A must for anyone using external storage

Foreword
In case you are thinking of buying this card but are hesitant because you have never heard of Iogear, they are one of these small tech companies that engineers connectivity products and keep their prices low by having their manufacturing done in Taiwan -the best place in the world to produce anything computer related as everybody knows.

This card is cheap and it works just as well as the ones that cost 2 or 3 times more, so go ahead!

Who needs this card?
This PCI card allows you to connect two USB 2.0 devices to your computer. It is a perfect way for owners of older Desktop PCs fitted with USB 1.1 ports to upgrade to the speed of USB 2.0.

USB 2.0 will be much faster for external hard drives and a little faster for CD/RW. I don't think the very small gain for printing and scanning is worth upgrading.

Also, keep in mind that both the computer and the external device have to be USB 2.0 compliant (!). If you need more USB 2.0 ports, Iogear also has a card with 5 ports available.

How fast is USB 2.0?
Time to copy 1.1 GB of data from an ATA 100 7200 RPM internal hard drive to another similar internal hard drive was 1 minute and 32 seconds

Time to copy the same 1.1 GB of data from the same internal hard drive to an external USB 2.0 7200 RPM hard drive using the Iogear USB 2.0 PCI card was 2 minutes and 33 seconds

Time to copy the same 1.1 GB of data from the same internal hard drive to an external 7200 RPM hard drive using the motherboard USB 1.1 interface was... so long I aborted it after 5 minutes... I have better things to do than to wait in front of my computer!

Price
I paid $14 for this card BEFORE a $10 manufacturer rebate. Needless to say that at this price anything that works is an excellent deal, whether the mail in rebate goes through or not.

Installation

Do NOT follow the instructions that come with it !

To install this card under Windows 98 SE:

1/ Go to the IOGEAR website and download the latest driver for the GIC220U (!!!the driver that came with my card did NOT work!!!). The URL is:

http://www.iogear.com/support/download.php?Item_ID=311

2/ Run the executable file contained in the zip file you downloaded

3/ Shutdown your machine and unplug it from the power outlet

4/ Open your computer, locate a free PCI slot, install the card, close the computer, plug it back to the outlet

5/ Reboot. Windows 98 SE will detect the new hardware and install the drivers... enjoy

Conclusion
The only negative about this card is that the driver that came on the CD ROM did not work under Windows 98 SE and it took me 15 minutes and a couple of installs to figure that out. Also some will find a way to whine that it takes a PCI slot and only provides 2 USB ports... If that's your case, get the more expensive 5 port version and stop whining.

Overall, this is an excellent product marketed at a ridiculously low price that will save you a lot of time when using an external USB hard drive.