Mini PCI Express wirless cards?

[Squintz]

I am using a Gigabyte GN-WI06N-RH and it has 3 spots for an antenna connection. I am only using one antenna at the moment. Can anyone here tell me how the 3 antenna connections differ from each other? I've read about other cards and they say one is a main antenna and another is an aux. I have not found any details about this specific card and how to connect it with only one antenna.

 

[wlj]

I am using a Gigabyte GN-WI06N-RH and it has 3 spots for an antenna connection. I am only using one antenna at the moment. Can anyone here tell me how the 3 antenna connections differ from each other? I've read about other cards and they say one is a main antenna and another is an aux. I have not found any details about this specific card and how to connect it with only one antenna.

802.11b/g/n products require one antenna to _minimally_ operate. 802.11b/g can switch between primary and auxiliary antennas and use whichever provides a stronger signal; some 802.11b/g access points will use one antenna to transmit, one to receive. 802.11n introduces the MIMO (multi-in, multi-out) concept that can use up to four parallel transmit/receive streams to gain increased performance. Each stream requires an antenna and related transmit/receive hardware. Modern 802.11n consumer gear often supports up to three parallel streams and, therefore, uses three antennas.

As you've discovered, you can successfully use your Gigabyte GN-WI06N-RH 802.11n card with only one antenna. Doing so, however, will cause it to operate at less than maximum performance on 802.11n networks, and may also cause it to operate sub-optimally on 802.11b/g networks.

Hope this helps,
-Bill