swapped flaky Atheros AR5BXB63 for Broadcom

Just thought I'd pipe up in here and share with you all that I finally gave up on the flaky Atheros 5007-
After it stopped working, I never got it to work reliably again, and I tried a bunch of stuff-
and finally resolved to get it out and replaced.
I Replaced it with a Broadcom 4311 based wifi card.
This was a pull from a Compaq C300 (built late 2006). HP made that Compaq laptop,
but I heard that the Dell equivalent (Dell 1390) works fine as well.

I turned the Acer on from hibernation, and Windows Vista picked it right up, and installed the drivers for it.

I will keep you posted on how it is working.

For the record, the Atheros wireless was quite erratic, it would stop working all the time, lose connection
and then disappear from the device manager. Often, it would stop working when coming out of standby.
Before I flashed the computer from 3301 to 3308, it seemed to be fine. But after that, and I could never get it to work quite right.

 

Oh yeah, for those interested, the swap took less than 10 minutes to do,
it took a patient hand and my trusty set of mini-screwdrivers.
I looked on ebay, and you can find those wireless cards for like US $10.
Right now, it is too early for me to tell if this has fixed my wireless problems, but this Atheros was really
quite flaky, and my hopes are high that this will be in the past now.

And if it works for me, this is a fast and easy fix-
and I really like this little machine-
and so was quite worth the time.

 

After some extensive testing my verdict is:
I love my One 100% !!! Wireless works all day,
since the first time the Broadcom 4311 established connection to my router last night.
It works after coming out of standby and hibernation, it just works. I've been on the internet
doing all sorts of stuff, including watching movies on Hulu, and bittorrent.
I should have done this swap sooner.
This netbook should accept pretty much any wireless mini PCI-e card including
cards with Intel 3945ABG (Centrino wireless-G), Intel 4965-N (Centrino 2 with wireless N)
both of which should be good for Linux as well (whereas broadcom cards need ndiswrapper)

Wireless is flawless now, I am a happy camper.

 

days later, the broadcom chip still performs well and there are never any problems connecting to Wireless-G routers, on open and WPA2 access points. This is on Windows Vista SP1.

 

Interesting idea. What I want is a card that works with Linux, with good reception & near 100% reliability.
Has anyone swapped the card on a Linux machine?

 

i swapped the atheros card out too, for an apple branded broadcom 4321 chipset card. Not had a single problem since. Well worth the effort

 

Do you run Linux or XP?

 

neither..

vista/windows 7/osx

 

As I said in the post you quoted, it is possible to replace the Atheros 5007 mini-PCIe
card with one that uses the Intel 3945ABG (wireless-G, from Centrino laptops) or even a 4965-N
card (from Centrino-2 laptops). Those two are good choices for Linux, especially the older
but proven 3945ABG (which is wireless G).

The general consensus seems to be that cards from different makes work,
like pulls from HP or Compaq laptops, also Dell.

A card based on 4965-N will work, upgrading your Acer One to wireless-N, but caveat:
you can't have the wireless-N capability unless your card also comes with the extra antenna (because
wireless-N uses an additional antenna, and has three wires instead of the two for wireless-G).
Installing the third antenna can be done, but people would typically open the casing for the screen to glue
it in on the right side, which is a little adventurous (well, but so is opening the One just to swap the card...)
BUT, if you don't care about wireless-N, you can install only the two wires and ignore the additional wire,
leaving you with regular wireless-G (4965 does wireless-G and N).

People have had good results with installing either type, and they seem to work well under Linux
(being that Intel is good about releasing documentation and even drivers for their chips).

 

Thanks for the advice.
I have a couple more questions:

1 Is there anywhere which has good advice regarding how to install drivers on Linux?

2 Is there any way of comparing the range of WIFI cards before buying?

 

@jjj

Concerning the range: to have range, not only you need more power, but also a good matched antenna. I believe the default atheros card has the best range since it is matched to the antenna. The power output is pretty standard so if you change to another card, you might not get better range unless it is matched to the build-in antenna.

 

I thought antennae lengths are generally optimised for the frequency range of the transmission, which I figure must be standard for WiFi. But I'm no electrical engineer, so will be very receptive to a further explanation of antennae optimisation for WiFi cards.

 

personally myself. I prefer the atheros due to the broadcomm have shoddy at best support in linux, i would have to use ndiswrapper for any sort of network connectivity.

i am glad that it has worked out for you.