Inspiron B120 / Wireless help...

The reason you have no option for a MiniPCI wireless card is because you bought the cheapest bottom of the line laptop computer that you could possibly buy.  It looks like you really researched this purchase well before buying it. Of course it is easier to blame Dell.  It looks to me like your only option is a USB wireless network adapter.  Good luck.  Note that if you are still within 21 days of invoice, you can return the system, do some research so that you are sure you are getting exactly what you want with all of the features you need, then spend a few more dollars and get what you need.  Good luck.

Steve

volcano11,

Is there any reason you have to be so pompous and mean spirited to a poster who was only asking for help?  He just wants a little help.

B-Roll,

I too recently bought the B120 as I was looking for the cheapest notebook I could find.  I did not research it well enough but I am pretty happy with my purchase as I have since researched what I need.  I was disappointed in a few things, one of them being the wireless interface and another being the express card slot vice the pcmcia slot.  I thought that was standard.

At any rate, I contacted Dell via chat and they were quite helpful, unlike our friend volcano here.  I quickly figured out the only way a wireless nic card was going to work was to use it in the minicard slot underneath next to memory.  The Dell chat representative told me that the Dell Wireless 1370 or 1470 would each work in that slot.  I couldn't locate one on the Dell site but I was able to locate one on ebay using 'dell usb wireless card' search I believe.

I have no idea what the express slot holds or can do but then I haven't researched it much yet.  Maybe someday I will be as wise as volcano but hopefully I will be nicer too.  Good luck B.

Cheers,

Wiredless

I just opened up my son's B120 to add an Intel 2200 b/g Mini-PCI adapter AND... there IS a Mini-PCI slot, but...NO ANTENNA leads!  WHAT GIVES?????

Please someone tell me that this is a mistake & the antenna is in there somewhere??

XPAddict

Volcano, you are an a**.  Dell did more than a p***-poor job of advising purchasers that its notebooks are going with the ExpressCard over the PC Card.  This new Inspiron B130, as nice as it is, does me no good if I can't go wireless and I am very displeased with the company for being so thoughtless about the use of PC Cards for wireless access. . . .

Does anyone know what fits in the expresscard slot?

Cheers,
Wiredless2003

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@Wiredless2003 wrote:

Does anyone know what fits in the expresscard slot?

Look here:

http://www.expresscard.org/web/do/pub/resourcedirectory

This is the industry organization site for ExpressCards - at today's count... hold your breath... there are TEN(!) released products to INSERT into the slot! Whoo HOO! One of them IS a network card... from Abocom, but... go to their web page... and they DON'T even list it on their products page! No wireless adapter... anywhere... but... remember it is ONLY the B120 that is wireless crippled, because Dell in it's infinite wisdom left out a $0.15 (based on bulk purchase, maybe less) part from the LCD assembly procedure that resigns this machine to the LOWEST of LOW end computers! Heck, even a 5 year old used laptop from eBay can take an additional PCCard wireless card! They took extra steps to make this machine unusable. Want to add an antenna yourself? (after all the Mini-PCI slot & associated electronics are still there.) Look here for how someone else added the antenna's to an IBM machine:

http://www.jordanautomations.com/tpa31-internal-wifi-upgrade.html

What REALLY chapped my w/Dell is that in separate purchases in the last three weeks, I have bought a high end Inspiron 6000 (2GHZ, 2G RAM, 100GB HD, 129MB ATI, ...), an XPS 140 (3GHZ, 250 SATA, 2GB RAM, high end graphics, ...) and my son is scr3wed on his first computer purchase from a company I have used since Michael Dell first started selling these machines! In fact, I worked for the company (SCI, now Samnia-SCI) that actually physically built the machines for Dell in its early days. This incident has really soured me on their competence and respect for all of its customers, the ones who buy its cheap machines as well as the ones who buy the full-blown ones.

XPAddict

I'm going with something from Linksys that plugs into a USB port.  I'll sell the Linksys PC Card wireless unit on eBay.  Somewhere, some marketing idiot came up with this idea.  Poor work on an otherwise good machine.

There are smaller choices for USB/Wireless such as these:

TRENDware TRENDnet 54Mbps 802.11g (even has a wireless hotspot locator as well)
http://geek.pricegrabber.com/search_getprod.php/masterid=10274948

IOGEAR WIRELESS NETWORKING 54 B/G USB ADAPTER (SMALL!!)
http://geek.pricegrabber.com/search_getprod.php/masterid=8336494

XPAddict