HP Pavilion 14-ab020tx Wifi Card Upgrade

[SJM_96]

Dear Experts,

I am looking to upgrade my existing wifi card (Broadcom BCM43142 802.11 bgn Wi-Fi M.2 Adapter) to take advantage of the 5ghz network. After opening up my laptop, I noticed that it only has 1 antenna cable and I'm not planning to add an additional one due to the complex procedure. As such, I understand that the compatible wifi card options will be limited. Based on my research in this HP forum, is Realtek RTL8821CE still the only option that I have? Would I be better off buying external USB adapters instead?

Any other alternatives/options would be appreciated.

Looking forward to your response.

Thanks in advance.

[Paul_Tikkanen · Accepted solution]

Hi:

Yes, the Realtek RTL8821CE Wi-Fi adapter is the only option available to you if you want both the Wi-Fi and Bluetooth to work.

You could buy a dual band USB Wi-Fi adapter that would have faster throughput than the RTL8821CE.

It just depends on if you want to use up a USB port for one of those.

Make sure you get a USB Wi-Fi adapter that is at least AC1200 or faster.

AC600 has the same 433 MBPS throughput as the RTL8821CE.

[SJM_96]

Thanks for the quick response. 

Another question, if i were to add an additional antenna cable, would I be able to use any Wifi 6/6e card, and both Wifi and Bluetooth would work?

[Paul_Tikkanen]

You're very welcome.

There is no one on the forum that has installed a wifi6.6e card in that model series, so I don't even know if one would work.

If you want to take a chance on an AX card and you want to go through the trouble to add a second antenna, then this is the model I recommend you experiment with:

Intel Wi-Fi 6 AX200 ax 2×2 + Bluetooth 5.0 MU-MIMO M.2 2230 non-vPro   HP part # L35282-005

[SJM_96]

Appreciate your suggestion.

Would the below be the same model as the one you suggested? I checked with the seller and they mentioned it should work with non-vPro.

Model: Wi-Fi 6 AX200 vPro
Dual Bands : 2.4Ghz, 5Ghz (160Mhz)
Standard: IEEE 802.11ac, 802.11ax
Bluetooth Version : Bluetooth 5.2
Integrated Bluetooth : Yes

[Paul_Tikkanen]

You're very welcome.

You normally can't use a vPro device in a non-vPro platform.

There are no consumer class notebooks that support vPro technology.

Only the higher end business class notebooks support vPro.

I see some listed on eBay,ph with the part number I recommended.

l35282-005 | eBay

[SJM_96]

 I see, I will check the link you shared.

Just for my own knowledge, do newer laptops nowadays still do whitelisting? Any brands in particular that you are aware of so that i can avoid such situation in the future.

[Paul_Tikkanen]

Most HP notebooks made in 2014 or later do not have BIOS whitelists.

We don't know exactly what models do or don't unless someone installs a different model Wi-Fi card and reports the results.

[SJM_96]

I see, thank you very much for the info.

[Paul_Tikkanen]

Anytime.

Glad to have been of assistance.