Replace BGN 1000 with intel 6300?

My lenovo Y470 has the 1000 installed but I wanted something that can handle the 5ghz band for my dual band router. Is the 6300 a better card and is it plug an play with the same antennas?

 

Yes it is, but you don't have a 3rd antenna so a 6200 will do the same job the 6300 would with 2 antennas. If you don't plan on wiring a 3rd antenna, might as well get the 6200 and save some money.

Yes, it is a plug and play situation, disconnect antennas, switch adapter, reconnect antennas.

 

Perfect, thank you! one more question would it be difficult to install the 3rd antenna?

 

You won't be able to benefit from a third antenna unless you have a 450mbps capable router so there's probably no point in doing so.
As for the ease of the upgrade- to install it properly you'd have to dismantle the notebook to some extent so it's not that easy.

 

True, but on most notebooks it is a couple of screws at most. There's always the exception though. For both my Asus laptops it was very easy though.

 

I have the e4200 router so I can actually make use of the 3rd antenna if installed.. could be worthwhile afterall

 

Placing a third antenna in a way that allows it to get good signal would require routing it around the screen like the other two antennas are placed. Not to say that it's a hard thing to do but not everybody wants to dismantle the notebook.
Still for a E4200 that's probably a good idea.

 

To add a 3rd antenna? It's usually more than a couple of screws...you have to run it through the case and up and around the bezel.

OP, does your BIOS have a whitelist? I know Lenovo has used BIOSes with wifi device whitelists.

 

Pretty sure 6300 was added to the whitelist in the latest firmware, will ahve to hack otherwise

 

I meant to replace the adapter, replacing the antenna is a lot more complicated, true. When i posted that comment, we didn't know what router the OP had and i assumed he wouldn't need to wire a third antenna.

Lenovo offers the option for the Intel 6200/6300 on it's thinkpad models so i wouldn't be surprised if they were included in the whitelist if there is one.

 

It's not hard at all to install a 3rd antenna. Yes, difficulty varies with notebook model. If you can use a screw driver, and be gentle with taking off parts, then you can do it fairly easily. The hardest part would be running the antenna through the notebook, but again that depends on the model.

 

Running the antenna through the notebook is the whole thing...so yeah, the hardest part is the entire process.

 

Well, I meant the running of the antennas through small spaces in the laptop... The dismantling of the laptop is easy, IMO. Dismantling the notebook is completely different from running the actual antenna through the laptop.

 

Hello,

Well, I just wanna ask if finally the replacement of the wireless card (intel 1000 -> ultimate 6300) works without bios adaptation ? Because on this page http://download.lenovo.com/UserFile...novo Y470Y570 Hardware Maintenance Manual.pdf I cannot see the 6300 in the hardware list compatibility ?

edit : I found the answer there y570 wifi adapter upgrading - Page 2 - Lenovo Community I'll probably go for the intel 6205 because I find the integrated BGN 1000 in the ideapad Y470/570 is very very bad in term of speed and mainly for the RANGE comparing of my thinkpad t61 AGN 4965 ! I know that the last one have 3x3 antennas but the difference is really crazy !! I hope this one will change the range a bit...

Thx

 

This is not true. The number of antenna's and the number of spatial streams do not need to match

You will get better signal on 2 channel (300mbit) with 3 antennas, and I am fairly certain you can run 3 channel on only 2 antennas as well.

Wifi cards are categorized like this AxB:C, where A is the # of Transmit antenna, B is # of Recieve antenna, and C is the number of spacial streams.

3x3:3 for the 6300, and 2x2:2 for the 6200.

 

Nope, you can't, on wireless N if you want to achieve 450Mbps theoretical link rate, you need a router that supports three streams and an adapter that has 3 antennas as well (1 stream by antenna). You can use a 2x2 adapter with a 450Mbps router and vice-versa, but you won't get 450Mbps, you'll be at 300Mbps max.

 

You know what, you're right about that, but you will still gain benefit(better signal) from having the third antenna on a 6300 even if you are only hitting a 2-stream router.

 

It's been tested by my fellow networking moderator Pitabred and he concluded that there was no difference between two and three antennas on an Intel 6300 working with a 300mbps router.
Besides there's no way adding another antenna of the same gain to the card of the same transmit power would improve range nor coverage (since antennas are so close together)

 

It's more to do with the recieve diversity (but the spec also can utilize 3 antennas for TX as well). In a laptop where they are very close together it wont help much, but it can, and the spec allows it. That's all I was saying, 2x3:2 and 3x2:2 exist in the spec.