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I own an Dell Inspiron 15 3542 laptop, which does not support the 5GHz Wi-Fi bandwidth.

I want to know if I can change the wireless adapter to a WLAN 802.11AC so that my laptop can connect to a 5GHz Wi-Fi connection. Would my laptop be compatible with it (because my laptop originally had a 802.11 b/n/g product)?

Also, how do I check if a particular adapter is compatible with my laptop?

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    Err, in theory any mini PCI-e wireless card should work... but my concern would be (a) with laptops, hardware can be tightly bound to the system BIOS so things like the wireless/bluetooth switches or hotkeys might not work with a different card, and (b) the wireless antenna (that's built into the screen) might not be suitable for 5GHz communication and would need replacing too.
    – misha256
    Sep 17, 2015 at 1:59
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    In the title you say "driver", which implies software. You will in fact need hardware. The simplest fix for a laptop would be a USB dongle. 5ghz range is generally less than 2.4 and with some 5ghz wifi dongles range can be very limited due to size and antennae, there are however some with decent range, you just have to try and see what works for your case.
    – Tyson
    Sep 17, 2015 at 3:56

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Your best bet would be to buy either a USB Dongle or a full USB Adapter. You can find some really good ones, very easy to set up, and work straight out of the box just by typing "USB 5GHz Wi-Fi Adapter" on eBay, Amazon, etc.

They're also way easier to do, and often even cheaper, than replacing the onboard card and possibly even needing to replace the antenna.

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Intel 7260 on my Dell 3542 works fine.

[14.531378] iwlwifi 0000: 06: 00.0: Detected Intel (R) Dual Band Wireless AC 7260, REV = 0x144

Bus 001 Device 002: ID 8087: 07dc Intel Corp.

Maybe useful for someone..

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