~Toughbooktalk~

So WLAN and BT appear to be separate cards inside my CF-31. The WWAN card is meh, I don't need it but the slot is a M.2, so that is useful. I was hoping to snag the wireless card out of my parts MacBook, but it looks like I actualy have to purchase one. So, I am wondering if I can pop this one into the WWAN slot? Broadcom BCM94352Z NGFF M.2 WiFi WLAN Bluetooth 4.0 802.11ac

I need to do some more digging as this might not be the best option... And if I need it to be in the WLAN spot, I will need a different card obviously. The main issue with a hackintosh laptop is the WLAN and BT drivers. I think if I can get past this with the right card, the rest will be much simpler to tackle.

On some of the older machines ones from HP/Dell from ebay wouldn't work. I think Toshiba would but don't quote me on that. But that was getting them used and "branded" so to speak.

The Bob Johnston video is informative: How to Replace the Wifi Card in a Panasonic Toughbook CF-31 I still have a lot of questions though...

My original idea was to yoink the WWAN card and put the wifi/bt broadcom card in there so that I can tune one setup off and the other on. But I would be going pretty deep in to install a second set of antennas. There seems to be enough usable options for the pci-e that I don't need the m.2 slot broadcom card. And I found some cool drive options for the m.2 slot also.

Oddly OSX actually has WWAN listed in "About this Mac" under the hardware section. I guess some MacBooks had a cellular option. Makes me wonder if there is support built in for the WWAN card... Well my plan for the moment is to do a dry run install and see what does/doesn't work. The intel wireless probably won't. If it doesn't, I will figure out what card I want and post it up here to verify.

I also need the short card, so I need to see if there is a short combo that is any good.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/macOS-Handoff- ... 632-2357-0

Will this fit the WLAN spot? I know it is a half card in there. Just don’t know if this longer card can fit under the bracket. Even if I have to mod/trim the bracket I would be fine with that. I can probably figure it out if I disassemble it. Trying to avoid doing that twice.

Its cheap enough. I dont have that model but you might be able to make it fit by grinding away some of the inside. I did similar to a cf-h2, added internal usb card to power internal gps and made usb type-c port

I may do that... I put buying anything on hold though until I get past getting the HDD configured right for the installation to take... That has proven a bit tricky and then I got distracted with new cool projects to poke at!