R40 and Mini PCI wireless card

[Connor]

I have a Thinkpad R40 type 2681-CU3 (what do those numbers/letters mean anyway?) and would greatly like to add WiFi to it. I would like to use the Mini PCI slot under my Thinkpad instead of the PCI slot on the side (have other ideals for it). So far the only Mini PCI wireless card I'm finding for my model is IBM's part num. 91P7261 which operates with b only, not g.

This computer is used only for internet browsing with some downloads of programs and movie clips (most recent download is a speech reconizion program. It's a hoot!). I rarely see a download faster than 100kps using cable modem and Linksys router/hub. My two sons play EQ all the time on their computers. They will stay wired for the time being and I'll be using Linksys's cable modem/hub/wireless gateway for base unit.

My questions are:

1. Will I get any less speed than the 50-100kps download using b only? Is 50-100 kps good? Average?

2. Does anyone else sell a Mini PCI card for this model that has b and g?

3. If I have to use the side port to get WiFi b and g, what can I use the Mini CPI space for? Does anyone make a bluetooth card for it (maybe for wireless headphones)?

Your answers will be greatly appreciated and thought over carefully.

Thanks...

Connor

PS: How do you get those cute little smily faces to show up in your post?

[hausman]

I have a Thinkpad R40 type 2681-CU3 (what do those numbers/letters mean anyway?)

Roughly the 2681 identifies the R40 series and the CU3 identifies the specific model you have.

1. Will I get any less speed than the 50-100kps download using b only? Is 50-100 kps good? Average?

I assume by 100kps you mean kilobytes per second (kB/s; lower case b is bits and upper case is bytes) In theory WiFi b is supposed to operate at speeds of approximately 10Mb/s or 1000kB/s. In practice there is transmission overhead, more overhead from WEP/WAP encryption plus speed degradation with distance so you're more likely to get less than 500kB/s. Still, if your Internet bottleneck is 100kB/s then WiFi b will be more than adequate.

Sorry, but I can't answer Q2 and Q3.

PS: How do you get those cute little smily faces to show up in your post?

Just click on the smiley you want and its code will be inserted into your post. (And make sure that "Disable Smilies in this post" just below the text input window is NOT checked )

[Connor]

I have talked to IBM's tech support on two different occasions and have been given two different part #'s for my ThinkPad's mini pci wireless card. The first one was part #91P7261 (and the guy said something about "not centrino capable for wireless") and the second guy gave me part #26P8496. Anyone know why they would give me two different part numbers?

Another thing that caught my attention was that I'm seeing the 2681 must have been normally furnished with a P4 but my model (CU3) has the P4-M. I see on their site different wireless mini pci cards listed for the P4 and P4-M, but they're usually showing the 2681 with the P4 in their list of what to use. Could this mean that I might be able to use an IBM wireless g mini pci card instead of the wireless b that the two mentioned part numbers above operate at? The second support guy said that the model CU3 was an upgrade of the base model (KPU).

Thanks for the replys in this query. I'll be purchasing one of the wireless mini pci cards but I want to make sure I'll get the right one.

Connor