Alan DuBoff wrote:
On Thursday 13 October 2005 10:25 pm, Paul Gress wrote:
I searched ebay
and came across a company that has generic "mini-pci" cards with the
Atheros 5212 chip. I purchased the card, removed the old Broadcom card,
loaded the SUNWatheros package and it just worked.
I've heard that some laptops won't work, and I've seen this internal at Sun
also. Many laptops will allow that, but some have a proprietary mini-pci
slot, such as the IBM Thinkpads I'm told. I believe that someone has replaced
one of the Broadcom mini-pci cards in the Acer Ferrari 3400 with success.
The link for this company
store on ebay is http://stores.ebay.com/Prime-Electronic-Components .
Thanks for posting that link, maybe that will help someone else out. Just be
warned that some laptops have problems accepting a different mini-PCI.
I have more to add. I sent an e-mail to the seller of the atheros cards
and what he has to say is promising. Please note, I have not tested
what is listed below, but I have no reason not to believe him. Again,
use your own discretion.
"We don't have a list of laptops that it works with, but I can tell you
this. Out of
over 2000 we have sold I have only had to take back 5 of them because
they wouldn't work and then it is usually an IBM that causes the
problems. You are correct that some manufacturers do not use a
completely standard mini-pci slot. The way I understand it is that
certain pins are designated for vendor use. We have run into the
problem where a card doesn't completely work. What will happen the OS
will recognize the card and install the drivers, but you will not be
able to pickup any wireless networks or the card will come up that the
radio is off. This happens when it is installed into a machine that has
a proprietary mini-pci slot. These machines are usually ones that have
a hardware switch to turn the radio on and off. The manufacturers do
not all wire this option the same way. All you need to do to work
around it is to cover 2 pins on the card and it corrects the problem by
disabling the hardware switch. I have instructions on how to do this
for anyone that runs into the problem. We offer a pretty liberal return
policy. Any buyers who can not get it to work are more than welcome to
return it for a refund if they feel it is incompatible."
Instructions below:
"Cover pins 11 and 13 on your m-pci wireless card (even pins are on the
bottom side, the odd are on the top. For orientation, the top of the
card is where you plug the two antenna in.
While facing the top of the card count to pin 11 and 13. (from the cut
in the card over, don't forget to count the lone pin as well 1,2) cover
both pins 11 and 13 with tape (or finger nail polish) Place card back,
start laptop, and you should be able to configure it from there."
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