Thinkpads Forum

I'm dissapointed with built quality of small notebooks nowdays, so I've thought - why not doing REAL FrankenPad!
What I'd like to achive is getting old ThinkPad hardware, removing stuff from inside and put some modern atom-based netbook mobo.

Have you ever thought about doing such mod?
What is in your opinion last built like a tank (and THIN) X series ThinkPad? I've heard that X31 was the last, but never actually seen one.

Were you disappointed with modern X Thinkpads?

The X6x series for example strikes me as a solid one. My wife has an X61 as her daily driver for over 2 years now, which travels a lot with her and she has zero complaints about quality or durability. Laptop still looks almost new.

I don't have first hand experience with X200/X300 series, but generally it seems that their build quality is considered good as well. I did briefly touch a X200s on display, and it felt flimsy, but I think that unit was just broken (screen did not latch correctly). I also have a friend whose small child managed to break the latches of his X201i about a week after the laptop was purchased, but again, I am not sure it is any true indication of quality.

The X3x series (actually X32 was the last of it) - I like it a lot, and it had a few design advantages over X4x and even X6x. However, strength-wise, I did not find it better than the others. If anything, it has at least one characteristic structural weakness - the keyboard bezel tends to snap above the PCMCIA slot on the left side.

I am not qualified to properly answer your question. In my mind, you have three major obstacles...

1) The mounting points of X31 would have to be modified to accommodate an Intel Core i3 motherboard.

2) The various connectors for display panel, HD, CMOS battery, wi-fi, PC Card etc may not match.

3) The GPU (designed for wide-screen) may or may not be able to be viewed on 4:3 X31 LCD panel. My guess is that you will have large black "window-boxes" at top and bottom of screen.

If you have the patience to fabricate new mounting points, splice new wires, and swap LCD panel, let us know your results.

dr_st wrote:Were you disappointed with modern X Thinkpads?

I've forgot to add - I want it to be cheap
x61 cost almost the same as my actual r61, and I don't have any plans to spend such money another time.
Atom based netbooks with broken screens (I don't need it anyway) are about 160$, and x3x series in semi-good condition are about 100$, so my budget for today is ~300$.

robert213 wrote:1) The mounting points of X31 would have to be modified to accommodate an Intel Core i3 motherboard.

Different mobo won't fit - this is obvious, I know that, but I don't actually care - will fix it with "hammer"

robert213 wrote:3) The GPU (designed for wide-screen) may or may not be able to be viewed on 4:3 X31 LCD panel. My guess is that you will have large black "window-boxes" at top and bottom of screen.

I'm pretty sure that even newest GPU are capable of 4:3 resolutions.

robert213 wrote:If you have the patience to fabricate new mounting points, splice new wires, and swap LCD panel, let us know your results.

My major point is: do something awesome with big effort and little money

The biggest obstacles in doing such mod that I see are:

• connecting screen - cables in both notebooks may be very different,
• connecting keyboard - same as above.

Thanks for all your opinions, I appreciate it

pit1337 wrote:Atom based netbooks with broken screens (I don't need it anyway) are about 160$, and x3x series in semi-good condition are about 100$, so my budget for today is ~300$.

For $300 you can get a hell of a X6x machine...

pit1337 wrote:Different mobo won't fit - this is obvious, I know that, but I don't actually care - will fix it with "hammer"

And the chassis connectors? And the internal connectors - you will also fix them with "hammer"? And after that you still expect to get any kind of working machine and a durable case?

Hmm... You took "hammering" too real - I wouldn't dare to use such brutal thing on shiny ThinkPad! Things like this: http://www.e-techalltv.com/direct/image ... -cable.jpg will help me with connectors

Yeah, this is going to be my "lazy evenings" project - I don't expect it to be finished in time shorter than a year or even more - right now it's still only in my mind :p
I will slowly collect all stuff, try to bring it all into one case, fix/change/modify... etc.

dr_st wrote:For $300 you can get a hell of a X6x machine...

I'm with dr_st on this view, an X61 is a better choice. Look at it this way, if you use an Atom based board, at the end of the day when you are all done the machines performance won't even be close to a Core 2 Duo X61. So what's the point in doing it?

$300? Not near Poland.
400$ here is minimum + add cost of new battery, HDD and RAM (another 200$?).
Yes, I could ship it from different country, but it would create a big mess (shipping, taxes, new keyboard) that is probably not worth 100$.

I don't find Atom CPU's slow - they can play 720p videos (and some newer ones even 1080p) - such power is completly enought for my daily stuff (my R61 is my main driver for bigger tasks).

And still, I consider this as mostly-for-fun-project

Your fun project is highly unlikely to work...

Connect a ThinkPad LCD to most non-ThinkPad boards and watch out for the smoke...connector cables, pinouts...are you able to handle all of that by yourself? You're looking into some extremely advanced modding here...

Buy a X60/s and call it a day, seriously...

I know others have already said this, but I find my X60s quite solid. Only problem I had with mine when I first got it was it being quite rough. I changed all the external panels and now it's like a new notebook. All inclusive cost for me was $325 CAD with all the new panels + initial cost of the notebook.

Good luck!

After some reading about incompatibility of screens/keyboards connectors between different brands, I've came to same conclusion, as all of you suggested:
effect won't be worth effort.

I will probably buy some old hardware (X2x series maybe, as they are thin and cheap) and use console-only Linux (more hakish way ).

Very wise decision! IMHO, something like, even a X24 can keep up with a modern netbook in several ways. I had a X2? (don't remember exactly which) a few years back, and was quite happy with it. But for built like a "tank", I don't think anything beats the 600 series. I still use mine every day. Not much computing power, but for my needs, it's just fine.

The X200 and X201 are solidly built and are excellent performers. You can find an X200 on Ebay for about $500.

Im running X30's with vanilla uBuntu, works like a charm!
My X31's are running some pretty sexy uBuntu derivatives with only 1 gig of RAM with no issues.
http://www.dedoimedo.com/computers/macbuntu.html

Ron

I have an X24. It's proven quite durable, but it doesn't "feel" as nice as a Thinkpad should. The X3x should also be a significant performance boost - the old X24 feels quite slow these days (why I haven't used it in at least a year...)

The X30 is prone to cracking around the keyboard. I had an X20 that you could probably pound nails with and not damage the thing. The lower housing was much more solid.

But these guys are right. In the US you can buy a CoreDuo X60 for around $150 online if you shop around carefully.