Best USB Wi-Fi adapters for a desktop?

So, me and a buddy were going back and forth on this one
He picked up some "easy line wireless lan usb stick" rated at 54 mbps for his laptop and he’s out here telling me he can just hop onto any router in the neighborhood for free. Honestly? I'm not buying it.
I mean, since basically every laptop these days comes with its own built-in Wi-Fi card, I don't really get why anyone would even bother with a stick like that.

He could probably crawl onto that ancient (a,b,g) USB Wi-Fi adapter at maybe 27Mbps if he actually knew everyone's passwords, which—let’s be real—is basically impossible nowadays with WPA2 in the mix, no matter what he thinks he’s doing 😁

....it's kind of a waste of time messing around with Kali Linux and all those tools when you almost never run into a router or an AP these days that still has WPS enabled or uses WEP protection.

Sam Peterson6 said:So, me and a buddy were going back and forth on this one
He picked up some "easy line wireless lan usb stick" rated at 54 mbps for his laptop and he’s out here telling me he can just hop onto any router in the neighborhood for free. Honestly? I'm not buying it.
I mean, since basically every laptop these days comes with its own built-in Wi-Fi card, I don't really get why anyone would even bother with a stick like that.

True, but sometimes you just don't have a device nearby that actually supports wireless connections.
Or maybe you need dual wireless setups on certain gear for testing purposes or some other niche reason.

wearymason4 said:He could probably crawl onto that ancient (a,b,g) USB Wi-Fi adapter at maybe 27Mbps if he actually knew everyone's passwords, which—let’s be real—is basically impossible nowadays with WPA2 in the mix, no matter what he thinks he’s doing 😁

....it's kind of a waste of time messing around with Kali Linux and all those tools when you almost never run into a router or an AP these days that still has WPS enabled or uses WEP protection.

That’s exactly what I’m telling him—you can't just jump onto routers that have a password set
And honestly, if there isn't a password, you don't even need those little buttons to connect
Am I tripping here?
I mean, I don't even get the point of those WPS buttons. Like, any laptop can just wirelessly hop onto any network as long as you've got the password, right?

Those sticks are mostly meant for desktops, not laptops.

You're spot on. Plus, basically every laptop out there today comes with at least a 300Mbps adapter that actually reaches halfway across the room, mostly because they tuck decent antennas right behind the screen. A little USB stick without an external antenna? It’s got pathetic range.
It would've been way smarter to just grab a faster, beefier WN722N v.2 with an actual antenna—it probably would've even saved him some cash.
ps:
And if I'm reading the situation right and he's planning on messing around with Kali later, he's gonna be stuck spinning his wheels.😁

Let’s not kid ourselves here; Wi-Fi simply isn't secure enough, and adding an external adapter just provides a secondary MAC address for anyone to exploit...

wearymason4 said:You're spot on. Plus, basically every laptop out there today comes with at least a 300Mbps adapter that actually reaches halfway across the room, mostly because they tuck decent antennas right behind the screen. A little USB stick without an external antenna? It’s got pathetic range.
It would've been way smarter to just grab a faster, beefier WN722N v.2 with an actual antenna—it probably would've even saved him some cash.
ps:
And if I'm reading the situation right and he's planning on messing around with Kali later, he's gonna be stuck spinning his wheels.😁

Exactly this.

The guy basically grabbed a NIC that actually supports IP sniffing, spoofing, and network monitoring. Most of those standard cards that come pre-installed on a laptop usually lack those specific capabilities altogether. With this setup, he can definitely capture packets, and if he actually knows what he's doing, he might even be able to slip into a network here or there.

So, you tell me... do you think this guy actually "knows what he's doing" or what? 😁
"...and then claims he can just hop onto any router in the neighborhood for free..."

ps: Last time I checked the signals around my place, everyone was running WPA2 (zero WEP in sight), WPS was disabled on everything, and there wasn't a single open AP to be found.
I didn't say a laptop, either—I specifically mentioned the WN722N, which can handle every single one of those tricks you listed... (besides, the v1.x uses the exact same chipset anyway).