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I have been lurker for a short time here and have found these forums quite useful. So, I thought I would throw something back to help anyone else out there who wants to add WiFi to a T21. I dont know if this would work for a 20, 23 or not but it may. Of course the std disclaimer applies - you mess up your machine using my tips, its your prob
I wanted to add WiFi to my T21 and after playing around with various PCMCIA options, I wanted something internal. I took a gamble and threw in the MiniPCI WiFi card from my Dell; 8500 and it worked. It is the Dell TrueMobile 14xx series Broadcom MiniPCI WiFi wireless card. Just downloaded the Dell drivers and used the "update driver" feature in Device Mgr to add them (the Dell installer wont work as it recognizes that its not a Dell machine)
After verifying the drivers installed, I then had to deal with the antenna. I took some fine coated tin wire (used for wiring in fine electronics projects) and wired it up between the keyboard and main unit. I dont have pics right now, but is pretty much the same as how others have wired similar TP's. At the ends of the wires I connected some conductive plates approx 1" sqauare to serve as antenna. I also found that since there is exposed metal (the CDRom compartment), I had to tape the antenna units so that they did not make contact with anything conductive (when they did, the signal was lower). Once complete, I get a good to excellent quality signal nearly throughout the house as I would with my PCMICA WiFi card.
The next step is to install with some proper antenna sourced from Ebay... Hopefully, this will extend the range even further...
Dave