Monthly Archives: May 2011

The new Kogan Agora laptop and tablet

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The new Kogan Agora tablet and laptop

The new Kogan Agora tablet and laptop

After a hiatus from selling the Kogan Agora netbooks, Kogan has released a new range of laptops and tablets.

No longer a netbook (anything over 10″ is a laptop in my opinion), the new Agora laptop features a 11.6″ LED display, an Intel Celeron processor and a 4 cell battery.

The laptop comes in two models – the Agora and Agora Pro. The difference? The former has 1GB of RAM and a 250GB hard disk, and the latter doubles those specs – 2GB of RAM and a 500GB hard disk.

The new product in the Agora range is the Agora 7″ tablet. The 1GHz processor, 512MB memory and Android 2.3 (aka gingerbread) really makes me wish it had a 10″ display! The specs are good enough to warrant purchasing one except for that 7″ display.

A 7″ tablet is really just a big phone, and I already have a phone running Android! So come on Kogan – compete in the tablet market and release a 10″ tablet running Android 3.0 (aka honeycomb).

If any readers have a product from the new Agora range and wants to post some reviews, please leave a comment below and I’ll be in touch :)

Improving wifi on the Kogan Agora netbook with an Intel 3945ABG network card

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Intel® PRO/Wireless 3945ABG

Intel® PRO/Wireless 3945ABG

Update: Please note this article is only applicable to 1st generation (10″) Kogan Agora netbook. If you have a 2nd generation (12″) Kogan Agora laptop you will need to purchase a “half” sized mini PCI-E card.

After several months of fighting my Kogan Agora netbook to connect to wifi networks, which included the netbook only connecting to my access point if I saved the AP’s configuration, I have finally found a fix to better the wifi performance.

Back cover removed, showing the network card (bottom left)

My frustration reached its peak when the netbook refused to connect to my new Netcomm NB9WMAXXN wireless router, so after a quick transaction on ebay I purchased an Intel® PRO/Wireless 3945ABG Mini PCI-E card to replace the Ralink wireless card that replaced the VIA card.

It came at a cost of $7.95 including postage, so it was a small gamble to take in the hope it would rid me of my connection woes.

Close up of the original VIA network card

And after a quick change over, I was quite happy to see the latest version of Ubuntu (11.04, which had up until now refused to connect to my wireless network) connect instantly when I logged in!

Hopefully this will see some better mileage obtained from my Kogan Agora netbook – at least until I can replace it with a 10″ tablet.