dv6-7XXX / dv7-7XXX: Dual-band WiFi cards that work!

I recently received an HP Pavilion dv6-7014nr (part of the dv6-7000 series) and it came with the not-so-great Broadcom 4313GN 1x1 wireless card. I had a couple of standalone Intel dual-band 802.11a/b/g/n wireless cards laying around and I decided to give them a shot. And guess what... the system successfully booted with these cards!

Obviously, these wireless cards did not prevent the system from booting. I'm hoping that this post will help those of you who have the Ivy Bridge or Trinity-based dv6 and/or dv7, and are looking for a dual-band wireless solution that actually works.

Intel Centrino Advanced-N 6200 (2x2, PCIe Half MiniCard)
Model: 622ANHMW
Specifications: Intel® Centrino® Advanced-N 6200, Dual Band

Screenshot (click to enlarge):

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Intel Centrino Advanced-N 6235 (2x2, PCIe Half MiniCard with Bluetooth 4.0)
Model: 6235AN.HMWG
Specifications: http://ark.intel.com/products/66890/Intel-Centrino-Advanced-N-6235-Dual-Band
Confirmed working by: sailerboy
Confirmed working on both INTEL and AMD notebook models (see this post)

Availability options:

• http://www.provantage.com/intel-6235an-hmwg~7ITE90TC.htm

Screenshot (click to enlarge, courtesy of sailerboy):



A handy installation guide is located here.

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Intel Centrino Ultimate-N 6300 (3x3, PCIe Half MiniCard)
Model: 633AN.HMWWB
Specifications: Intel® Centrino® Ultimate-N 6300, Dual Band

Availability options:

• Amazon.com: Intel Ultimate N 633ANHMW IEEE 802.11n (draft) Wi-Fi Adapter - Mini PCI Express - 450Mbps, Bulk: Electronics
• PROVANTAGE: Intel 633AN.HMWWB Intel Wifi Link 6300 633AN.HMWWB Half Height Minicard VPRO Enabled

Screenshot (click to enlarge):


Also works...although you will only be using 2 of the 3 antennas possible. I personally would stick with the 6200/6230/6235 series - it's cheaper and you would be fully utilizing the card's capabilities.

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Intel Dual Band Wireless-AC 7260 (2x2, PCIe Half MiniCard with Bluetooth)
Model: 7260.HMWG
Specifications: http://ark.intel.com/products/75439/Intel-Dual-Band-Wireless-AC-7260

Availability options:

• http://www.ebay.com/itm/Intel-Netwo...-H-T-Dual-Band-2x2-AC-Bluetooth-/221261687154 (while supplies last)
• http://www.provantage.com/~7ITE91L5.htm

Screenshot (click to enlarge):



If any of you guys decide to purchase and try out other dual-band wireless cards (especially those that have an integrated Bluetooth module), please feel free to share your experiences here!

 

Wow Nice.

Way much better than the 6000

 

I've bought the Intel 6235, and will be sticking that in my DV6T, to see if it works, once the DV6T gets back from warranty.

 

Let us know if it works.... I just bought the same card today and should have it by the end of next week! Hoping it works...

Thanks

Jason Pollard

 

Does the 6200-series that good compared to the intel 2200 series?
Is it really something u can tell ?

 

Only if you got a quality wireless ap, you will notice a large difference in performance (for the average user, they wouldn't care much if they only surf the web) and range.

I wonder if the 6250 works with it too. If it does, then it possible to have dual band + bluetooth 4.0 + wimax + 4g support in a single laptop.

 

I upgraded dv6 7000 CTO in the wifi card into the intel one integrated with bluetooth. To be honest, I do not think it is a wise choice.
It is intel N 2230 card, which according to intel, is a 2*2 but only work with 2.4 Gbps card. Compared with my other two laptops, Asus M51 series with a Atheros AR928X and I failed to find its specs. The other is HP elitebook 6930p with a intel 5100 wireless card.
When I put all the three laptops at nearly the same position, according to wirelessmon version 4.1, the other two can both find more than 10 APs but the 2230 can only get 4 APs at most. Also at my working place, I found that the 5100 can connect to the internet smoothly, while the 2230, although can reach the router, failed to connect to the internet.

Also, last night I was playing LOL, and the internet gets off 4 times in 15 mins. I have to figure out what the problem is.

 

Were you playing on battery or using a power saving profile?

The newer Intel cards are really aggressive on their power saving method.
Namely the 6230, 6235, 2200, 2230.

Try playing with the power saving settings with the Intel Wireless properties.

Their newer power saving algorithm don't play very nicely with older wireless ap due to different timings.

 

Wait.

Intel Advanced-N 6250 Product Brief
does neither list Bluetooth nor "4g" (as in 4G LTE).

Note: There's also a 4G WIMAX. However it is not based on the mobile network technology and therefore separate hardware is required.

It's a shame that 4g, wlan, bluetooth, nfc, a-gps, fm, ... all fit into a single tiny mobile device, but they fit into a laptop.

 

The Bluetooth thing required that you already have an existing separate card, which is already in most retail HP bluetooth included laptops.


I forgot there is more than 1 different meaning of the term 4g ... bah

 

The intel 6250 that has wimax is dirt cheap on ebay.. just ordered one for $6.99 including shipping. I don't use bluetooth much so don't mind that it doesn't have it. Hopefully the 2x2 antennas in my laptop will work with this card.. I'm still waiting for my laptop to arrive. (dv6-70XX) ordered it with the intel 2230 so the 2x2 antennas should already be installed

 

What does 2x2 antennas mean anyway?
Btw- where do i install the card in the laptop?

 

2x2 means there are two antennas in the laptop that plug into the wifi card. the more expensive wifi cards use 3, so you'd have to buy the 3 antennas and install them, which is a big hassle since you have to take apart the laptop. The wifi cards we're talking about plug into the mini pci express slot which is under the same panel you remove to get to the hard drive. this laptop takes half size cards, which are pretty easy to find
Here's a picture of where to install the card, it goes on the top left. you can see the two wires for the antennas plugged into it with gold connectors. The intel wifi upgrade you can buy from hp has 2x2 antennas for 300mbps. if you don't get the upgrade, there's a chance they'll only install one antenna.. no one has confirmed that though

 

Wow man - thanks for the answer.
So if i got the intel upgrade - does it mean that the bluetooth is on the same card with the wifi?
Comparing the 2200 vs 62xx series - will i notice any difference in the range? will i get more AP using the 62xx ?

 

Well, it means that the two antennas can be used for "Spatial multiplexing. This is a transmission technique in MIMO wireless communication to transmit independent and separately encoded data signals, so-called streams, from each of the multiple transmit antennas. Therefore, the space dimension is reused, or multiplexed, more than one time."
wikipedia

Note, cheaper 1x1:1 solutions like the BCM4313 or AR9485 also have two antenna ports, but these chips are not able to process the data for both antennas at the same time, so they just switch between the antenna and ignore the one with the weaker signal.

If you just want to know more about the nomenclature of 2x2:
IEEE 802.11n-2009 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

Yeah, that was true.... I remember I had a BCM2070 with the BCM4313. But HP now mostly sells combo cards (802.11 + 802.15) like AR9462, Intel (x)x3x (i.e: 1030, 130, 6230, 2230, ...) and the RT3592BC8 that have everything on the minipcie card as well (usually the bluetooth is connected to the minipcie usb pins though).

Na, I think they called it "4g WIMAX" on purpose just to sell that stuff.

 

Thanks for the info.....
I just hope the intel 2200 perform well.....
I know dell/apple wifi card are very good so i hope the 2200 will have a good range....

 

I didn't get the upgrade, and they still installed 2 antennas.

 

I have ordered the 6235 once it gets in later this week i will let you guys know if it works or not.

 

I have my dv6 for 2 weeks now and i think i have a problem with the INTEL 2230 network card.
I have my router in my room and my dv6 in the living room. the router is behind a wall but the door is wide open.
I can only get 2-3 bars of reception where my dad's MBP gets a full 5 bars.
The MPB is placed next to the dv6. The room is pretty close to the living room - I have a small house....
I've read people reporting about bad reception - is it because the intel card sucks or maybe a faulty card or bad assembly?

Maybe i will buy the Intel 6235 - do u guys think it will help?

 

The freaking seller at amazon had to send me a refund cause the ones they had in stock were faulty ( waiting on the refund now)... I put in a order with provantage and the card with 2 day shipping came to $30.27 Hopefully I will get it Friday and I will let you guys know if it works or not.. provantage has 19 still in stock.
PROVANTAGE: Intel 6235AN.HMWG Intel WL WiFi 6235AN.HMWG Centrino Advanced-N 6235 Dual Band

 

To OP:

Do it need to be a HP/IBM(lenovo) card to work? they look different than a regular card I believe.

Edit: just to clarify, non HP card can boot on my old dv6z(whitelist removed) but windows cannot start them.

 

I got the same card thru ebay and it arrived today.. Put it in my DV6T-7000 and it works perfectly!!!!!

Thanks.

Jason Pollard

 

This is the cheapest place that I've seen them. It's 25 USD, and shipped by an american company, so it wont take a year and a day to get to you.

I can vouch for them.

(Looks like they're backordered, but you'd be hard pressed to find a cheaper alternative.

 

How does the performance compare with the card the factory installed for you? Does it really make any difference?

 

Seems better... not sure by how much yet though.....

 

Were you having problems with connection strength in certain areas that now seems better? Did you run any network speed tests with the old card to compare it to the new? Just curious.

 

I agree.
2230 performs very poor on my new dv6 7000 CTO

 

Great information - thanks for sharing! I think I'll have to purchase one for myself, now that we have a confirmation that the 6235 works.

Could you post a screenshot? I'll add it to the first post once you're able to do so.

 

Was that wireless card happen to be an Intel wireless card?
The newer (2009+ era) Intel wireless cards have a hardware dependency on Intel chipsets.
Without them, you basically bsod within seconds.

Also, no it doesn't have to be a card directly from HP or IBM.

The difference is the slight change in their labels and hardware id.

 

Various Intel card work on my 2 amd machine and C2D desktop via adapter so it probably is not a chipset problem.

A non-ibm/hp card will not work in the hp in sig but work on the asus in sig and desktop.
A ibm/hp card work in the hp but not on the asus or desktop.

 

Installation guide here: http://forum.notebookreview.com/hp-...ntrino-6235-dv6t-7000-probably-dv7t-well.html

Screencap of the verification too:

Spoiler

 

Great job !!!
Is the range much better comparing to the 2230?

 

I haven't the faintest. I had the Ralink RT5390 in mine previously, and the range is much better. I haven't the 2230 to compare it to.

 

I'm very surprised that your Intel wireless cards work for your AMD chipset.

Usually, they behave really strangely on them.


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Anyways,
I'm sure Op got his from provantage unless he got new ones since last time I seen them.

 

I got mine from ShopBLT, as mentioned previously. Their 6235 is OOS, and quite badly backordered, but they also have the 6205, the 6230, both in stock.

Everything's got $2 shipping, so much cheaper than provantage too.

 

can you show me the video of how changing the wireless card of hp pavilion dv6t-7000. by intel 6235 one. thx

 

Hello

I ordered this card from EBAY
Intel 6235 6235ANHMW WIFI WLAN BT Bluetooth 4.0 Half MINI pci-e wireless Card | eBay

The details in your card are not as shown in the ebay picture.
On ebay is written "Made in china" and ur card is not !

Is it a fake ? the performance will be the same?
I'm thinking bout cancelling the order......

 

I haven't a video camera, and I'd really rather not use my phone to take a video. Let me know what you had trouble with and I'll help you over the forum.

Everything these days is made in China. I believe that the back of my card says that it is made in China.

 

I know that everything is made in china.....even some of us humans

The other side of the card had a sticker too or just a board?
In the ebay card theres not FCC ID.....
What do u think - can it be a fake or something or an OEM product?

 

There's a sticker on the back. If you really want me to, I'll get my card out if you really want to.

I seriously recommend that you get it from ShopBLT or from Provantage, like everyone else. It'll be probably cheaper, and you have a guarantee that it'll work.

The FCC ID may be an issue...

 

I will really appreciate it if u can remove the card and take a picture of both sides or only the back side.
I need to know whether to cancel the order before they ship it.
I'm sorry for all the hassle !

 

Just got my 6235 from provantage and its working perfectly in my dv7-7000
with my 2230 i was getting -50dbm with the 6235 im getting -45dBm
(lower is better) testing with inSSIDer
The real test will be at home where i was getting just an ok signal with the 2230.

It was really effortless to install the new wireless card..
Anyone can do it every easily.

 

I got a 6235 from ebay and installed it in my dv6-7000 and it's working

 

I don't want to be pedantic, but -45dBm is not lower than -50dBm (yep, it's: the stronger the signal the better) .

 

Can u please send me the link from ebay that u've bought it?
I'm not sure if these card are original intel card.....see my posts above

 

Someone please tell me how to get these wifi cards to work in the 6000 series without touching the BIOS.

 

So I installed the Intel Centrino Advanced-N 6235 in my dv6-7000 this morning. Everything seems as if it's working great, only when I check HWinfo it shows that my max connection speed is 54 mps? The 2230 that was in here showed at 150 mps. Any ideas?

 

That's funny. Did you install all the right drivers from HP? Mine shows 300 Mbps.

Are you sure you didn't get ripped off? Is it the Intel Centrino Advanced-N 6235 in HwInfo?

 

Check your router max speed. if your router has only 54mbps connection so that's what u will see in HWinfo.
I have the intel 2230 and it shows 54mbps (exactly my router's max speed)


Where did u get the 6235?