Which is more effective, strengthening the Wi-Fi environment of old PCs, meshing or USB Wi-Fi 6 adapter?

The problem is that the built-in Wi-Fi of old PCs is up to 11ac

Even if your Wi-Fi router is compatible with Wi-Fi 6, not all devices in your home can comfortably use Wi-Fi.

In order to benefit from Wi-Fi 6, the PC or smartphone must also support Wi-Fi 6, but if it is a device up to a while ago, the built-in Wi-Fi is Wi-Fi. In most cases, it supports up to 5 (IEEE 802.11ac), which limits the speed (with IEEE 802.11ac, even 2 streams to 866 Mbps).

The maximum speed of Wi-Fi 6 is 1201 Mbps (2 streams 80 MHz width) for general smartphones and 2402 Mbps (2 streams 160 MHz width) for notebook PCs, so simply 866 Mbps Wi-Fi 5 is inferior in terms of specifications, In addition, Wi-Fi 5 chips are many generations old, which can lead to poor processing performance and poor radio reception sensitivity.

If Wi-Fi 5 compatible devices are mixed in the Wi-Fi 6 environment, the functions unique to Wi-Fi 6 (such as MU-MIMO uplink) may be restricted, so ideally the devices in the house should be Wi-Fi. It's supposed to support 802.11ax, but there may be times when you have to use an old PC for work.

With the aim of improving this situation, from around the end of 2021, the release of USB-connected Wi-Fi 6 compatible handsets has become conspicuous. Buffalo's "WI-U3-1200AX2", which was also featured in this series, and ASUS's "USB-AX56" have already been released.

[Satoshi Shimizu's "Initial B"] USB connection is the first in Japan, and Buffalo's Wi-Fi 6 adapter "WI-U3-1200AX2" is ideal for securing "Vesposito"!

Wi-Fi adapters for M.2 slots have been released as devices for converting PCs to Wi-Fi 6. However, it is necessary to use such products that have acquired technical suitability in the state of being set with the antenna. If it is a desktop PC built-in type and the antenna is a set PCIe connection, it was difficult to use it on a notebook PC where it is difficult to replace the antenna.

This situation will be improved with the introduction of this USB adapter. If you have a Wi-Fi 5 compatible laptop, it's worth considering taking this opportunity to upgrade your Wi-Fi with a USB adapter.