 802.11n standard is set, but I found it surprising that my 150n and 300n 2.4Ghz adapters performed identically, while this 300n model on the 5GHz frequency band was 5x faster. Again, it could simply be 2.4GHz frequency congestion, but it's hard to know, given the 100% signal strength at 2.4Ghz.

Pros: Works well enough. I bought 2 of these for my dad. I'm only using the 5 Ghz band. But it gets good reception about 10 feet away through a wall and about 25 feet away upstairs and through several walls and a ceiling. Gets about 83% signal average on the upstairs adapter. Which is more than enough. Actually picking up several other signals coming from a fair distance away. The software is easy enough to use. My dad was able to figure it out and that's a testament to it's ease of use.

Cons: Dropped a signal once, but I don't think it was the receivers fault. They both failed simultaneously. Probably just lost internet for a few minutes. Just thought I'd mention it.

Overall Review: I bought this because I trust the Rosewill name. There are literally dozens of brands out there I've never heard of. Rosewill is a brand that has made some pretty sweet hardware. So it's a name I trust. And they haven't let me down yet.

Pros: I use this for backing up files to a PC over the LAN, and wanted to avoid interference from a microwave oven on the 2.4 GHz band. This adapter gives me fast file transfers (measured at 6.5 MB/sec = 52 Mb/sec) and good signals on the 5 GHz band, from a PC in the basement to a TRENDnet TEW-672 router one floor up.

Cons: None.

Overall Review: I have wanted to put more of my PCs on the 5 GHz band for some time, but equipment is hard to find. This works well, faster than most 802.11g equipment on the 2.4 GHz band for me. The signal strength is somewhat less, but the speeds are faster over most of the house. And it avoids interference from microwaves and portable phones.

Pros: I never thought of Rosewill as a provider of networking equipment, I always went with linksys or netgear. However I'm glad I got this card. It picks up my router in through two walls and one closet. Recognizes my 5 gHz and 2.4 gHz access points. The transfer speeds are great and it hasn't dropped a connection yet.

Cons: None

Overall Review: It does NOT work out-of-the-box in Linux. I am using Ubuntu 10.04 LTS which is a older distro but I refuse to upgrade because it would force me to deal with Unity and Gnome3/Gnome Shell which are possibly the worst desktop interfaces ever designed. Anyway, to get this working under Ubuntu 10.04 you need to do two things. #1 upgrade compat-wireless #2 upgrade your firmware Use synaptic to upgrade compat-wireless. I'm using kernel 2.6.32-40-generic so I installed the linux-backports-modules-compat-wireless-3.2-2.6.32-40-generic package. Next upgrade your firmware. Go to ralink's website http://www.ralinktech.com/en/04_support/support.php?sn=501 and get the "rmware RT28XX/RT30XX USB series (RT2870/RT2770/RT3572/RT3070)". Put the rt2870.bin in the /lib/firmware/updates/2.6.32-40-generic and reboot. Your card should work now. I also read that you had to put the rt2870.bin in the /lib/firmware folder, I did this but I don't think it was necessary.

Pros: Dual band External antennas - hopefully better reception Compact Open source driver

Cons: Does not work 'out of the box' in Ubuntu Oneiric. Once I install the most recent compat-wireless driver and downloaded the firmware from the ralink website (Included in the linux driver @ http://www.ralinktech.com/en/04_support/support.php?sn=501) it worked perfectly.

Overall Review: 148f:3572 Ralink Technology, Corp. RT3572 Wireless Adapter This requires the rt2870.bin firmware and & rt2800usb module.

Pros: This card is based on the Ralink RT5572 chipset. It is an excellent card for such things as wireless penetration testing and other uses.

Cons: None... As long as you have the most current drivers, see below

Overall Review: This card is based on the Ralink RT5572 chipset. For those of you having poor performance issues, hanging or whatever else, use your favorite search engine and search for Ralink RT5572 drivers Or You can go directly to Mediatek's website (Ralink was recently bought by Mediatek) newegg doesn't allow hyperlinks, but if you put a .com after the above mentioned company name, you'll find their website, or you can just simply google it. Once on their website, the fastest and easiest way to find the drivers is to type RT5572 in the search box at the top of page, I had no success trying to navigate to the page, so just use the search box. Once you find the page for the RT5572, on the right side near the bottom you'll see a big blue downloads button, this link includes Windows, Mac and Linux drivers, and they will be the most current drivers available. Its really not that hard, A little research goes a long ways, For future reference: If you take the model number of your wireless adapter, not the manufacturers name, just the model number, in this case its RNX-N600UBE and put it in your favorite search engine along with the word CHIPSET, so RNX-N600UBE+Chipset, and look at the first maybe half a dozen links, avoiding the sales sites, you'll quickly discover what chipset / radio your adapter uses and who made it, you can then go their website and get the most current drivers available. This applies to any wireless adapter. You'll quickly discover that despite there being well over 100+ wireless adapter manufacturers, there are only a handful of chipset makers. Mediatek/Ralink, Atheros/Qualcomm, Realtek, Intel, Broadcom and Marvel, so if youre having driver / performance problems, find out who made the chip and get the latest drivers!

Pros: Has been a decent dual band USB wifi adapter for Windows Vista and Windows 7. Actually works in new Windows 10 (7/30/15). But you need to d/l the MediaTek driver. See notes, below. My adapter is labeled fcc id w6rrnx-n600ube. Somehow, I determined that the internals are RT5572. But I can't remember how I arrived at that. I bought my adapter in 2012 or 2013, I believe. Dual band was automatic and flawless in Windows 7. Also worked well in Vista.

Cons: Loses the 5GHz band in Windows 8 and Windows 10. Needs a driver downloaded from MediaTek. The ones on Rosewill site won't work for Windows 10, or at least didn't for me. I still had only 2.4GHz using the download from the Rosewill site.

Overall Review: Windows 10 -- Go to MediaTek http://www.mediatek.com/en/downloads1/downloads/ and download the file labeled "USB (RT2870/ RT2770/ RT307X/ RT2070 RT357X/ RT3370/ RT8070/ RT5X7X/ MT7610/ MT7601/MT7612U)". The actual file is named IS_Setup_ICS_050615_1.5.39.126.exe. Install it. Then go into settings, Network & Internet. Disable your original or built-in wifi adapter if applicable. This Rosewill is labeled Wi-Fi 2. It shows both the 2.4GHz and 5GHz band option there. Make sure Wi-Fi 2 is "On" and then connect to whichever band you want. Apparently Win10 has the same prob a lot of people had with dual band adapters in Win8: The default Windows drivers are old/obsolete/incorrect only see the 2.4GHz band, not both. You can plug this in to Win10 and it will work, but it will only have 2.4GHz band. Before I got the MediaTek driver, I tried the only semi-appropriate driver from the Rosewill site . It didn't offer me the 5GHz band. ymmv.