Hacking the Mac mini: Wireless-N Upgrade
22-Oct, 2009
My lady friend and I use our 2007 Mac mini as an HTPC. We hook up the mini to our Samsung LCD TV via a DVI to HDMI adapter, sound comes courtesy of the minimalist Bose Companion 3 multimedia speaker system and we control the whole sha-bang via the Rowmote Pro iPhone app.
We typically spend most of our time upstairs, so that’s where I put our wireless router; a high shelf is ideal. Our TV/movie room is downstairs and, since we don’t subscribe to cable-TV service [300-channel bundling bastards], we use our setup to do the whole Hulu-Netflix-streaming thang. Running Ethernet cable in the walls was right out and I tried two different powerline adapters from Best Buy, which yielded crappy results. To make a long story not so long, I decided to upgrade the wireless card in the Mac mini from the “802.11g” variety to the “802.11n” flavor. Enough of the blathering…let’s get hacking.
I was inspired by a post on EvilTyrant.com which provided links to the hardware and confirmed all was well after the hack.
The Hardware
- 1 SparkLAN WPEA-124N 802.11n a/b/g/N 2.4/5GHz Dual-band Mini PCI-Express Module ($59.95 ea.)
- 3 Laptop Internal Aerial Antennas U.Fl plug connector ($9.99 ea.)
The Tools
- #0 phillips screwdriver
- #1 phillips screwdriver
- 2 sharp-edged putty knives
- tweezers
- old credit card (rounded corners)
- adult beverage of choice
Cracking it Open
Before you start open-heart surgery on your Mac mini, for the love of all things holy, watch the Mac mini Intel 2006-2008 Install Video from Other World Computing and page through the most-excellent Mac mini A1176 tear-down tutorial from ifixit.com. Then, take a big swig from your adult beverage and dive in.
Click on the thumbnail image (right) to view my photo-set of the tear-down. Be very, very gentle when using your tweezers to lift the hard drive thermal sensor cable connector up off its socket on the logic board and the power button cord. The aforelinked ifixit.com step-by-step tutorial also says to detach the audio board ribbon cable. I did not perform this step as it scared the crap out of me.
After replacing the old WiFi card (two screws), connect the three antennas and carefully bend them out the back via the left-most vent-hole. Wallah! She is done and the resulting 300 Mbit/s 802.11 N-hotness!
