Aspire 5733Z-4633 bluetooth ( I know it isn't built-in )

I have an Acer 5733Z-46633 laptop, which comes with an Atheros AR5B125 WiFi card. That card does not provide bluetooth connectivity.

I would like to have bluetooth in that laptop, but several obstacles need to be overcome.

I am aware that I can buy a bluetooth dongle, and that I can also buy a different laptop which has that feature built-in. Let's say I have a thing for pain, and that for several reasons neither of those are options.

I also understand that I will need to route the bluetooth antenna and cable through the LCD and across the motherboard, but I can handle that.

The obstacles I see are:

There is only one antenna wire in the minicard port, whereas all bluetooth cards have two terminals.

I can purchase and install a bluetooth antenna, but I would like some additional information about that in order to choose the best antenna for the job. I have found articles on the theory of bluetooth antenna design, and ads for bluetooth antennae for sale, but nothing on the geometry or specs that I should be looking for.

The card I have available is an HP/Broadcom BCM94313HMGBLP1. I can't find any documentation which clarifies which terminal goes to which antenna, let alone the switching mechanism which allows the card to listen on both WiFi and bluetooth, and respond to one or the other.

Broadcom's published phone numbers are set up to prevent you from reaching an actual human being, and HP, being as helpful as they are, is the wrong place to go, since they will immediately refer you to Broadcom.

Responses which help to achieve the stated goal are welcome. Others, not so much.

Thanks to helpful forum members.

Accepted answers

All comments

JackE

Sorry, the 5733z mainboard does not have a bluetooth interface or separate card socket. It also will not recognize bluetooth hardware in a wifi-BT m.2 combo card. The only BT option for this mainboard is the CSR 4.x mini USB. Jack E/NJ

inforit

At the risk of being snarky, please read the question carefully before answering.

Per the question title, I know that bluetooth is not built in to the motherboard.

Per the description, the card I have, an HP/Broadcom BCM94313HMGBLP1 is NOT an M.2 card, but rather a half card which fits the existing slot where the Atheros card is right now.

The questions are:

1) which antenna works best in these laptop enclosures ? there are other aspire models with bluetooth, and hopefully someone on the forum knows what geometry is used in those, which is probably the best candidate here.

2) which terminals on the HP/Broadcom card go to which antenna ? hopefully someone on the forum has experience with this card or one like it, and can share what they know about the terminal posts.

I would be very happy to hear from anyone who can share that information.

JackE

It might recognize the wifi but not the BT functionality of the combo card. Jack E/NJ

inforit

what makes you say that ?

JackE

Like other WinVista/Win7 era mainboards, the card socket does not have a BT connector interface with the CPU, only wifi. However, the mainboard can handle BT thru its USB ports. Jack E/NJ

inforit

tolerate my ignorance. there is a wifi card in a slot, and the wifi/bluetooth combo card fits into the same slot. why should that card not provide bluetooth service ?

the point of the slot is that it allows you to plug in a variety of cards which provide different features. it is sometimes possible to plug in a card which provides storage. why should the protocol matter ? if the OS supports it, and there is a corresponding service (bluetooth is built into Windows 10), it should work without issues.

the only question is which antenna is the right one.

if there is more to know, please share.

JackE

The BT connectors on a modern mini m.2 dual band combo card don't have corresponding line traces to the CPU inside the mini m.2 socket on mainboards of that era. Back then a separate non-m.2 BT socket was used on mainboards so equipped. The existing lid antenna is tuned to the 2.4GHz wifi band for these older models but may still pick up 5GHz signals if the router is close enough. Jack E/NJ

inforit

so the Acer 5733Z-46633 laptop has an M.2 socket where the wifi card is plugged in ?
and the HP/Broadcom BCM94313HMGBLP1 is an M.2 card ?

again, I could be displaying ignorance, but it appears that the PCIe socket is NOT an M.2 socket, and the Broadcom card is NOT an M.2 card.

StevenGen

inforit said:

I have an Acer 5733Z-46633 laptop, which comes with an Atheros AR5B125 WiFi card. That card does not provide bluetooth connectivity.

I would like to have bluetooth in that laptop, but several obstacles need to be overcome.

I am aware that I can buy a bluetooth dongle, and that I can also buy a different laptop which has that feature built-in. Let's say I have a thing for pain, and that for several reasons neither of those are options.

I also understand that I will need to route the bluetooth antenna and cable through the LCD and across the motherboard, but I can handle that.

The obstacles I see are:

There is only one antenna wire in the minicard port, whereas all bluetooth cards have two terminals.

I can purchase and install a bluetooth antenna, but I would like some additional information about that in order to choose the best antenna for the job. I have found articles on the theory of bluetooth antenna design, and ads for bluetooth antennae for sale, but nothing on the geometry or specs that I should be looking for.

The card I have available is an HP/Broadcom BCM94313HMGBLP1. I can't find any documentation which clarifies which terminal goes to which antenna, let alone the switching mechanism which allows the card to listen on both WiFi and bluetooth, and respond to one or the other.

Broadcom's published phone numbers are set up to prevent you from reaching an actual human being, and HP, being as helpful as they are, is the wrong place to go, since they will immediately refer you to Broadcom.

Responses which help to achieve the stated goal are welcome. Others, not so much.
Thanks to helpful forum members.

Look, Bluetooth is limited to about a 30 feet range at best, its not like an FM signal or a WiFi signal. Have a look at this Broadcom BCM94313HMGBLP1 card antenna combo its a "HP Broadcom BCM94352HMB WiFi Card Bluetooth 4.0 724935-001 Antennas Screws T620" have a look here: HP Broadcom BCM94352HMB WiFi Card Bluetooth 4.0 724935-001 Antennas Screws T620 | eBay

Just as a reference, this is the WiFi/BT card wire setup for a V3-571G and where the black/white antenna wires go, Black to 1 AMIN and White to 2 AUX. Also you can always swap them around if its the other way around on the Broadcom BCM94313HMGBLP1 card.

Image: https://us.v-cdn.net/6029997/uploads/editor/49/0g83j9x6b0gb.jpg

V3-571G Atheros AR9462-AR5B22 WiFi/BT card wires setup

Image: https://us.v-cdn.net/6029997/uploads/editor/tf/68ugu1opmdav.jpg

Broadcom BCM94313HMGBLP1 card antenna combo wires

JackE

It's called a mini m.2 card socket. The dual band BT combo card should fit if the its keys slots are the same as the single band card you pull out. Try it. You may even get BT to work and magically prove me wrong.

Good luck. Jack E/NJ

inforit

it turns out that the Broadcom card has fewer traces on the edge that slides into the slot than the ??? (wifi only) card which is the original part.

so here's the deal (drum roll):

oddly enough, the result of plugging the card into a mini PCI socket in my laptop running Windows 10 and loading the driver you linked to produces the following results:

Both the wifi and bluetooth adapters show up in Device Manager

Broadcom 802.11n Network Adapter PCI device 4727 = BCM4313 802.11bgn Wireless Network Adapter

Broadcom 20702 Bluetooth 4.0 Adapter PCI device 21E3 = BCM20702A0 HP Portable Valentine

I can get that laptop and another one to see each other on wifi using a Netgear router with wifi built in and DHCP running on the LAN side. Each laptop takes an IP address and they can ping each other through the router.

I can get the laptops to see each other, pair and transfer files via bluetooth (with the wifi router shut off).

If, however, I try to connect the wifi to a hotspot (in a restaurant), the laptop with the Broadcom card will say connected and secured, but any attempt to bring up a web page results in a connection reset.

I am going to use wifi diag tools to further investigate that, but it seems that the card is actually working very nicely.

An interesting part of this is that the laptop in question only has a single antenna wire, intended for the wifi connection, which is all the original card had, and that card only has a single antenna terminal.

JackE

Congrats. You might want to run a few driver search tools like iobit's DriverBooster freeware to see if they'll pick up any better drivers online that might address the hotspot quirks. Jack E/NJ

Driver Booster https://www.iobit.com/en/driver-booster.php
Driver Talent https://www.drivethelife.com/
Driver Fix http://driverfix.com/
https://www.lifewire.com/free-driver-updater-tools-2619206

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