T430 WiFi card options

[sktn77a]

OK folks, our 4 T430 ThinkPads are still chugging along just fine with Windows 10 and an SSD in each. One of them has the Intel N-2200 (from 2012) wifi card which is only a 2.5 GHz band card. The specs say its a single band dual stream wireless N-card ("300mbps"). I replaced it with an older Intel N6205 (from 2011) dual band card - 2.4GHz and 5GHz - ("300mbps"). What's the difference between the performance of these two cards (if any)? I was thinking of getting the N6300 Ultimte card ("450mbps") but I'm not sure its worth it as each band is still only 150mbps (?)



Opinions?

[RealBlackStuff]

It also depends on the speed from your ISP, your router and if you regularly transfer large amounts of data between machines and/or servers/NAS.
If you already have an AC-capable router, then a good card would be the Intel AC-7260 in Mini-PCIe format, otherwise the Intel 6300N is fine.
A proper AC-7260 would have Intel Dual Band Wireless-AC 7260 and only Model: 7260HMW printed on it.
Watch out: many sellers try to flog identical looking cards, but with Intel Dual Band Wireless-N 7260 and Model: 7260HMW BN printed on it.

All those cards also include BlueTooth 4.0, so you could take your old BT-module out and free up an internal USB port.

[sktn77a]

Thanks RBS. I would love an AC card but I don't want to mess around with and aftermarket BIOS. My ISP speed is 300Mbps and it'a a Netgear R7000 dual band 1900 (600 + 1300) A,B,G,N,AC router. So I'm not sure if I gain anything with either the N6205 or N6300 over the N2200 card (other than the 5GHz band option).

[RealBlackStuff]

IVprep and 1vyrain take care of that.

[sktn77a]

Thanks but like I say, I don't want to mess with a 3rd party BIOS. If I can get faster speeds (from multiple streams or bands) with the lenovo cards, I'll do that but if not, I'll just stay where I am.