Why do laptops still come with crappy 1x1 N cards?

[sm00thpapa]

Just bought my daughter a new laptop and it came with a single 1x1 N card that maxes out at 72Mbps. I was what no AC card or at least a 300Mbps card. Can't wait till every thing in my house runs on the 5GHz band.


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[connorm]

Just bought my daughter a new laptop and it came with a single 1x1 N card that maxes out at 72Mbps. I was what no AC card or at lease a 300Mbps card. Can't wait till every thing in the house runs on the 5GHz band.


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my $200 acer aspire one came with a 300N dual band intel 6205

but my sisters $600 asus vivobook only came with 300N (144 @ 20MHz) card

 

[RMerlin]

my $200 acer aspire one came with a 300N dual band intel 6205

That was probably with the later SKUs (after they changed manufacturer), because all the info I see online point to an Atheros single band card.

Sadly, the norm these days is still to use crappy single band 150 Mbps cards in the majority of laptop.

 

[sm00thpapa]

my $200 acer aspire one came with a 300N dual band intel 6205

but my sisters $600 asus vivobook only came with 300N (144 @ 20MHz) card

That's sad my daughter's happens to be a $600.00 Acer with a 72 @ 20MHz.

 

[RMerlin]

That's sad my daughter's happens to be a $600.00 Acer with a 72 @ 20MHz.

Upgrade that stinker of a card Unless Acer also uses a PCI-e card whitelist.

 

[sm00thpapa]

Upgrade that stinker of a card Unless Acer also uses a PCI-e card whitelist.

I'm looking for an internal card. I have a few N and AC USB adapters but they don't want these USB dongles hanging off their laptops. One is a Lenovo that came with a 72Mbps card.

 

[RMerlin]

I'm looking for an internal card. I have a few N and AC USB adapters but they don't want these USB dongles h as thing off their laptops. One is a Lenovo that came with a 72Mbps card.

Did you see if the mini PCI-Express card was easily serviceable? This is what I did with my Asus K53E laptop. I replaced the craptastic Azurewave card with an Intel 6230 or 6235 (for about 30$). A year later, I replaced it again with an Intel 7260, for roughly the same price.

 

[sm00thpapa]

Did you see if the mini PCI-Express card was easily serviceable? This is what I did with my Asus K53E laptop. I replaced the craptastic Azurewave card with an Intel 6230 or 6235 (for about 30$). A year later, I replaced it again with an Intel 7260, for roughly the same price.

Yes on both laptops it is very easy to swap them out. Just need to find what's compatible with each one.

 

[azazel1024]

Is this a $1,000 laptop or a $300 laptop? Price matters.

You don't stick a 6-spd transmission in a 3-cyl, $6,000 geo metro.

BoM is everything. For a cheap laptop margins are going to be very small. The difference between a cheap "off brand" single stream 2.4GHz adpater and even just a "lowly" off-brand 2:2 11n dual band adapter can easily be $5-6 once you include a second antenna along with the price of the card.

For a $300 laptop, that represents only 1.7% of the purchase price, but it might represent 10-20% of the margins on the laptop.

 

[sm00thpapa]

The Lenovo was a $450.00 laptop and the Acer was a $650.00 laptop. For the price of $30.00 for a N300 card why not throw one in. My Gateway cost close to $1,000 and came with an AR5B93 N300 card. I don't use wifi as I hate the fluctuation in speed so all of my devices are hard wired unless they can't be like my LG G2 and iPad Air.

 

[RMerlin]

Yes on both laptops it is very easy to swap them out. Just need to find what's compatible with each one.

Check online if there are reports about Acer using a BIOS-based whitelist. If not, go with an Intel 7260 (would be barely more expensive than a 6235).

 

[RMerlin]

The Lenovo was a $450.00 laptop and the Acer was a $650.00 laptop. For the price of $30.00 for a N300 card why not throw one in. My Gateway cost close to $1,000 and came with an AR5B93 N300 card. I don't use wifi as I hate the fluctuation in speed so all of my devices are hard wired unless they can't be like my LG G2 and iPad Air.

Lenovo does use a whitelist, so that one will be trickier to upgrade.

 

[sm00thpapa]

Ok cool, thanks Merlin for your input. Much appreciated.

 

[speedingcheetah]

Even in mid to high end laptops.....I see 2x2 cards....often with only one antenna installed.

All of the newer HP Probooks I have worked on are this way. Many Lenovo thinkpads and Dell Latitude and Precisions too....seems to be a trend in business class laptops, crappy wifi cards.

Price of the laptop seems makes no difference. Most of the time, they cheap out on the wifi card and antennas. Sure, it may come with an N300 card, but its crippled since it only has one antenna.

I have worked at my local Microcenter in the tech shop for 2 months now....have yet to see a single laptop with 3x3 card or 3 built in antennas come across my bench. Even desktops that have wifi built in, only 1 antenna) (all Dell Inspirons desktops are like this it seems)

You really have to do some research before you buy a laptop these days. Look online for disassemblely videos/pictures for that exact model.

 

[TonyH]

Hi,
Cost cutting measure? Even $2K worth ASUS ROG came with crappy Atheros which I replaced with Intel 7260 AC. Also I
installed few Intel 6300 adding 3rd antenna. Best -N mode card. One MSI AMD APU based gamer came with Atheros. Right away I put in Intel 7260 there. Fortunately
accessing WiFi card is pretty easy on most laptops. Just a few minute's job to swap it out.

 

[IAAI]

because not so many like you sir know about networking or even care . (the market wants the cheapest with outstanding performance .

and marketing departments knows how to play it well . for example

you want 4 usb's ok np get it 2.0 speed

you want wifi got it 1x1 not even N just G/B

you want big hard drive ? got it 500GB 3,600 rpm

you want fast cpu ? here you go intel atom

Just name the thing and they got the cure

 

[remixedcat]

Does HP whitelist? I want the Intel AC7260 card.

 

[connorm]

patiently waiting for something like a 4360 or another 3X3 to start coming available in a mini pci express format..........

im really suprised no one is filling this 3x3 ac card market...... asus has released the pce-68,and 66 but no smaller brothers for the laptops. most people dont need wifi on there desktop anyway............. so im just confused why asus hasnt released more 3x3 solutions?

 

[sm00thpapa]

I don't know anyone with a desk top anymore. All of my family and friends been using laptops for the last 15 years.

 

[connorm]

u must not know very many people then.