ASUS has introduced one of the industry’s first Wi-Fi 6 cards for desktops. The ASUS PCE-AX3000 dual band PCIe 3.0 x1 adapter promises to provide up to 2.4 Gbps data transfer rates over 160 MHz channels when used with an appropriate router.

The ASUS PCE-AX3000 card is essentially an adapter carrying an M.2-2230 Wi-Fi 6 card for laptops. The actual radio that powers the card is unknown, however it supports all key features of the Wi-Fi 6 specification, including 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz bands, 80 MHz and 160 MHz channels, MU-MIMO, OFDMA (Orthogonal Frequency-Division Multiple Access) for allowing different devices to be served by one channel, and WPA3. Besides Wi-Fi 6, the card also supports Bluetooth 5.0 technology allowing desktops to connect to various mobile and peripheral devices.

The PCE-AX3000 Dual Band PCI-E Wi-Fi 6 has two large antennas to ensure strong signal and fast connectivity in various situations. The adapter should be compatible with all existing desktops that use Windows 10 (64-bit) or Linux.

UPDATE 11/20: The card appears to be based on Intel's AX200 Wi-Fi 6 solution CNVi solution and therefore requires an appropriate Intel platform.

Numerous modern laptops feature Wi-Fi 6, providing higher performance in crowded networks, but not everything is that rosy with desktops as Wi-Fi 6 adapters for desktops are practically nonexistent. Luckily, with products like the ASUS PCE-AX3000, 2.4 Gbps connectivity will now be available for desktop computers too.

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Source: ASUS (via Hermitage Akihabara)

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  • DigitalFreak - Wednesday, November 20, 2019 - link

    What is that connector on the back of the card? Hopefully it doesn't require a separate power connector.
  • weilin - Wednesday, November 20, 2019 - link

    It's likely used to connect the USB pins on the M.2 slot. M.2 offers USB + PCIe, a PCIe adapter board like one (and it's not alone) only supplies... well PCIe. The USB pins are used by the integrated BlueTooth controller built into the AX200.

    Yes they could have integrated a PCIe to USB bridge... but this is (much) cheaper... This isn't unusual for products like this. Even Intel's 7260 Desktop Kit had this USB cable.
  • regsEx - Friday, November 22, 2019 - link

    Sounds like Asus made a breakthrough. But Intel AX200 has been available out there for months and there are tones of Key.E WiFi M.2 to PCIe adapters, like this fenvi flagship with m.2 slot and powerful heatsink for $30
    https://www.aliexpress.com/item/33034513938.html

    Or this simpler one, for $25
    https://www.aliexpress.com/item/33014502853.html

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