Chapter 9. Wi-Fi on Your Desktop

In this chapter

• Adding an AirPort card to an AirPort-ready Apple desktop

• Adding a Wi-Fi PCI card to a Windows desktop

• Using a USB Wi-Fi adapter with both Apple and Windows computers

In Chapter 8, "Adding Wi-Fi to a Mobile Computer," I showed you how to add a Wi-Fi card to your laptop computer. This chapter shows you how to add Wi-Fi to a desktop computer.

There are a number of reasons you might want to add Wi-Fi to a desktop computer. For example, you might have a Wi-Fi?enabled laptop and want to network it to a desktop computer to share files (and Internet access). (For the details of setting up a small office or home network with Wi-Fi, see Part IV, "Creating a Wi-Fi Network.")

I'll start this chapter by suggesting that if you are buying a new desktop computer, you should buy one with Wi-Fi already on board. Next, I'll show you how to add Wi-Fi, which Apple calls AirPort, to an Apple AirPort-ready desktop.

Moving back to the wonderful world of Windows, I'll show you how to add a generic Wi-Fi card to a generic Windows desktop computer.

Finally, the chapter will end with a nifty alternative for adding Wi-Fi to a desktop computer (actually any computer with a USB port). This option is, as you'll see, to use an inexpensive external USB Wi-Fi device.