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It would probably be a whole lot simpler to just buy a USB wireless network adapter. Or share your internet connection via Firewire/Bluetooth. But hey...

Are there USB wireless network adapters that work reliably with the Mac?

I would clone the disks before I would take a mini apart.

But I agree with pubb, the best thing to do is add a wireless adapter to the mini that doesn't have one.

Here is one for $14 which works with Macs.

http://www.google.co...IwAg#ps-sellers

You might also find the internal card for your mini on eBay, possibly scrounged from a retired mini. In that case it may be worth opening up just the one mini to add a new card and make it complete, rather than opening up both to transplant the existing card.

Another option would be to use an Airport Express - connect it to the Mini via ethernet. Switch off the Mini's own Airport and you have a 802.11 N connection for your Mini. Slightly more expensive than a USB adapter but more reliable in my experience!

Hey, that's almost exactly what I have here; two Mac Minis with the no. 1 Mac Mini a 1.25 GHZ PowerPC G4 with no airport card and no.2, a 2.0 GHZ, 2 GB RAM, Intel core 2 duo Mac Mini with an airport card.

First, how I love migration assistant! Makes things soooo much easier. Second, how I love OWC for their great upgrade videos!

I have opened no.1 Mac Mini a few times, upgrading both RAM and hard drive. True, it is not for the faint of heart, but it's really fairly straightforward. Anyway, no.1 Mac Mini now has 1 GB RAM and a 250 GB internal hard drive. Sweet little machine!

First, I simply shared the internet from no. 2 Mac Mini, via Firewire. (At that time no. 2 Mac Mini was serving as the router, too.) That worked great, but funky things did happen with the external hard drives as I would find them mounted to the other Mac if somehow they unmounted an then remounted. Also, I had to disconnect the Firewire cable whenever I rebooted the machines or the externals would end up mounted on whichever booted up first.

Then, I shared internet connection via Ethernet. Slower, because the no. 1 Mac Mini has a slower Ethernet port. Slower than Firewire for sure, but at least I didn't have the musical external drives issue. : )

But I wanted it to be wireless.

I looked into getting an internal airport card for no. 1 and installing it myself but the trouble was actually finding the correct card that would work. Looked and looked and prices were all over the map and no guarantee any would work. So, in the end I got a USB Wireless stick adapter (MaxPower From OWC). Set that up so it talked to my new Airport Express and it has worked flawlessly, ever since.

Both Mac Minis have Leopard 10.5.8 on them. Makes things much smoother keeping things synced. Things were good when the no.1 Mac Mini was still on Tiger, but it's amazing how much faster and more responsive it is on Leopard. So far, so good.

Hope this helps. -Charlotte

I need to upgrade an older PPC mac mini to 802.11N so I went the external route - simple USB device with a driver. It's worked flawlessly. I'm pretty sure OWC (macsales.com) has some that might not be the least expensive but will definitely work with your machine.

Why not just buy a used Airport card off eBay? That would be easier as then you would only have to dissemble one Mini, not two. The cards are cheap -- around $20 or so -- plus then you'd have two Minis with cards, not one. Airport cards are simply not that scarce you need to move it.

Random but does anyone think a new mac mini will release in 2011 or is that too soon?