Can I upgrade my network card

Feb 7, 2018
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I want to increase my network speed. I have google fiber 1000 but the laptop can only measure up to 100 mbps.

Also can I add ddr3 to increase speed?
 
Solution


I would say maybe at absolute best. Here's the problem. From looking more in to your laptop, it looks as though the general Toshiba C75D series may have had either MSata or PCIe cards used for it's wifi card. Those are two entirely different slots. So to know for sure which kind you have, you'll need to physically look at it. Which means pulling the bottom cover off of it and seeing what kind of card it is.

Your best bet is to buy a USB 3.0 wifi adapter.

Paul NZ

Admirable
Looks like it's got 2 ram slots and it supports up to 16 GB. That's if 64 bit is installed

If you can remove the network card, you should be able to buy a 100/1000 card.

If you can't you may have to buy a USB 100/1000 adapter

 

captaincharisma

Distinguished
it depends on what Toshiba does with their BIOS. most laptop manufacturers have a database encoded into the BIOS called a "white list" where the list only authorizes certain hardware like network cards to work. i ran into this when i wanted to upgrade the wifi card in my old Lenovo so i could use the 5ghz/AC band
 

jaslion

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Dec 17, 2012
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Whilst you can get a usb 3.0 to gigabit ethernet you will not really notice the speedincrease. You will download things slightly faster but the problem is that you have a very slow 5400rpm hdd which will not allow you to have use all of the bandwith of your fiber since it simply can't keep up with it.
All in all not worth it getting a better network interface since for regular browsing it will not speed anything up 1 bit. The things it could help with (downloading big games, streaming 8k video's,...) are things the laptop is not capable of handeling in it's current state.
 

ikaz

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Dec 27, 2005
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Your limited to 100mb assuming this is your laptop.
https://www.cnet.com/products/toshiba-satellite-c75d-b7230-17-3-a6-6310-6-gb-ram-750-gb-hdd-us/specs/

However you could try something like this:

usb 3.0 network adapter

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00M77HMU0/ref=asc_df_B00M77HMU05363074/?tag=hyprod-20&creative=394997&creativeASIN=B00M77HMU0&linkCode=df0&hvadid=167140037427&hvpos=1o2&hvnetw=g&hvrand=9182455275538255697&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9031336&hvtargid=pla-195027879195
 

13thmonkey

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Jan 10, 2006
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Sorry but that's BS Jaslion, 100Mbps is about 12MBps, so much much slower than a 5400rpm disk. 1Gbps, is around 100MBps in the real world, which should be achievable by a 5400rpm disk, so something that is at least 5-6x faster than 100Mbps.
 

azaran

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Feb 17, 2010
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Increasing RAM isn't going to help your wifi speeds. If you don't want to go Ethernet cable you have two potential options.
1) The easy one. Get a USB 3 to AC wifi adapter. You will need to have a router capable of using AC (your current card only supports up to N networks).

2) Replace your existing wifi card with one meant for AC networks. Again, you would need a router capable of AC. From the looks of it, your existing card is a MSata card. While there are cards out there on the market that are AC capable you may run in to issues with the BIOS accepting the card like captaincharisma and Paul NZ said earlier in the thread. Your laptop isn't terribly difficult to tear down to the point where you can replace the card, but you'd need watch some teardowns to see how it's done and be comfortable doing so.

Since you're existing card is capping out at 100Mbs you may be running in to issues with your existing network and interference or poor coverage, in which case you may run in to issues with a higher performing wifi card/adapter.
 

azaran

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Feb 17, 2010
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I would say maybe at absolute best. Here's the problem. From looking more in to your laptop, it looks as though the general Toshiba C75D series may have had either MSata or PCIe cards used for it's wifi card. Those are two entirely different slots. So to know for sure which kind you have, you'll need to physically look at it. Which means pulling the bottom cover off of it and seeing what kind of card it is.

Your best bet is to buy a USB 3.0 wifi adapter.
 
Solution

jaslion

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Dec 17, 2012
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I was talking about 1000Mbps. I don't know what 5400 2.5inch hdds you have but the regular low end old toshiba drives are really slow.
 

13thmonkey

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Jan 10, 2006
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1Gbps is 1000Mbps. Since a 1000Mbps card will deliver about 120Mbps to the disk in perfect conditions, then in imperfect you might get 80MBps, which will be slower than a 5400rpm HDD.

Even the worst here is just below 80, which would still be 6-7 times better than what you could feed it with using 100Mbps.https://hddmag.com/best-hard-drive/#25review
Of the 3 samples, 2 are greater than 100MBps, the 3rd is around 50, which is still 4-5 times more than 100Mbps can supply and therefore 1Gbps would be beneficial. http://hdd.userbenchmark.com/Toshiba-Notebook-SSHD-25--1TB/Rating/1957