Mini PCI-E to USB Adapter with SIM Card Slot for 3G / 4G Network Cards

Mind the interface, PCIe versus M.2. It probably works fine, so I'm going to give it five stars, but I don't actually know because I wasn't actually able to use it. I don't want my inability to use it to affect their score.

Ordered one. Wouldn’t turn on. Returned for a different one. Wouldn’t power on.

Worked fine with no issues. I didn't pay attention to the SIM size when I purchased this, so I had to purchase an adapter for my Micro SIM to plug in my SIM. Does what I want, and connected at exact same speeds as my old modem. I had hoped for more (and still have time to tweak it), but it didn't go down, so that is a start. Shipped fast with no issues.

Case is decently well designed and quality of the enclosure is okay. Weird marking, but that’s obvious in the pictures. That said, I wasted about 6 hours using this with a Sierra Wireless MC7455 LTE module due to the included USB cable being defective. The cable wouldn’t provide enough power to operate the modem properly. Unfortunately the cable WOULD power up the modem and initialize a USB connection, but behavior was completely unpredictable after that. Simply swapping out the included USB cable (which is suspiciously thin) solved those problems.

Connected an mPCIe card and able to flash it via USB. Just what I needed.

Be very careful with the USB connector. Mine arrived bent and worked very intermittently. Not good for a modem to stay connected since the mini pci-e mc7455 card put in here would work about 20 percent of the time and only if you held the thing so usb cable was in just the right spot. Seems like a bad USB port or soldering job. Always be leary of chinese build quality.

Great for testing PCI WIFI/BLUETOOTH in another machine. Must order half-height adapter for half-height cards. Also need antennas to make fully functional.

This works as is intended. It needs an appropriate WWLAN card though. WWLAN cards normally are meant to be embedded inside a laptop (sometimes a mobile router). If you don't know what a WWLAN card, this will not work for you. The WWLAN card is what normally provides a laptop with mobile 3G or 4G internet - you still need to slide your SIM card into the laptop slot. What this box does is allow you take the card that would normally be embeeded in your laptop - and instead, put the card in this box and provide you with a slot to insert your SIM. I have found that this box becomes problematic if you don't use the regular size SIM card and instead are using a nano or micro sim with an adapter. After a couple dozen insertions of a micro/nano SIM + adapter, the box is no longer able to properly read the SIM card. I had bought two of these boxes and one went bad and I initiated a return on it, then the 2nd box went bad shortly after. However, I found they still worked if instead, I affixed a piece of tape to the bottom of the sim card (to faciliate removing it later) and just insert the card without the adapter - aligning with the pins. This is the primary reason for 4 instead of 5 stars. Upon discovering this, I cancelled the return on the first box and now use both boxes with the tape trick. It does take some hacking skills to get this to work - if you are looking at this solution, you are probably aware of this. If you are uncomfortable with hacking, then you probably want to get a more out-of-the-box solution than this. This is not a box where you put your SIM card in and turn it on and it works right away. In addition to this box you need a WWLAN card and an account+SIM that is compatible with the WWLAN card. The WWLAN card I used cost 8x this box and the mobile provider+SIM is an extra charge per month. Keep in mind that this actual box is a very small minority cost vs the whole solution. The primary reason you would want this box is if you wanted to take your active 3G/4G service that is now tied to a specific laptop or hotspot - and be able to access it though some other means.