HP 15 Series Notebook WIFI Card Upgrade

[js1999]

Hi,

I have an HP 15-bs115dx with an Intel Core i5, and I bought it in the summer of 2018. It currently has a Realtek WLAN combo card with Bluetooth 4.2. I tried looking through the maintenance manual to see what the upgrade options were for upgrading the internal Wifi card. I would like some clarification about which upgrades would be compatible with my laptop. 

Thank you.

[personal info removed]

[Paul_Tikkanen · Accepted solution]

Hi:

Your notebook only has one antenna wire connected to the RTL8723DE wifi card, so there is only one model dual band card you can upgrade to where both the wifi and Bluetooth will work with a single antenna wire, and that is this one...

Realtek RTL8821CE 802.11 ac 1x1 WiFi + Bluetooth 4.2 Combo Adapter (MU-MIMO supported) HP part # L17365-005.

You can find this model on eBay, or Ali Express,

https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=L17365-005&_sacat=0&_sop=15

The card will have the same 72 MBPS throughput as the original wifi card on the 2.4 GHz wifi band, but on the 5.0 GHz wifi band, it will have a max throughput of 433 MBPS when you have an AC router with an excellent wifi signal strength.

Below is the link to the service manual, where you can find the wifi card removal and replacement procedure.

h10032.www1.hp.com/ctg/Manual/c05493257.pdf

[js1999]

The service manual mentions a 

Intel Dual Band Wireless-AC 3168 802.11 ac 1x1 WiFi + BT 4.2 Combo Adapter

and a 

Intel Dual Band Wireless-AC 9461 802.11 AC 1x1 WiFi + BT5 Combo Adapter (non-vPro) (MU-MIMO
supported) as well in the section referring to the WLAN module. 

Are either of these even options for my notebook or were these just possible other configurations my notebook model had when they were selling it?

[Paul_Tikkanen]

The Intel 3168 requires 2 antenna wires in order for the wifi and bluetooth to work.

If you don't care about having bluetooth then the wifi will work if you attach the single antenna wire to the card's 'Main' antenna terminal.

The Intel 9461, while it also only needs one antenna wire, only works in specific model notebooks in which the card was the original one. 

The 9461 is what is known as a CRF (companion RF) card, and the easiest way to explain what that means is the card is not a 'complete or whole' standalone wifi card.  It must use certain supported Intel processors in order to work.

Folks that have tried to install that card indicate that it does not show up in the device manager.

So that card will not work in your notebook since it did not come with that model wifi card.