Interest in wireless networking seems to be gathering pace, hanging on the coat-tails of Bluetooth's (deserved or undeserved) hype. Xircom's CreditCard Wireless Ethernet Adapter supports 11Mbps wireless connectivity, conforming to the IEEE 802.11b standard. This means that it can communicate with other 802.11b adapters and LAN access points, either as part of an existing network or as a totally new wireless LAN.

The card fits into a Type II PC Card (PCMCIA) slot, with just the plastic antenna section visible. This latter part incorporates the usual activity and link LEDs, as well as giving the unit its range - over 100m in a straight line of sight, but typically around 30m in an office building (due to walls, floors and other obstacles).

It's possible to build a peer-to-peer network using this card, making it ideal for the small business and for home networking. But if you want to connect to an ordinary cabled LAN, or support roaming inside bigger buildings, one or more 'access points' are required. Xircom doesn't sell these, but several other companies do, although they're not cheap.

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The card has built-in WEP (Wired Equivalent Privacy) encryption, with a choice of 40-bit and 128-bit keys available to protect wireless communications from eavesdroppers and bandwidth-stealers. Software to manage the encryption keys can be loaded from the CD supplied with the adapter, together with other utilities to manage the wireless channel settings and the power-saving options when running from batteries.

Drivers are provided for Windows 95/98/NT, and the card is Plug-and-Play compatible, making for very easy and straightforward installation - in our tests we were up and running in minutes.

The Xircom wireless LAN adapter proved very reliable and robust, and is another string to the wireless Ethernet market's bow. It's likely to appeal more to larger corporate organisations initially, but the peer-to-peer option could also be a winner for the SME buyer.