Picked a $15 PCIe WiFi card over a $60 USB adapter for office builds

Been building desktops for a small real estate office here in Phoenix. They kept complaining about dropped connections on the cheap USB WiFi dongles I used to throw in. Decided to switch to a basic Intel AX200 PCIe card for the last 5 machines I built. Cost me $15 each from a surplus store and took about 3 extra minutes per build. Every single one has been rock solid for 4 months now with zero callbacks. Has anyone else noticed PCIe cards just perform way better than USB in multi-user environments like offices?

2 comments

2 Comments

john4301mo ago

Honestly, that makes me wonder - did you ever test one of those USB dongles side by side with the PCIe card in the same office setup?

michaela161mo ago

My old Intel AX200 was honestly fine until I swapped to the ASUS USB-BE92 and realized the latency difference in Teams calls was night and day. You got me reconsidering the whole internal vs external debate.