I just bought this Dell Inspiron N7010 a.k.a Inspiron 17r and at first I was happy with it. I mean it’s got 6GB (1X4GB Samsung RAM and 1X2GB Nanya RAM with a Max of 2X4GB) of DDR3 1333MHz RAM and a Blu Ray player and a HD LCD. The problem is that the WiFi card is crap.  According to it’s earlier documentation,that Dell has scrubbed all traces of, says it’s a 130Mbps dual channel (2.4GHz and 5GHz) WiFi card. The problem is that it maxes out on a Wireless N connection at a mere 72Mbps and can’t detect or connect to a 5GHz WiFi network. So my solution is to purchase an Intel Centrino Advanced-N 6200 Half Mini PCI Express WiFi card from Amazon.com and put it in myself.

Click to see it on Amazon.com

I ordered the card on Wednesday and had it on Friday.  I downloaded the service manual, and read through it.  The service manual shows that you have to take the laptop completely apart to remove the wireless card.  I had to take out over 20 screws, take the hard drive out, the keyboard off and separate the chassis from the palm rest. It took about 15 minutes to take it apart and put it back together.  There is just one more screw to take the wireless card out, then you just lift it out at a 45 degree angle and pop the new card in and then you are ready to put the laptop back together. Drivers for Windows 7 64bit can be downloaded from Intel here.  I can now connect to wireless N networks at 270 Mbps – 300 Mbps on average. I got my card for $25 with free shipping and it arrived in 2 days from Amazon.com. Not bad for a days work.