PPC hardware hack idea: 802.11g in an original AirPort slot.

[Anonymous Freak]

I have found something very interesting...

An "all-internal" size, 16-bit PC Card, 802.11g card.*

That's right, an 802.11g card that is physically-compatible and electrically-compatible with the original AirPort card slot. It is the Summit SDC-PC10G. It is made for "industrial" devices, and has two antenna sockets that appear to be the same type as on the original AirPort card (although "vertical", not in-line, but they are slightly recessed, so it shouldn't be a problem.)

I cannot find any information on what 802.11g chipset it uses, though. There are plenty of third-party-supporting WiFi drivers, so even if it doesn't have an OS X-recognized-as-native-AirPort chipset, there should be a way to make it work.

Now, am I willing to spend € 82 (plus shipping) to gamble on this?

Sadly, I don't think I'm willing to make the € 82 gamble (that's $108 at present exchange rates - plus taxes and shipping.) Anyone else willing to take on this experiment? (Or start a collection to help me do it?)

My thought was that this would be great to make a "better-than-11Mbps wireless" G4 Cube, without resorting to USB. Because I would love to have a cube that only has a power cord going in, and only a display cord coming out. Oh, and the insane way I found this? Google Image search for "PC Card 802.11g -CardBus", and rifled through the (still nearly all CardBus) pictures until I found one that was obviously not CardBus, and not really an 802.11b card.

*(They also have an 802.11a+802.11g card, but it requires a separate antenna for the 5 GHz band, which no original AirPort slot-device has.)

 

[volvo242gt]

If I come across one at RE-PC, I can pop it into the MDD and see if it works.

-J

 

[uniserver]

pretty interesting piece of info thanks!

G is much better then B, more then double the speed.

 

[NJRoadfan]

Looks like its a Wireless-G Compact Flash card in a PC Card adapter. There are a few CF Wireless-G adapters out there that are MUCH cheaper, but have the antenna plastic stub. The other problem is lack of Macintosh drivers. These CF devices have Windows CE and XP drivers from what I can see.

 

[Anonymous Freak]

Looks like its a Wireless-G Compact Flash card in a PC Card adapter. There are a few CF Wireless-G adapters out there that are MUCH cheaper, but have the antenna plastic stub. The other problem is lack of Macintosh drivers. These CF devices have Windows CE and XP drivers from what I can see.

Hence the reason to find out what chipset they have. There are numerous third-party WiFi drivers for OS X out there - and chipsets that are used in the AirPort and AirPort Extreme cards are natively supported. (There is a CardBus card you can throw in a PowerBook G3 (Wallstreet or above,) or Titanium PowerBook G4 that is recognized by OS X as a native AirPort Extreme card.)

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

Interesting, I wonder if that's the card that came with my Pismo, I'll have to find it to see which model it is.

I bought a couple of 3Com 11a/b/g cards with the retractable XJACK antenna with the same thought in mind.

M/N: SL-3040

3CRPAG175

I haven't even played with it yet, but I figured it might be hacked into the internal slot of the Pismo.

 

[gsteemso]

(There is a CardBus card you can throw in a PowerBook G3 (Wallstreet or above,) or Titanium PowerBook G4 that is recognized by OS X as a native AirPort Extreme card.)

Argh! Details please? Make & model? Does it go in the actual external PC Card slot or what?

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

My card is AWOL for the moment, but it plugs into the CardBus slot and has a good size antenna pod. It'll turn up soon, I'm in cleaning/organizing mode.

I missed the bit about the pictured card being a 16 bit PCMCIA card . . .

. . . oh, for an OS9 driver for my beloved Beater (1400c/G3) and internal antenna!

http://www.summitdata.com/SDC-PC10G.html

Chipset = Broadcom BCM4318E

 

[Paralel]

Bringing this one back from the dead, I have a one of these on order. I would love to get it to work on classic Mac OS. Drivers are the big issue. Anyone have any insights on this? As T80 mentioned, its based on the BCM4318E.

 

[eastone]

Bringing this one back from the dead, I have a one of these on order. I would love to get it to work on classic Mac OS. Drivers are the big issue. Anyone have any insights on this? As T80 mentioned, its based on the BCM4318E.

I have such a card and it does not work in the airport slot. It is visible in the system, but only in the additional pci-pcmcia card, of course it does not work here either. All on G4 mdd and Leopard.

 

[Paralel]

Huh, I wonder why the original airport card slot rejects it?