tomcat what is the best wifi..

tomcat what is the best wifi... for a cf-18 your the expert ive herd please help

 

Engenous 600Mw wifi card.. This is generally recognized as the best....

 

To sgttoughbook: the model#: Engenius EMP 8602-S.

Hey TB, or anyone else that knows...
I'm about ready to smash my 2200bg card into tiny little bits, I can't take the thing anymore performance-wise. I've been looking into the Engenius 600mw card and had a few questions is 600mw peak or average and can the tb pci slots power that card to its full potential, let me digress, what is the power output of the pci slot on a tb specifically a 28? Also, I've been looking at the ALFA AWPCI085H as a possibility, its IIIB so I'm good there but has a MMCX connector which is no big deal I can rig up a jumper aaaaand sensitivity looks real good. I'm not around anyone...ever... using this laptop so I don't have to worry about jacking up other people's wifi signal. I was just wondering if anyone has tried it or if there are any naysayers. if not I'm going to give Doc Brown a call and were going to turn this delorean into a time machine...

 

Be thankful you don't have a 2100B , they were worse

The less adapters the better, as each connection adds loss at wi-fi frequency's
Change the antenna end to the correct type if needed

Atheros based wi-fi cards for m-pci
The 600 mw Engenius or 400 mw version would be a good choice

The Intel cards in m-pci are not the best choice

The 2100B is just junk (low throughput,frequent disconnects, limited range)

The 2200bg is usable but suffers the occasional disconnects , slightly better range , it has good throughput but only when it wants to work

The best Intel m-pci is the 2915 , not as good as the Atheros, but fairly stable and good throughput ,acceptable range ,but less than Atheros and newer Intel mpci-e that the current Toughbooks have

The standard wi-fi cards in the cf-18 series were all Intel

Mk-1 - 2100B
Mk-2 - 2200BG
Mk-3/4/5 - 2915ABG


Alex

 

Haha yea, after I posted I looked back and thought, "wow I'm dumb, just change the end out.." but was too lazy to edit lol. I'm going to go dig around on modly's site and see if I can find any electrical specs.

Yea no kidding about the disconnects! BLEAAARGH! Seriously just driving around town diagnosing the problem I can't even connect to 3/4 of the unsecured networks (not using them of course as I have mobile broadband in my patrol truck). And another thing, I'll see "ghost" networks that I'm an hour away from but when the wlan refreshes boop there they are. I have to delete them in advanced settings to get them to go away. </psuedorant>
I'm using an external 5dbi antenna mounted to the side with an aux flag antenna. Anyhoo I'll report back what I find about the power output of the mpci slots.

 

Sensitivity is the most important spec for the laptop
The Atheros based cards are usually better
Remember that unless you are using your laptop as a server or access point ,the majority of use is in downloading, and transmit power has little effect on that


Alex

 

3.3 V~400ma or 5 V~400ma and the card consumption for the Engenius EMP 8602-S is exactly 400ma so in theory that card is working at full specs. Cool....
Mad props to Modly

Anyhoo that alfa card IS an atheros chipset specifically (AR5006X AR5414)
but anyhoo I'm giving up on it because the engenius card is a proven card AND sensitivity is IDENTICAL step for step across the board so whats the point. I'm not sure even with a 90 degree mmcx connector if I can make that turn under the HD caddy as the plug faces straight up at the caddy off the board so meh, if it aint broke don't fix it.

 

anyone tried one like this? ebay item # 140374199481
bluetooth and wifi in one, thinking of doing this to wife's cf-28 TB,(I Guess I 'have the DISEASE, we got 2 TBs I hear that's how it starts) no internal wifi, using linksys slot card hanging out the side right now. Thinking it's probably prone to getting sheared off.
I have heard mention putting wifi antennas under palm rests works on TB, what type of antennas do you use to do that, or was that gps antennas?

AAAAAUG, info overload!!!, been surfin the TB forums, having trouble sorting out what info belongs with what subject.

 

Do not get this card for your CF-28. It won't fit.
The old 28 only works with old style mini pci cards. The newer PCI-E cards plug into an entirely different connector.

Bob

 

what Greybeard said ...

 

thanks, really loving this forum, great info to be had by people who really know their stuff. I am a tool maker by trade, know a huge amount about machining, not much about fixing/customizing laptops, but am learning.

so what I want is this 130357431958
or this 160394853745
I don't see any mni pci with bluetooth, bummer

 

dammit, too slow... what greybeard said... blah blah blah...

1.21 giga-watts of NOT GONNA FIT MARTY!!

 

they are talking about wifi flag antennas, a main antenna and the aux antenna, there is also an external antenna technique that I use. Pics if you want them

 

are the flag antennas sufficient? i would like to do it all internal if I can
but yeah love to see what you have done.

 

Give them a try, and if you are not happy with the range change out one for an external
The cf-72 and cf-m34 that I modded hidden antenna's had OK,not good range

Alex

 

Flags.... BAH... RM antenna mods... GREAT... Aux SMA bulhead great.... 110v up the butt... not so great.... I think that was Beavis and Butt-head.

wlanparts.com has the best price on the Engenous cards that I have seen... but every time I say that... They sell out.

And by the way... It is Jigiwatts! Not Gigawats!

 

Well since my last post I had a little accidenty with the antenna palm rest. I think you jinxed me rick with all that talk about the fragility of the sarentel antenna!!! lmao I digress, capt dogfish had some pics of my exact same setup, let me go dig around for em...

The antenna is not screwed on in these pics but its for an sma antenna.
Sma is the main and the flag is the aux. I was getting 100 yards out of a 2200 card with this setup but would not get the card again. it disconnects all the time.

And here we go courtesy of capt dogfish:

 

The single flag antenna alone is quite sufficient for around the house if you have a decent router and card. It does not seem to matter how you hook the antennas up, "main" & "aux" are interchangeable as far as I can tell. One caveat, the external antenna bulkhead fitting we all use is RP-SMA. I've got a good story and a lot of SMA antennas as part of that learning curve! Props to Tucker for digging out those pictures.
CAP