TP-Link Gigabit PCI Express Network Adapter, 32-bit PCIe
TP-Link Gigabit PCI Express Network Adapter, 32-bit PCIe interface, Supports operating systems Windows 11/10/8.1/8/7/Vista/XP, Low-Profile Bracket(TG-3468)
From the brand
AV1000 Gigabit Powerline Kit
- HomePlug AV2 Standard – high-speed data transfer rates of up to 1000 Mbps
- Gigabit port
- Up to 300 Meters
| Weight: | 99.8 g |
| Dimensions: | 16 x 2.79 x 13.49 cm; 99.79 Grams |
| Brand: | TP-Link |
| Model: | TG-3468 |
| Colour: | Black |
| Batteries Included: | No |
| Manufacture: | TP-Link |
| Dimensions: | 16 x 2.79 x 13.49 cm; 99.79 Grams |
The card is decently low-profile for an easy fit, and the drivers were picked up right away by Windows 10 (and still function fine having now updated to Windows 11). I get solid connection to my nearby router, and a good speed (the router itself is not WF6, so I’m not getting the peak of what this card can do, but it’s about as fast as the router can handle). Bluetooth stays connected and stable with no drops. Very happy.
Be aware, however: you have to have a free internal usb header to connect a small cable from the card to your motherboard if you want to utilise the Bluetooth functionality. I knew and had checked this in advance, but I can see it catching some people out as it’s not made as clear as it might have been on the listing.
Easy to install, mostly works brilliantly, it does momentarily have a break in the Bluetooth audio, a very short drop, about one an hour or so. Other than that it’s perfect.
I bought this to replace my previous network adapter which was constantly disconnecting every 10 minutes.
Installed easily replacing the old adapter. Only complaint is that I can’t screw it into the case as it doesn’t line up exactly with the screw hole, if I were to screw it into the case then it would pop slightly out of the slot.
Aside from that, this works brilliantly. I haven’t opted to connect the bluetooth as I don’t have the confidence to do that myself, I personally don’t need it.
Still worth it in my opinion though based on the high download speeds.
Bought to upgrade an older WiFi card and the performance is night and day improvment. Will be upgrading my aging router shortly too Zane the inclusion of 6ghz on this NIC means I can grab a 6ghz router to compliment it and future proof my home.
My only issue, as with another review is it didn’t seat well in the slot when screwed into the case. Definitely not my motherboard or case as the old one was fine and all my other cards likewise, but it does work so I have left it screwed in but not fully seated.
Installation:
I built my own PC so found installing the card into my rig pretty straight foward. Installed into a spare PCIE x1 slot and USB to a USB header. Simple.
Powering on – I had numerous issues, including no network devices found to Blue screens, to my computer boot looping to the point where I had remove the card and reinstall windows.
After the PC was back up and running, I found on the TP-Link FAQs website for this card that if your MB already an intel Wifi chipset – it is likely to conflict with the new card, causing issues. They recommend disabling the intel wifi (Intel Wifi AX200 or similar) in device manager and reinstalling.
I did just that – and straight away, with a cable plugged into the network via powerline – drivers downloaded and the card started to work.
My new 6E network was not showing- but going to TP Link and downloading the new drivers fixed that.
Overall the product teamed with a 6E router is fantastic and faster than my powerline set up by some distance. 4 stars as it would have been nice for a note in the quickstart guide to warn of the potential Wifi conflict.
When paired with Netgear Orbi wifi 6 mesh network I get nearly 900mbps Internet speed tests and a very stable connection overall. Latency is comparable to an ethernet connection.
The Bluetooth is strong and, with 3rd party software, supports LDAC codec for high bit rate streaming of HQ audio to my headphones (Sony XM5s + Tidal) .
I did experience one glitch and that is my everytime I turn the PC my pixel bud headphones disconnect from my phone. Perhaps the Bluetooth signal is so strong it causes interference? Once I reconnect it’s fine though and I don’t experience that issue with my other headphones.
I just installed this in a Dell Optiplex 5040 SFF and it works really well. Download speed = 870Mbps and Upload speed = 50Mbps, which is not much under the speed for a CAT6 connection on the same PC.
Easy to install but be warned, it needs an internal USB pin header connection for the Bluetooth. If your mainboard doesn’t have one (most do) you have a problem! It comes with a spare low profile backplate, which made it ideal for the small form factor Dell.
I ran the autoinstall.exe program from the supplied CD and drivers installed seamlessly. One re-start and all was good.
I’ve not fully connected the Bluetooth yet as I have a specialised device to connect to it and need time to set it up. So far I have no reason to believe that it won’t work.
All in all I’m very pleased.
Pross:
No driver issues noted – auto installed by windows. No additional drivers needed like other lesser know brands
Decent performance
Cons:
the plastic cover – it should be metal or no cover at all as it does not help to cool down the card
.
So I installed it, powered on, and it wasn’t recognised automatically by Windows. I installed the WiFi drivers first (directly from the website mentioned in the small print of the instructions) because I don’t have a CD-ROM drive, so couldn’t use their included CD. As soon as the WiFi driver was installed I was able to easily connect to my home WiFi. I then repeated the same process for the Bluetooth drivers and then Windows recognised it had Bluetooth capability – so far, so good.
So everything was working perfectly and I was very happy. I had a nosy around in the settings. Then a few hours later, I couldn’t get WiFi to connect. It would just timeout when verifying the connection, every time. I scratched my head for around half hour. I had another nosy in the settings and saw that I had checked “Use random hardware addresses” when logging on to WiFi networks. This is an option in the Windows WiFi settings, and I thought it sounded like a good idea. Turns out that, for some unknown reason, this isn’t compatible with my system or the TalkTalk router we have here. The moment I switched that setting off, my connection issue resolved. The router isn’t configured to limit connections to certain MAC addresses, so a connection from a randomised address *should* work. It’s weird that it doesn’t. So take that as a heads up: if you turn that feature on, and experience connection issues on new connections, turn it back off again! 🙂
Overall I’m really happy with the purchase in terms of reliability (no connection dropouts), ping time, download speeds etc.
Firstly, the installation process is very simple. The card will fit into any sized PCIe slot which allows you to place the card anywhere on your motherboard and be spaced around other components. In addition, the card itself is rather thin an does not take up much room; so, you’ll easily be able to fit it around any graphics card etc. A small USB cable will need to be connected to your motherboard to power that card, so make sure you have a spare header available. To finish the installation, you simply screw in the bracket to the back of your PC case, then screw on the antennas which can be done easily by hand. There is no additional adapter to move around, only the antennas at the back which can be rotated — so very convenient.
As for performance: the card worked perfectly straight out of the box in combination with the MSI B450M MORTAR MAX Motherboard. The drivers installed themselves, and there was no struggle to get things going. My connection speeds have noticeably increased from what I was using prior. Importantly, if you want to make the most out of the Wifi-6 technology then pairing the card with a Wifi-6 router will greatly increase your speeds. However, the card will work great with older routers with no problem.
Overall, I’d say this is a perfect WIFI-card when considering the price, ease of use, looks, and performance.
This card comes as a full height card, though also comes with a half height backplate which you can swap to if you are fitting into a machine with half height slots. The card itself is very small which is perfect since you should have no issues with it blocking up space or airflow if for example you had a graphics card in an adjacent slot (I don’t mean double height card of course!)
I went into BIOS, disabled the onboard network card, then switched off and opened up the case.
As you can see from the photo, the card fits nicely into the small PCIEx1 slot (I’d always wondered what would really ever use those slots and my question is now answered!)
On booting up Windows 10, this was automatically detected as a Realtek Gigabit network card and configured automatically without need of the driver disks. Though I did manually update to the ones on the disk since they seem to be a couple of years newer than the ones detected by Windows 10.
In terms of performance, it seems to run just as well as the existing onboard 1Gbit adapter. I noticed no network drops during my time and I could see it connected and transferring data at the 1Gbit speed.
For 9, this is a great network card and if you’re in the situation of needing one, I can definitely recommend this one.