Replace and Upgrade WLAN card on HP Pavilion X2 11-h010nr

[vchircov]

Hi,

I have the HP Pavilion X2 11-h010nr Model and overall it's a great small laptop for a day to day use.

The only thing that is bothering me is that my Wifi connection speed maxes at ~34 Mbps.

I have a D-Link DSL-G256DG, Dual Band AC modem and other devices that can connect to 5-GHz WLAN or LAN can reach up to ~55 Mbps. (According to the Internet provider this is what the infrastructure can currently support).

Currently, the laptop has an out of the box Ralink RT3290 WLAN+Bluetooth card and on the product page it says that the laptop supports 1x1 802.11b/g/n WLAN.

Here is how the card looks from the inside:

Ralink RT3290

My question is, what is the best Wifi card for the that I will be able to upgrade to in order to get more speed.

Thanks, I appreciate your support!

[Paul_Tikkanen · Accepted solution]

Hi:

I don't believe the Intel 7260 dual band AC card will work on models with the Pentium processor for some reason.

The card shows up in the device manager, but no wifi connections can be made.  It is as if the wifi was turned off.

The only suggestion I can offer, but I cannot guarantee it will work, would be to use the Broadcom equivalent card instead.

Broadcom BCM4352 802.11ac 2x2 Wi-Fi + Bluetooth 4.0 combo   HP Part # 724935-001

You should be able to find this model card on Amazon or eBay.

Do your search by the HP part number, not the model of the wifi card.

[vchircov]

Hey Paul,

Thanks for the quick response!

I will check the look for the option that you suggested.

I do have a few more questions (I apologize in advance if these questions are obvious, I am not that familiar with the subject),

Do you think that the model's board will support a 2x2 dual-band WLAN card? Are there 2 antennas on that model?

Is there a single band 802.11ac card that can also be suitable? or will it fall back to 2.4Ghz?

Do you have some other suggestions for a card that will also support 802.11bgn to fall back to if it will not work with 802.11ac? or of another brand, just to consider as another option?

How do you know if a card will work with a Pentium processor? 

Thanks!

[Paul_Tikkanen]

You're very welcome.

The antenna system in your notebook will support the 2 x 2 AC card just fine.

If for some reason the BCM AC card I recommended doesn't work (I think it has a good chance of working though), then there is no better wifi card for you than the Ralink card you have in there now.

I only knew the Intel 7260 AC card didn't work in a different model with the Pentium processor because a couple of forum members installed one and reported the outcome.  So, I drew the conclusion that it had something to do with the processor.

Many folks have with the same Ralink wifi card as yours, installed dual band Intel 7260 wifi cards in notebooks that had Intel 3rd and 4th generation core processors, and they worked just fine.

So, I am hoping it is an Intel thing, and that the Broadcom card would work just as well as the Ralink one, but at the higher AC speed on the 5.0 GHz wifi band.

[vchircov]

Works!

1) Ordered the card from eBay.
2) Uninstalled the previous card Network Adaptor and Blutooth drivers in the Device Manager.
(Downloaded the driver for the previous card as a back up)
3) replaced the card. Its a plug and play card so as I turned the computer it was working.
4) Connected to 5Ghz AC Wireless network.
5) Updated the Network Adaptor and Blutooth drivers in the Device Manager and restarted the computer.
6) Speed test showed improvement compared to the previous card.

Thanks!

[Paul_Tikkanen]

Anytime.

Glad to have been of assistance.

Thanks for letting us know the BCM AC card works in notebooks with the Pentium processors.