For some reason or another I always hear… “Nope, I have two USB ports though”, “I have a firewire but only one USB!”, “No, I don’t think I have wireless on my laptop” or the infamous “I can’t see where it plugs into”. Connectivity isn’t the most straight forward thing in the world. The real issue lies with the manufacturers as they are forever developing new technologies and integrating these in the new computers you see lining the shelves in PC World! This creates a problem for those of us who still wish to use old or existing devices.
More specifically this article is tailored to laptops and the reason is simple, most laptops still have either an ExpressCard or PCMCIA slot! This allows us to add a host of different ports to your laptop that would normally be very costly. For example, you can add up to 4 (Sometimes even 6) extra USB ports without having to purchase a separate external hub. You can easily add Firewire, Multi-card readers, WIFI cards, eSATA and even old serial ports!
The first thing is to determine what you have… Is it an ExpressCard Slot or a PCMCIA Slot?
You can find this in your laptop manual, simply ask a friend or call us, we’ll be glad to help: 01604 684816. You’ll find Express Cards are the most common of slots available today. There are however, different sizes you’ll need to make note of when ordering. Please see below:
The most common size is the 34 & 54mm slots. ExpressCard slot are hot-pluggable, meaning they can be activated by connecting them while the computer is on. The ExpressCard/54 is L-shaped with the external portion measuring 54 mm wide and the connector at 34 mm (same port as the ExpressCard/34). ExpressCards communicate with a higher bandwidth than a PCMCIA card because they function through both the PCI Express and USB 2.0 paths. Many laptop manufacturers incorporate an ExpressCard/54 slot into certain models, including Acer Aspire, Panasonic’s Toughbooks, and late-model Gateway notebooks.
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