# Dedicated network card? Is there any benefit?



## MyTechAddiction (Dec 18, 2015)

Hello,
My computers motherboard comes with a built in Qualcomm Atheros AR8151 PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet Controller .Would there be any point in installing a dedicated network card? I mostly browse , watch videos and play JC2 MP.


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## R-T-B (Dec 18, 2015)

Not really, honestly.


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## puma99dk| (Dec 18, 2015)

Your onboard ethernet is great, only like Intel onboard is better, so no need a dedicated one, other then if u have weird problems with it that new net cable or driver cannot fix.


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## alucasa (Dec 18, 2015)

Many moons ago, it used to matter. Nowadays, nope. Unless you require two ports and need some advanced features of server class, onboard is perfectly fine.


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## Jetster (Dec 19, 2015)

Only if you have issues with the onboard. Ive had a few that on reboot would not connect but honestly I think it was the router

Remember when the Killer Nic was like $300


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## remixedcat (Dec 19, 2015)

That's like the beats of NICs. Ha ha!^

Also Intel NICs FTW but I would only shell out bookubucks if you need em for HA-VMs or enterprise stuff. They can be very expoonsive.

BTW if you do need more NICs you could use server 2012 and team em like I do , buuuut that might be a bit much for yah to deal with if you don't got it allready


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## MyTechAddiction (Dec 19, 2015)

Thanks for all your answers,i have no problems with it and i don't do enterprise stuff with it. I`ll stay with the onboard card


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## hat (Dec 21, 2015)

I remember the Killer NIC. Back when it came out, even with onboard offerings then, the general consensus was that the only good thing about it was that it provided a front-end for some traffic shaping rules, on the computer it was installed in, which would be better handled by your router anyway. Good for people who hook up directly to the modem and don't know how to throttle torrents to save bandwidth for other things... which is probably nobody.


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## Kursah (Dec 21, 2015)

hat said:


> Good for people who hook up directly to the modem and don't know how to throttle torrents to save bandwidth for other things...



Horrible idea... home grade router firewalls are bad enough, but Windows firewall acting as a WAN firewall between you and the Internet is downright insane beyond very temporary testing and diagnostics purposes. Even if you know what you're doing with your PC and hook it up this way, home-grade operating systems are easy enough to break into that it wouldn't be worth the effort. 

Localized traffic shaping has its place, and is kind of a nice feature to manage at your PC if you're a power user, I'd still do so behind a router/firewall. While the router might do QoS/traffic shaping for the LAN, the Killer NIC software doing it locally could provide a power user with some nice features that lose their shine after a few days...but could be of little use for many. Especially if they have a crappy router or haven't firmware modded it yet, even then...meh. 

@OP, ya sticking with what you have is the best option...no need to move on unless it has issues, causes issues or failed.


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## remixedcat (Dec 22, 2015)

best to get an actual stateful firewall like a meraki or cisco asa or ubiquiti or roll your own pfsense/untangle/ipcop box.


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## brandonwh64 (Dec 22, 2015)

I only use add on cards if I am building a router, my on board is dead, or I want two interfaces into different networks.


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