AAO D250 3G Modification

Hi guys, I've just completed the first major step in upgrading my AAO D250 to 3G Capabilities.

I'll be posting this step by step as I get it done. With photo's if I don't get too ahead of myself.

So far I've ordered and received a Sierra Wireless MC5725 WWAN modem. Bought it from eBay for about $15 from a European seller. I know this is only a 3.1mbps card, but that's all I need for now.
I've just looked in My Ebay at the same item, the seller has more stock, but for some reason now selling them for 90.00 Euros, I guess I got mine on a fluke? http://cgi.ebay.com.au/ws/eBayISAPI.dll ... K:MEWNX:IT

After taping pin 20 (the second pin from the notch, on the underside, not the antenna mounting side of the card) and installing, Windows 7 immediately popped up asking me to install drivers.

The drivers for this card weren't on the manufacturers site, however they were only a Google away. First result in the list after searching for "Sierra Wireless MC5725 Drivers" took me straight to the Lenovo site, where I was able to quickly download the drivers.

This is the site where I obtained the drivers: http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... 67954.html - they were only about 2.8Mb and installed relatively quickly on Win7.

The card is now ready to go. The next step will be to attach a SIM reader, and an antennae. I'm not sure if it'll work, but I have the old WiFi antennae from my old AAO 150, I'll see if it'll connect.

The SIM Reader part number required for the AAO D250 is a Molex 0475530001. I am in the process of accquiring mine from JerryT. Thanks Bro!.

 

I have the sim readers, PM me for price and details.

 

The dream is (temporarily) dead

Just an update:

The SIM readers arrived with many thanks to JerryT.

But while installing it, i've accidentally removed a pad from the board, pretty much rendering it impossible to install a SIM reader, so now I've got a spare MC5725 mPCIE modem, and am in the market for a modem with SIM reader attached.

 

you might want to look up the novatel eu850. I was doing some research previously and this was the only one I found. It has an integrated sim slot. they're on ebay but seem pretty hard to find.

good luck tho!!

 

I just had an amazing stroke of genius!

I have a MiniPCIe 3G modem that works, and two SIM readers.

The SIM reader is fed to the 3G card via the MiniPCIe Port right?

so in theory, i can put the SIM Reader wherever I want, and solder wires from it to the modem!

I think the SIM reader would be very handy and accessible right beside the card reader

Just need to find the mPCIE pins for the SIM reader... can't be hard

JerryT posted the pinout for the mPCIE port a li'l while ago, just gotta match up the pinout of the D250 SIM Reader to that and I should be online

 

Re: The dream is (temporarily) dead

Make a jumper from a strand of solid copper wire from a cat 5 cable.

 

And after you test it and make sure it works put a dab of fingernail polish over it to insulate it and provide strain relief. As long as there isn't a through hole there you should be OK

 

After poking and prodding and giving my best with everything on this mod, I've come to the conclusion that the modem I bought must be farked. The whole reason i accidentally took that solder pad off was because i kept getting "hardware failure" in the modem so I thought I'd remove and re-solder it to make sure it's in properly.

So then I tried attaching the sim reader direcly to the appropriate pins on the modem itself. Same thing. So I removed the modem from the computer only to find it was insanely hot. There was no solder bridges from where I attached the sim reader. So I've come to the conclusion that I wasted $15 on this modem.

Definately going to wait for another 3G Modem with integrated SIM Reader before I even think of attempting this mod again. I'm really not happy with myself over this one as I've done some far more difficult projects before.

 

Nothing is more difficult than a faulty part because it leads you to assume you did something wrong and you start desoldering stuff that's perfectly fine and 4 layer motherboards aren't exacly 'user friendly' when it comes to SMD rework .... At the service centers they just swap in a new board even for things as small as a bad resistor because of the labor cost of rework, especially if you hit a snag