[X220] Installing Intel AC 7260

[balleny]

Hello,

I finally got my hands on a X220 and plan to upgrade it soon. The Thinkpad got already flashed with a whitelisted 1.42 BIOS and after I read through a lot of posts and stuff you can find on the web I have a little question left:

Can i replace the 6205 wireless card which is currently installed or do i have to use the WAN slot (the longer PCIe slot) for the Intel AC7260 card? Moreover i read a lot about the PIN 51 (&20) and how to run the 7260 best under linux, but if you have any additional information, I would appreciate those, too.

Regards

[apojoga]

FWIW, I was never able to get 7260 AC to work reliably in my X220.

BIOS is modded, it connects fine (and has good speeds), but it's impossible to power down/suspend the machine.

[mrj47]

Yup as long as you got the modded bios you can just replace the existing 6205 with the 7260. I'm on Ubuntu 14.04 LTS w/ kernel 4.1.19, everything works fine, didn't have to tape any pins.

[ansible212]

Same here - works fine (have posted about it in the past).

Bluetooth that comes with the card is more problematic (but appears to be a fairly common issue across the board).

[apojoga]

Same here - works fine (have posted about it in the past).

Bluetooth that comes with the card is more problematic (but appears to be a fairly common issue across the board).

Just to confirm -- this is the card I have, it is the same as yours? http://i.imgur.com/vAeWgMJ.jpg
Which BIOS exactly did you use?
Thanks!

[ansible212]

I believe it is the same card (i.e. would only be able to confirm 100% if I looked inside the laptop, however I can confirm that I ordered the 7260HMW card).

I'm using the 1.39 BIOS (whitelisted).

[apojoga]

I believe it is the same card (i.e. would only be able to confirm 100% if I looked inside the laptop, however I can confirm that I ordered the 7260HMW card).

I'm using the 1.39 BIOS (whitelisted).

I have a 1.40, maybe this is the problem...

[Starlight5]

I have modded 1.42 BIOS on my X220 Tablet, and Wi-Fi works fine. FWIW I managed to make 7260 AC's Bluetooth work without having Thinkpad Bluetooth daughterboard installed - by taping pin 51 with electric tape. It was on a card with faulty Bluetooth (Bluetooth visible in the device manager, but fails to start), however I believe there's nothing stopping normal card from working in this setup. Hardware switches obviously don't control it with pin taped.