CF31 wireless ac upgrade

Is it possible to upgrade the wireless LAN card on Mk 1-4 CF31s to the current ac version as fitted to the Mk5 CF31s?

 

Not until there is a Panasonic approved model, BIOS gets in the way sometimes.

 

A Intel 7260 will work. Make sure you get a 7260 that has ac. Not all of them do.
Avoid Hp and Lenovo cards.

But Bluetooth may or may not. Early mks you need to keep the dedicated Bluetooth module.
There seemed to be trouble with Bluetooth on later mks when upgrading the wifi card. Later mks use the combo card with bluetooth built into the wifi. I don't use Bluetooth so I did not care.

BTW..The 7260 is faster when connected to an 802.11ac router. But the Intel 6300 blows it away for all other situations. Especially true for distance and weak signals. The 6300 would need a third antenna installed.

 

Thanks Shawn.

Would the ac7265 as fitted to Mk5 work too?

 

Hmm.
I never tried a 7265. I have tried a 7260. I actually still have one or two of them.
What's the difference between the 7260 and 7265?

 

7265 has M.2 form factor

 

Well that is out.

 

OK. I bought and installed a new ac7260 card and had the following issues:

1. After downloading the Intel7260 ProSet drivers, the card was recognised and connected to my router but only on the n band. I changed the settings so that it would only connect to the 5ghz band - which it did but again only on n. I just could not get it to connect as ac.

2. WAN was greyed out in the options under the Panasonic wireless switch - even though it was working and recognised in Device Manager.

3 As mentioned by Shawn above: bluetooth would not work. I downloaded and installed the 7260 Intel bluetooth drivers but still no joy. Bluetooth was not even shown in the BIOS when I went to check it had not become disabled by the BIOS.

Any ideas much appreciated....

 

1. Maybe this 7260 doesn't support 802.11ac, maybe router doesn't support 802.11ac
2. WAN is not Wireless LAN (Wi-Fi), so it's not a question of 7260 at all
3. Maybe this 7260 doesn't have bluetooth on board, maybe BIOS doesn't allow it's bluetooth to start.

 

Like I said above......
Not all 7260's have 802.11AC
Some are 802.11N only

Post a photo of your card.

 

Thankyou.

1.Card is definitely badged ac7260... and definitely an ac router as other laptops connect on ac.

2. Sorry my typo should have said LAN not WAN. So Wireless LAN shows on the list but is greyed out.

3. Looking at Intel specs for ac7260 it doesn't show any non bluetooth versions available. How could I check? https://ark.intel.com/products/75439/Intel-Dual-Band-Wireless-AC-7260

 

Look at this page

https://ark.intel.com/products/series/75620/Intel-Wireless-7200-Series

7260's ALL have Bluetooth on them. <<<<---THIS IS INCORRECT

ALL 7260ac have Bluetooth on them

Wireless switch is greyed out because BIOS does not "see" 7260
If you go into BIOS and check wireless section, WLAN will now be missing with the 7260 installed.

 

That's not true - these 802.11n editions don't have bluetooth:
7260HMW NB
7260NGW NB
But everything else in your post is correct, of course

Geraout, there is nothing you can do to enable 802.11ac. It just has to work... Try to change driver

 

Hmm..you are correct.
Odd that the Intel Ark does not list any without Bluetooth. But here is the product brief for those 2 models.
http://www.intel.com/content/dam/ww...ct-briefs/dual-band-wireless-n-7260-brief.pdf

 

Seems Intel is very relaxed for some years. Awful drivers, awful website (even datasheets), almost no progress at all. Hope AMD will force them to work. Their new Ryzen is a very good CPU

 

That's what I understood ....

 

The Intel 7260 802.11ac Bluetooth 4.0 Wireless-AC Notebook DUAL BAND 867Mbps 7260HMW is what your looking for. I purchased from EBAY for about $24.00 and upgraded the card, downloaded the drivers from INTEL works like a champ!

Here is your install video for the CF-31

 

Your card is badged as AC model but it is also branded by Dell. See "D P/N" as Dell Part Number.

Every vendor uses their own VID/PID or a Sub-VID/Sub-PID. It is possible that AC doesn't work because Dell requested to have it disabled in the EEPROM of the card.

You should try to get the generic Intel card and check with that. If you can dump the BIOS you can check the VID/PID allowed combinations and modify your Dell card accordingly.

For example a CF-19 MK7 had in the BIOS only the 6235 card as far as I saw...

Bluetooth will not work since the PID if for sure different than in the 6235 and if it doesn't find it it will not enable it. Also the wireless switcher could have the IDs inside since I modded a BIOS to have the WLAN card VID/PID whitelisted and wireless switcher is still not showing the WLAN. BIOS is OK, RF switch is OK, wireless switcher not.

Hope it helps...