I bought wireless a/b/g card for T41; how hard is install?

[silo]

I dl'd the hardware maint guide for the T4x series and it seems like a small nightmare, including removing keyboard and maybe the handrests etc?

Can someone clarify how difficult this is to do? I could, for example, just by a G wireless PCMCIA card -- does the internal perform better or is there some other reason to mess with this?

[KristianJ]

As long as you separate your different screws into piles according to what removes what (eg. the keyboard, palmrest), it's something that should in practise take only 10 to 15 minutes and not be too difficult a job at all. I recall the first time I opened up my T40 when I had one, it was rather fascinating to see what was inside, so IMHO there's more than just changing components when it comes to taking your T41 apart.

If you're wanting to upgrade other internals such as the RAM (if there is one occupying the RAM slot under the keyboard) or the CPU, you'll need to grab a screwdriver and the HMM for that. But in essence, there are just the 2 main steps of first removing the keyboard, then the palmrest, and the wireless card is very easy to replace from there.

[rkawakami]

Shouldn't be too hard to physically do the work. However, before you begin, you may have to determine if you will need a BIOS "hack" in order to get the system to recognize the new card. I believe that the T41 falls into this category. What exactly is the new a/b/g wireless card? If I'm wrong on this point I apologize since I haven't poked around my T41s too much (yet).

Assuming that it does not need any special BIOS handling, check the driver installation instructions for the wireless card. Most of them will specify that you load/install the drivers BEFORE the card gets installed.

Yes, you do need to remove the keyboard and the palmrest to get to the MiniPCI card (just below the UltraNav if you have one). Be sure you note which screw goes where! The bottom of the system has a guide to the different screws but I generally use a small utility box with individual compartments to keep track of what goes where. The only tricky part is snapping on the tiny U.FL antenna connectors. You need to place them directly over the jacks on the MiniPCI card and press straight down. Once connected, they should be able to rotate while in the jack but not pop off by themselves.

A PCMCIA card is easier to install but then you have it sticking out of the system when you're using the laptop. Performance between the PCMCIA and MiniPCI cards should be about the same, if not slightly better for the MiniPCI card since the antennas are located higher up and in the normal orientation of the access point antennas (i.e., straight up and down).