Really need some help from a wireless pro about Draft-N, Ohm and antennas

Hey guys, I have a Dell e1505 that came stock with a piece-of-crap Intel 3945ABG WLAN card. The card constantly fails (requires a restart) under Windows Vista, and I've got a new(ish) Netgear Draft-N router, so I want to upgrade to one of the newer WLAN cards, like the Intel 5300 or something.

I just had a few questions that I can't seem to find consistent answers on:

1) Out of all the current ~$50 Draft-N WLAN cards, is the consensus still that the Intel 5300 about the best value for the money?

2) Regardless of which card I get, will I also need to buy a third LCD antenna since the Draft-N cards have 3 antenna connectors? If so, are all of the antennas they sell on eBay and whatnot the same? (What I mean is that the two antennas in my Dell LCD panel are color-coded...one black, one white. I've seen that in most of the 3-antenna setups, the third one is usually grey-colored. Is this a different kind of antenna, like a neutral one or something?

3) Assuming I need to get this third antenna, will I be able install it in the LCD panel without worrying about Ohm impedance? I've heard that spatial layout of the antennas in the LCD panel is important...Would I just fasten the third antenna in the middle, so all three are evenly spaced apart?

4) My Draft-N router is 2.4 GHz, not 5 GHz... Now THIS is another reason why I thought I needed that third antenna...I've read customer reviews about their WLAN cards not being able to achieve Draft-N speeds; something to do with the radio frequencies...I dunno. But in order to achieve Draft-N speeds with my 2.4 GHz router, do I have to be careful to only buy a certain model WLAN card, or is it dependent on installing the third antenna that I mentioned above?

...I know this is a really long post, but I've been asking these questions over the last couple months, one or two at a time, at various forums and sites. And I still don't get really consistent answers. If anyone could please help me out I'd really appreciate it. I'm just soooo tired of my WLAN card disconnecting whenever too many connections are established, or whatever is making it fail (from what I've read about the 3945ABG, that's part of the problem under Vista with the current drivers).

Thanks in advance.

Josh

 

That depends. Users with non-intel chipset based notebooks might not regard 5300 best of anything at all, as it won't work for their systems.

And also there's a possibility that 5300 also won't work with your Inspiron 6400/E5105 as reported by other member in this forum that 5300 has problem with notebooks using older generation of intel 945 chipset. But my Mini 9 with newer intel GS945 chipset can accept 5300 w/o any problem.

As far as I can remember from MIMO concept, all of the 3 antennas are the same.

You don't have to be that precise in putting the 3rd antenna. Just install it in a place where it can easily receive and transmit radio wave. Cause multiple radio streams will be affected by many things, mainly reflections along the way. So, it's not like they are evenly spaced three signals travelling in the air from source to destination.

Getting connection of (draft) N speed, or anything above 54MBps of 802.11a and g can actually be achieved with only 2 antennas. I used to use Broadcom based wireless (draft) N card and also Intel 5100 card which only use 2 antennas and I could get up to 270Mbps of (draft) N speed with these cards.

In case of 5300, it will be in its full potential when used with 3x3 spatial streams capable wireless router/access point to get up to 450Mbps of speed. So, it's best to have it equipped with 3 antennas, although with current 300Mbps wireless router/access point, some say using it with only 2 antennas is still okay.