10Gtek® 2.5Gb PCIe Network Card, 2500/1000/100Mbps NIC PCIE Ethernet Network Adapter Card, Single RJ-45 Port, with Realtek RTL8125, Wake on LAN, Supports Windows/Linux/MAC OS/Ubuntu

Was looking for a 2.5gbe NIC that would work fine with Windows Server 2019 due to the 2 NICs built onto the motherboard not being compatible with Windows Server family (thanks Intel for purposely doing this so users are pushed towards proper server platforms instead of using a consumer one). The Realtek chipset used on this NIC installed without any hassle once got the drivers from Realtek’s global website. granted you will lose available PCIe lanes so may not be for someone that wants to keep 16 lanes for their GPU & multiple NVMe drives on a gaming rig, but general usage overheads are low and no worse than an onboard NIC (a lot of the cheaper NICs rely on software & the CPU to control traffic etc but this seems like a true hardware controlled NIC). Doesn’t seem to slow down under load either which a lot of cheaper cards can do as the controller gets hot, but this shouldn’t be a problem if got sufficient cooling in the case. Very happy with the performance of this NIC and will be buying more of them when required to either upgrade from Gigabit to 2.5gbe connectivity or replace a failed onboard NIC.

Easy to install, works really well and good value for money, what's not to like! Used in UnRaid server with 'RTL8125 Drivers' plugin and works flawlessly at 2.5gb/s

overall happy with the card but it doesnt work with esxi 8+ because the drivers aren't available in esxi anymore. good build quality and i get the advertised throughput.

Ordered this as I recently upgraded to 5GB FTTH, while i am slowly moving to 10gb networking in my home 2.5 is perfect for what i need at the moment. The card came well packed, in an antistatic bag and seems well built, also comes with two adapters depending on your style of case. it was compatible with my pc and the drivers downloaded instantly no messy setup , as you can see from the speed tests it functions as should , note i was uploading and downloading a lot of files during it Overall i would recommend it

Have been using this for months now and perfect….. if you want to upgrade your current 1GB but don’t want the expense of 10GB then this is the perfect choice….

Given my PC a 20x speed boost on backups to NAS

Works great plug and play.

the motherboard lan is so awkward to insert and remove the ethernet cable. Using the nic I now have easy access to the 2 ports, tested 1 port via 3 meter ethernet cable6e between 2 pcs speed was tested using ipef3 60 pings 3 were 2.38 Gbits and the rest were 2.37 Gbits, so not bad. Close to my expectation of 2.4Gbits. The other port will be used after an openreach visit. Under £40 worth it. PCIe slot easy to fit. Recieved today. An update if unit fails.