socollins

Hi all, In looking at the teardown, I note the 2011 Mini uses the Broadcom BCM4331 for connectivity. I recently upgraded...

Yes you can and I have done so successfully. It was tough finding the Broadcom BCM4360 to buy. But if you trawl the DHGates and Alibabas you might get lucky as I did. Here's proof (as best as I can provide) that my early 2013 15" rMPB is connected to my ac Time capsule using 5Ghz ac wireless: http://imgur.com/LZvbqzU The test linked to above uses a 2013 MBA card in a rMPB. The Air's card only has 2 antennae while the rMPB uses 3. As such I would take their results with a grain of salt. I can't provide throughput metrics and comparisons however as I lack the setup/inclination to do so. All I can say is that I have seen significant improvement moving files to a file server with gigabit ethernet. It's an easy and worthwhile upgrade if you can find the card.