The funny thing is that there really is a significant benefit to a good NIC over the schlock that most motherboards ship with.
The sad thing is that this card is extreme overkill for almost all uses. A decent 3com or Intel card that you can buy used for $5 will do almost all the actually useful things this card will do. -- It's wierdo, not weirdo. Yes, I know that's not the 'proper' spelling of the similar english language word.