Is the Dell Wireless 1703 wifi card any good?

I'm looking to buy a new laptop. Lately, there has been a large amount of issues regarding wifi cards, specifically connectivity problems, so I'm concerned. My current laptop, a Dell Inspiron Mini 10v, uses a Dell Wireless 1397 card and it works fine.

The laptop I have in mind, which is the new Dell Inspiron 14z ultrabook, uses a Dell Wireless 1703 card. The laptops that have received the most complaints about wifi card issues are XPS 14 and XPS 15 laptops, which use Intel® Centrino® Advanced-N 6235 cards.

My question is, are there any issues with the Dell Wireless 1703 wifi card? If you have an Inspiron 14z or a laptop that uses a Dell Wireless 1703 wifi card, can you describe your experiences with it? Any connection problems? Sudden drops in speed? Sudden disconnect from the internet?

Thanks in advance.

 

Hi EdwarChenCanada,

The Dell Wireless 1703 Wi-Fi card doesn’t have any issues as mentioned. There are settings in the device driver properties like, Enabling / Disabling N-mode, Roaming aggression and Power management (not allowing the device to sleep to save power) will enhance the functionality of this card. Also under the Power options the wireless card should be set to Maximum Performance on both battery and AC adapter. All this settings will ensure best performance with this Wireless card.

In case Dell does come across multiple complaints from consumers with regards to any component, we always do come up with the best possible solution proactively. Example: Driver Update, BIOS Update, etc…

I hope you find this information useful.

Thanks & Regards
Swapnajan MC
#iworkfordell

 

Hi EdwardChenCanada,
Well I was using vostro 3560 which uses DW1704 ahd major signal/speed drops on N mode.Dell tech support said the following pirated OS,the change the wifi router try in different one,WLAN antinna cable lose and when asked waht about the other customer commenting on the dell community site said they mite have just commented.the only the DW 1704 wifi issue sould be solved by downloading drivers from lenevo website for the same which is broadcom WLAN ,its shame on dell for not understanding customer problem when so amny complain the same.and quote with their dell international anthem"NOT KNOW ISSUE".Same with the cpu fan spins fast with any apps runing.
You may check for sony vaio,asus,toshiba you will not find any such issue,but u will not find any such issues when it come to Quality.I Sincerely Would not recommend dell because of such problem and not providing solution.
The price in dell may be cheap but at same time one needs to think if you will get the best of all.the other brands price are higher but best in all works great.

 

you should look into the Killer wireless N 1202 that dell is putting in the alienware laptops now. I hear good things!

 

gixer2000 ,

If you see the numerous complain its because of driver issue dell does not even provide update for SMB laptops customer.
And I dont think customer hence forth are going to go for dell as its common issue with cpu fan spinning high and also the major probs with wifi.

With regards to your wifi killer I dont think that would be implemented in other laptops other then allienware.

 

The XPS 15 L521x also has a wifi issue and people have seen a good improvement by using it instead of the Dell 1901 or the Intel card. Just wanted to put an option out there for you that's all. Good luck!

 

Hi EdwardChenCanada,

The card operates at 72 mpbs max but even if you change the bandwidth of from the properties of this card to 20/40 MHz you would get the same speed also setting the router to 40mhz.. no change...could be a bug in dell driver. other then this no issue.