Hawking HWU8DD Hi-Gain USB Wireless-G Dish Adapter
by Hawking Technology
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Our Price: $174.99 Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $54.99 (click here) Category: CE See more product details |
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Customers in the UK,
Buy this product at amazon.co.uk
for British Pounds
Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Hawking HWU8DD Hi-Gain USB Wireless-G Dish Adapter
Customer Review: Works great, tough to transport
Summary: 4 Stars
This is a nice little product. It pretty much does what it says it does and gives you a significant range boost over a standard wireless card. It will frequently expose networks that you can't even see with your normal card, and it will allow you to achieve a stable connections to networks that your normal card can see but not connect to. The software it came with performs fine, although there is no reason you can't just install the driver and use Windows to connect. I prefer the Hawking software since it shows a network's connection strength as a percent rather than just bars.
My only real complaint with this product and the only reason I didn't give it 5 stars is that its not easily transportable. As other reviewers have mentioned the dish does not fold down so it would be pretty easy to break during transport. Your best bet is to keep the original box which will pack it securely, but thats takes up a lot of room in a suitcase so its not very practicle for trips.
Bottom line, if you want something for stationary / local use this is a great product, but if you're looking for something you can travel with you would be better off with something a little more compact.
Customer Review: Mixed feelings
Summary: 3 Stars
I just purchased this adapter as a back-up for my internet satellite system, should it go down.
I have the older dish -54DZ, but can't get it to work on my Vista laptop. Even tried downloading the Vist driver for it, but no go. So I sprung for the new dish - HWU8DD. Knew there were going to be problems upon opening it, with a flyer note saying "For Windows Vista Users...go to hawkingtech..." Went through the download routine for the newest drivers, and loaded the program from the disk. No go. Then called support in India. We went through the reloading procedures several times, but no go.
Afterwards, I was diddling with Windows Network settings, and got it to work. Here's my summary:
This product is cheaply built, with lousy software (for Vista, anyways). If you get it, just download and install the latest Vista drivers, (don't bother with the disk) then plug it in and configure it with the Windows Networking system found in the Control Panel. Hawking gets good reviews, but I think it is dropping the ball lately. Maybe they should get better software programmers. Don't forget to turn off your computer internet when trying to use the Hawking device.
Customer Review: very flaky drivers
Summary: 1 Stars
I had previously owned an HWU54D and it worked wonderfully. Hawking stopped driver development at Win2K for that model so when I upgraded to XP I needed to shelve the 54D model (never you mind that Hawking says they have XP drivers for the 54D they do not work and tech support confirms that).
I got the HWU8DD and it has been nothing but problems. Installation is not seamless and after install it will suddenly decide that it doesn't like the USB port or current driver. To solve the problem I usually have to physically remove device, uninstall the device in hardware manager, uninstall software, edit registry to get rid of hidden references, reboot computer, reinstall software, reinstall device and maybe it will work. Most times it give "code 10" error.
Got rid of the HWU8DD and got latest model which is HWDN1 and which seems to work with XPSP3 OK but not well with 64 bit Vista.
Unfortunately Hawking is the only seller of these devices (which I need) so I am stuck but cannot really recommend Hawkings devices to anyone. Their driver support is pretty much non existent and seems to be about 1 OS generation behind. Also no drivers for Linux that i can find.
Customer Review: Good piece of gear (works with Windows 7)
Summary: 5 Stars
I've had this for over a year.
Some reviewer said his was fragile. Not mine. I've dropped it 4 ft. several times. It's been sticking outside my window in Minnesota throughout the humid summers and frigid winters. It still works.
I don't know the range, but it works fine for me. (I "share" the network with my neighbor's house in a suburb).
I recently bought windows 7. This is how you install:
-Bring your computer to a location where you can get internet.
-Plug in your dish.
-Under the start menu, select "devices and printers."
-Right click the icon representing the dish (it may be "unknown device" or something).
-Select troubleshoot.
-You will then click through a series of dialog boxes. You want to make sure that Windows 7 tries to find the driver for you, which it will. (Also be sure your settings allow Windows to install drivers - mine didn't at first).
Your install CD is now useless. You can access the dish through Windows 7's software. If this doesn't work, try each USB port. For some reason only one works with the dish on my pc.
Sam
Customer Review: Works well for me
Summary: 4 Stars
This device works well for me. Installing the software is not as intuitive as it could be, but I had no real problems with this device & software on XP. Being USB capable and self-powered is a plus.
The software application itself looks "old", like something from Win3.1/95/98, but it DOES work well and is quite useful.
Moving/tilting the dish does feel fragile, so as previous posters have indicated, use care when moving the dish itself (the base seems okay).
The LEDs are a nice touch, though sometimes it's a little hard to differentiate if the signal is a 2- or 3-LED level due to light spill-over.
The instructions indicate that the user may have to disable the present/built-in WiFi connector on your computer to use this one. Although I had no problems with using both the built-in and Hawking devices together, the Hawking did seem to work better when disabling the built-in WiFi on the computer. Plus, it was much easier keeping track of just one WiFi application (instead of two).
For the price, this item is well worth the purchase. Treat it gently, and it will serve you well. :-)