That Linksys card feels out of place in an over-the-top late 90s build.

As I recall it, the local LAN scene had an almost religious cult around 3com 10mbit ISA cards, that eventually morphed into a similar thing for Intel 100mbit cards.

Drivers and hardware were even more shit back in those days than today. Cards known to have worked in multiple motherboards and across multiple operating systems were held in high regard.