Killer 1535 vs Intel 8260

Older killer wifi cards were a great idea but ended up causing driver issues for a lot of people, which caused people to jump back onto the intel boat. The new 1535 has gotten great reviews and seems to have resolved those issues, and I can only find positive reviews about it.

In the new laptop I'm customizing, the Killer 1535 and the Intel 8260 are both offered as an option. The Intel 8260 is $20 more expensive, which should have made my decision easy since I've seen reviews where the Killer is said to perform better. However, the Killer 1535 has Bluetooth 4.1, where the Intel 8260 has Bluetooth 4.2. I looked up the new features of 4.2 vs 4.1 and they do look substantial, transfer rate between devices increased by about 10x, better security IPv6, etc.

I would say I use bluetooth about once a month, minimal use, but I guess if the Killer and Intel wifi are just the same, I would be willing to pay another $20 for the upgraded bluetooth. If the Killer wifi itself truly is better, that would obviously be a higher priority for me than the bluetooth.

Looking for other people's opinions.

 

Latest Bluetooth support is not what would be a distinguishing factor for me (nothing I need depends on BT).

But Wireless LAN support is another story. Intel all the way.

Not because I support Intel blindly; but because I know in some distant future, I will still be able to use the card to connect as I need (as long as I don't buy a platform that white/black lists components).

Proprietary cards (even if mostly software) like Killer do not interest me because their use would be mostly limited to the model it was bought with which to me is a red flag that longevity is not the manufacturer's greatest concern (let alone their performance being actually superior in any real world setup and usage scenario).

 

Both the Intel and Killer are 2 stream cards that limit the theoretical link speed to 866.7Mbps.

Wireless home networking can have many many variables so there's nothing to be taken for granted.

Anything that can go wrong will go wrong.

If you transfer a lot data between connected devices across a home network(NAS,USB attached storage) on the 5ghz band using a dual band 2 stream AC card that's rated at 866.7Mbps paired with a quality 1750 AC router or higher then the Killer N1525/N1525 would be my recommendation based on 1st hand experience.It can transfer the files much faster in my tests.

Downloading from the internet can have it's own set of variables but mainly depending on your settings,Internet service,time of day,traffic,distance from the router,walls and floors and the site you're connecting to.I've found no difference downloading from the Internet using Intel and Killer.

Both companies have released very good driver versions and some less than stellar ones.

WiDi is something that Intel has so if you mirror to a Smart TV Intel wireless cards may have an edge

So Killer or Intel boils down to a personal preference most likely based on your previous experience with that company's products.

I have a Killer N1525 in 1 notebook and Intel AC-7265 in a 2nd notebook plus an Intel AC-7260 in a desktop. desktop.

I have a drawer full of old N cards from both companies plus a few others

 

Ended up going with the Intel 8260 because my router doesn't support mu-mimo and I don't plan on upgrading it anytime soon

 

I have the 1535 on a clevo p770dm. No driver issues, and it works great. However I never tried the intel one though.

 

Every Intel card I have ever used has been rock solid stable and a great performer. The same cannot be said for Atheros cards. In some cases, they are better than Intel, but only a very select few. The last greatest Atheros cards are the AR9280 (half height) and the AR9380 (full height)

 

I've just received my Intel 8260 card, ordered from an eBay-seller, I'll pop it in tonight after work, and I'll edit this post with my first impressions

Edit: Alright, I successfully installed the card. It was substantially wider than the previous one (Qualcomm Atheros 61x4), and fired the laptop up. I installed the Intel drivers and had a scare... Bluetooth couldn't be installed... On a hunch I followed the old adage: "Have you tried turning it off and on again?" And voilá, Bluetooth finally showed up in Device Manager!

Wireless performance so far is really nice and consistent, file transfers are around 12-15 MBytes /sec on my home LAN (old Linksys E3000 router, only N), Signal strength is excellent.

Overall a nice improvement, and finally I could get rid of the horrible Atheros drivers that caused immense DPC latency

 

Sounds great. That is exactly what I was curious about as I do a lot of file transfers over the network to my NAS etc.... so go with the Killer in that case eh?

Most of the time I'm plugged in directly (Ethernet) so I guess the Killer is more than sufficient for the minimal times I am on WiFi when out of the office.

Is the Intel 8260 worth the $25 upgrade though?

It'd be nice to see a side by side comparison of the two with the pros and cons...