looking for 3g/4g provider that supports hardware.

[sona1111]

Hello i came into possession of a nice 14" t60 thinkpad. I am shopping for a 3g/4g mobile broadband plan in central NJ. I saw in the bios and some manuals that their is a "wireless WAN device". When i opened the computer i could not seem to find a dedicated hardware for this use, but maybe thats just me. Would this kind of device be compatible with any modern contracts or am i completely off base here?

thanks.

[RealBlackStuff]

It would be a small MiniPCI-e card (same as the wifi card) on the left side under the keyboard.
Your LCD lid would have a ca. 4" long 'blob' on the righthand side, such as shown here:
http://www.pc.ibm.com/de/lenovo/pressep ... 0_wwan.jpg
If you don't have that blob, your machine does not have WWAN.
Verizon offers such a service for the T60 (and others).

There are external options via Express card, such as this in the Market forum: http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=104888

[sona1111]

thanks for the reply. it seems their are solder pads there but no card slot...why would they not include the slot so at least i could buy one and plug it in...

anyway it looks like the devices in your link are sold in the UK, any idea if they would work with T-mobile plans sold in america?

thanks again.

[bill bolton]

...why would they not include the slot so at least i could buy one and plug it in....

There wasn't anywhere near as much demand for WWAN service when the T61 was designed (5 T-series generations ago) , so unless you specifically ordered WWAN capability it wasn't provisioned at all

...any idea if they would work with T-mobile plans sold in america?

US WWAN carrier 3G offers are generally somewhat unique, in one way or another. AT&T is pretty much the only carrier that offers a straigtforward "globally compatible" 3G WWAN (US 4G is yet another can of worms in terms of global compatibility).

For a T61 without WWAN capability, you'd really be better off buying whatever USB device T-Mobile pedals in the US.

Cheers,

Bill B.

[sona1111]

hello again. I am happy to say that the motherboard installed successfully. (other topic) and that this one does have the second pci-e slot.

now can anyone point me in the direction of what kind of pci-e card and antenna i could buy to install? and, if its not too much to ask, what service i can buy from verizon?

thanks so much.

and why i am at it, could you use something more modern like this :http://www.techship.se/products/novatel-e362/ or would the 4g use another kind of antenna, not the 3g one?

[sona1111]

after some searching i managed to find this:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/IBM-Lenovo-Thin ... 2648615%26

any idea if that is what i am looking for? does this type of antenna work with the 3g/4g or just 3g data? I also have seen people talking about a sim card which is something i have never used before, but i have also found the sim card holder on ebay. Is their any place with a run down of setting this up?

if this is the wrong section i am sorry.

[Peak2Peak]

There are two WWAN antennas for the T60: "Main" (with Red lead) and "Aux" (with Blue lead) - The "Main" sits and protrudes from the right side of the LCD cover assembly (See pic's 1 & 2 for a 14.1" T60 with WWAN antenna) and the "Aux" sits under the top left side of keyboard bezel assembly - AFAIK, these WWAN antennas generally support 3G frequency bands (850/900/1900/2100MHz), therefore may not support the newer 4G bands (eg: 700MHz etc) - Also depending on your network provider a SIM card slot maybe required too.

The official WWAN cards that the T60 supports out-of-the-box is the Lenovo branded Sierra Wireless MC5720 & MC8755/MC8765 which by today's standards are slow - If you intend to use a newer WWAN card the T60's BIOS will need to be updated to get around the BIOS whitelist as well as taping over pin20 of the WWAN card.

Checkout the T60 Hardware Maintenance Manual for assembly/dis-assembly, FRU's/Part No's etc.

If the above is not for you, then a Plug 'n' Play USB or ExpressCard WWAN might be another solution.

[sona1111]

it is "for me", doing the installation is the best part!

anyway, are the "slow" Sierra cards "slow" because they do not support 4g or just because the 3g speed is generally slower? if the latter, i would prefer to do the mod for the faster card. Any you would recommend? (and what carrier?)

I will message that guy if his antennas are still for sale, but is the one i linked to the same as the "main" that he has?

What kind of tape are you supposed to use for the hack? RealBlackStuff sold me this replacement mobo which does not have a whitelist apparently, so that step should be good.

thanks.

[Peak2Peak]

Some of the newer 3G cards are theoretically capable of up to 21Mbps downlink/5.7 Mbps uplink throughput (as opposed to the older Sierra Cards - 1.8/2.4Mbps downlink/384kbps uplink) - In the real world these speeds are generally not obtainable due to the actual network carriers supported speed and it's traffic management load as well as location etc. The "Gobi" WWAN cards are capable of connecting to multiple 3G wireless networks worldwide as they support several frequency bands.

The "Main" WWAN antenna's for the 14.1" & 15.0" T60 are physically different in size - The AUX WWAN antenna & Sim card slot are common to both - The link you quoted for the "Main" WWAN antenna in your previous post is correct for your 14.1" T60 - Forum member Virgi44 WWAN antennas in this forums marketplace have been pulled from 15.0" T60, so only the AUX antenna and Sim card slot is usable in your T60.

I use masking tape to cover pin20 - others have used electrical insulation tape - The WWAN I currently use is a Huawei EM770W which is also capable of Voice calls - I have found it to be very stable and fast (with the network I am on).

I am unable to recommend any US carriers as I do not have any experience of them - I hope there are forum members who will point you in the right direction (as well as any info I have missed out etc).