I have HP Elitedesk G3 800 mini computer, according to manual it should be compatible with Intel® Ethernet Server Adapter I210-T1 - PCle slot, can I get cheap and fast this NIC instead - is it compatible?
Thanks
Should be, even though it's probably a Realtek chip based adapter.
But you can't know for sure, until you've got it in your hands.
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Yes either one will work you just need to swap out the metal bracket for the included low-profile one. The extra bracket is not shown on the TP-Link box but the spec sheet says it is included. The TP-Link is indeed a RTL8111 chip. Avoid the Realtek chips unless you're trying to go really cheap.
I bought a no-name Realtek card for less than $10 just to see if it would work. It does work but there is no offloading at all in the Realtek chips so they demand quite a bit more of your CPU time for a given data rate.
OpenWrt x86 has drivers for both chips (igb and r8169) included by default.
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If you're on ebay, get a used low profile server card, multi port even, should be better in every way.
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You're usually much better off with either Intel or Broadcom based NICs over Realtek simply because they're are of higher quality. You should have no issues finding lets say a BCM5720-based NIC (Low profile) cheap pulled from a server.
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You can find dual 2,5 Gb cards as well. Might be worth taking a look, not too expensive. I wouldn't do 10 Gb and certainly not cards with a fan.
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Even though the fan runs all the time, the risk of overheating when running at 1gbit it pretty much zero, if you'd disconnect it.
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Thanks guys! Appreciale your fast and useful answers!
It was the fastest way to get it and also the cheapest :), maybe will try to get one with 2.5G!
Be very care about this, either you get Realtek (I'd suggest that you avoid that) or most likely Intel (you'd want revision 3 of the controller(s)) in that case.
Do you happen to have a suggestion for a "cheap" (second hand) single-port 10GBASE-T card (ideally fanless (not a priority), full profile or low profile slot bracket doesn't matter, extra points if it can do 2.5GBASE-T and/or 5 GBASE-T as well) card in EU/ DE as well?
Will see if I can find something.
If you don't mind waiting, I can get you one from US.
But it'll probably be the dual port Broadcom, they're usually the cheapest ones around.
No need to take any efforts, I've just been looking for a reasonable way to retrofit a system (or two).
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