Also make sure that the Wi-Fi adapter (either external or built-in) is always up-to-date. Dropouts, standby issues, low performance may be gone in the next 0.1 release of your adapter's drivers. Although the frequent driver delivery via Windows Update has gotten better in recent years, it rarely fetches you the latest and the greatest drivers. Instead, do this...

The first place to hit for updates is the manufacturer's support pages. But if their driver area is not well maintained, you can go the chipset maker's website. It's not uncommon that the chipset of each Wi-Fi adapter was just bought and rebranded. For example, my external Linksys WUSB 600N adapter houses the popular RT2870 chipset manufactured by Taiwanese manufacturer Ralink. It's a perfect example for why going straight to the chipset maker is always a smart move.

Just head over to their Support/Download pages, enter your e-mail address and get the drivers.

To figure out which chipset you've got, it's a good idea to check the specification sheet of your Wi-Fi adapter. The Debian Wiki sports a .