Thinkpad A21m wireless upgrade question

[Padelicious]

Hello, I have a Thinkpad A21m, 2628-F2U, laptop. Can someone please tell me what is the easiest and quickest way to upgrade my laptop for wireless capabilty. Thanks

[ARD]

PCMCIA wireless card.
You just stick it in on the side of the A21.

[Padelicious]

PCMCIA wireless card.
You just stick it in on the side of the A21.

Will try that....thanks for the quick help.

[Kane77077]

On my wife's A21m, we're currently using an Airlink 101 PCMCIA card (its a 54G) that I initially bought for my 600X Thinkpad. It works great and was cheap ($12.99 - no rebate - at the local Fry's Electronics), but I'm not wild about it - I think I'd rather use an internal (mini-PCI) card.

I very new to laptops :I was given both the A21M and the 600X from a guy I work with who assumed they were worthless - all I needed on the 600X was a power cord and battery and the 10gig Travelstar hard drive I had around the house, and for the A21m I needed to add a power cord and battery and dissassemble the LCD assembly to re-seat the cord into the LCD screen.

The point of my post is this:

I have downloaded two different repair manuals, but am still unclear on replacing the 3Com card with a 802.11g mini-PCI card - is that even possible?

What features do I need to look for in a mini-PCI card? Are there certain specs or versions of mini-PCI card that are compatible with the A21m?

IS a mini-PCI card the same as a daughter card?

A few specs about our A21m that may help answer my questions:

BIOS: 1.09 (KXET36WW)
Machine type-Model : 2628FWU
Windows XP Pro w/SP2
Processer: x86 Family 6 Model 8 Stepping 3 (I think P3 750 speedstep)
Network Adapter: 3Com 10/100 Mini-PCI Ethernet (disabled in Device Mgr)
Modem: 3Com mini-PCI 56K Modem (I think the same card as the 10/100)
Memory: 328MB (but I'll soon be upgrading to 512)

Thanks.

[schen]

Basically, here is what you need to think about in attaining "internal" wireless on your machine:

*A22ms were not equiped with the built-in wireless capability so if you want that, you'll have to not only add a Mini-PCI card, but the antennas as well.

*Mini-PCI and daughter card are not the same thing.

*Internal antennas come in 2 flavors; under the keyboard/base or behind the LCD/lid.

*If you get beyond the antenna thing, there are quite a few cards that work well. I personally have only used 2 (intel and Atheros). My Atheros 5001X+ is an A/B/G that works great and connects to SuperG APs with no trouble at 108Mps, so I can definitely recommend that.


That said, I'm not certain that doing an internal is worth the hassle of adding the antenna by taking the machine completely apart. So a good PCMCIA card that has the retracting "X-Jack" antenna may be the best bet.