PCMCIA Network card vs PCI Network card?

[carvedeye]

HI all I am wanting to know which one would IS faster as I now have a mediator lt4 and don't know if should stick with the PCMCIA card or get a NIC network card instead?

what are your thoughts?

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

Not that I have any first-hand experience, but at a guess I'd say the faster 32-bit bus of the Mediator would win out over the 16-bit interface to the PCMCIA port, but then you've got a lot of additional circuits the Mediator is going through, whereas PCMCIA is going pretty much directly to the motherboard.  Be interesting to see some speed test results from people who have both!  :idea:

[rdolores]

I agree with Oldsmobile Mike on this.  32-bit has double the bandwidth of 16-bit so the PCI NIC should be faster than the PCMCIA NIC.

This brings to mind another question: Which would be faster, the PCMCIA NIC or a USB NIC attached to a Subway USB port?  I have this option on my A1200.

Anyone?

HI all I am wanting to know which one would IS faster as I now have a mediator lt4 and don't know if should stick with the PCMCIA card or get a NIC network card instead?

what are your thoughts?

[carvedeye]

That's great, I am sure I have a PCI Network card somewhere so will give it a try.

[smf]

If you want to use a pcmcia card and a mediator you have to move the memory window jumper on the mediator from 8mb to 4mb, and that should make your mediator go slower or behave worse, i have never tested it myself but i guess they had good reasons to add that jumper.

[carvedeye]

If you want to use a pcmcia card and a mediator you have to move the memory window jumper on the mediator from 8mb to 4mb, and that should make your mediator go slower or behave worse, i have never tested it myself but i guess they had good reasons to add that jumper.

I have my mediator set to 8mb and I am still able to use my PCMCIA network just fine, I think you need to change it to 4mb if you are using a PCMCIA memory expansion.