Vostro 3450 WWAN add mod

Here is a post I did with some screen capture images of the results.

 

where is the mSATA card slot on the vostro 3450? daughter card?

 

Yes, it is in the daughterboard, placed to the right-top of your Laptop, where the two USB3.0 connectors also are. If I remember well, to install it you have to disassemble most of the laptop, which is fairly simple if you have some practice (to me, the hardest part was to take out the keyboard).
Some 3450 models don't come with the connector, but you may solder a plastic (female) connector to the empty pins. This is the main point of this thread. Alternatively follow the Ebay link (up this same thread) where they sell it ready for you. Take notice that this daughterboard is the one that has the 1rst generation Renesas USB3.0 chips that were replaced late last year because they were far from optimized (to say it politely).
Some of us have been attentive for any new on Dell's replacement of these boards, but I very much doubt they do something... except because of a novel reaction to their actual poor laptop sales, that at some point may force them to listen to their customers and possibly offer a paid upgrade service/buy and install yourself.
//I do sense, manufacturers might start to consider their customer base as a new market for upgrades (like the one we are commenting about), since these relatively minor step-ups in performance won't cannibalize the customer 2-4 years replacement lapse and would be a good revenue source opportunity that they have forgotten for too long... We'll see.
Hope it helps.

 

When I install my drive, will it show up as [drive model here] on the boot list? I ordered a new Adata 120GB drive that can read/write > 500MB sec.....

 

does anyone know the updated part number for the daugher card that has the WWLAN/mSATA connector and updated USB 3.0 ports?

 

Installed the drive and it does not show up in the system in device manager or manged volumes. Intel RST does not see it either. It does show as powered up and ready to go (blue power light). does not show up in BIOS either. Adata 128GB drive.

 

Thy this one. Go to softpedia.com and download "EASEUS Partition Master 9.1.0 Home Edition" freeware, and carefully run it.

It helps to identify units that may have a conflicting IRQ, lost MBR or partitions. I rather manage my drives with this software than with Windows tools.

If it appears somewhere, make sure it is not hidden, assign it a letter and a label, see if it is going to be primary or logical, and see if it is formatted using NTSC. Once you have it, configure windows for SSD usage with that specific drive, there are plenty of good guides over the web.

 

it does not show in BIOS or Windows. Ran the utility and no go. all the daughter cards with thw wwan/msata connector support a drive, right?

 

Well, it did worked for two different people as posted in this very same thread, so it should also work -by design- to you.

I would look for the state of physical connections inside (check the pins for each) or related Ws services.
One additional software trick would be to create a small new partition and try different OSs and use their ways to mount/install drives and evolve from there...

 

^I am going to test the drive in another system and see what goes from there.