Thinkpads Forum

Hi,

I am currently in Hong Kong and was helping a friend add a dvd drive to an IBM desktop that is about 2 years old. There is no manual and I couldnt find a model number ... So i will describe it and maybe someone will recognize it? I will be helping him again tomorrow because i ran out of time today.

Description:
x1 cd drive
x1 40gb hdd
pentium 2.6
x2 128mb ram [total 256] only two slots for ram
ibm mobo
big chunky alumnium heatsink block maybe 4x4 inches
weird cpu fan-- shuts off intermittenly and turns back on... maybe an automatic temperature sensor?? or faulty wiring?

Problems:
--THE [censored] THING IS SELF-UPGRADE PROOF.
--We took the cover off and tried to get the faceplate off the second drive bay. Did that but there was a metal plate behind the front facia that was fused with the main cage... I forcefully broke the metal tabs and yanked it out. I then put in the new dvd drive.
--The front facia itself is immovable. we had to break the clips holding it partially remove it so we could take off the drive covers.
--Reinstallation of the PSU wires resulted in NOTHING. took forever to realize the problem... the hdd required a SPECIFIC 4pin molex plug... labeled "P7"... the other 4pin molexes are labeled like p2, p3, p4, p5. I thought molexes worked for any hardware? Since when were psu molexes picky?!

I finally got things running normally but now the original cd drive and the new dvd drive are not recognized... How do i get them recognized?? we tried every combination of molexes but it wont even recognize the original cd drive at all.

thanks guys

benCho--[/i]

bencho wrote:I am currently in Hong Kong and was helping a friend add a dvd drive to an IBM desktop that is about 2 years old. There is no manual and I couldnt find a model number ... So i will describe it and maybe someone will recognize it? I will be helping him again tomorrow because i ran out of time today.

It HAS to have a model number somewhere on the unit! Look for a model designation on the front of the machine like "A50" or "Netvista".

Look for a sticker on the bottom or back of the unit that will have the model and serial numbers.

Go into the BIOS and the model and serial numbers are reported there.

Report back.

James

Hi,

ok i just called him up.

ok there are no more stickers on the outside of it and he doesnt know how to access the bios.. so i will probably get more info tomorrow.... ths computer is second hand and the original owner may have taken off labels and whatnot... *cough moron*

anyway, system info says:
p4 2.6ghz
256 ram
windows xp 2002 sp1

the only other info he found was barely legible and is as follows:
type 3434
model 698
serial 99GNL93

hope this can help... thx

I thought we might be on to something, but the model no. 3434 doesn't work.

See here!

Then read this.

Regards,

James

ok !! we tried everything and its all good now.

however, i would like to know, where is the fan controller ?? i want to make the fan always on. currently it only turns on at 58 degrees C and shuts off at 40-ish degrees C. where is the controller??

I don't know of any controllers for the IBM desktops; although I am very iffy on giving it a shot with the TP FCU.

Reason? Simple, that desktop has a different EC than the Thinkpads...Using the TP FCU on a system that isn't a Thinkpad or doesn't closely match the specs of a Thinkpad can result in damage to the hardware of that system.

You could always try SpeedFan ( http://www.almico.com/speedfan.php ) as it is a more general way of looking at all the sensors and collecting the data.

HTH

bencho wrote:however, i would like to know, where is the fan controller ?? i want to make the fan always on. currently it only turns on at 58 degrees C and shuts off at 40-ish degrees C. where is the controller??

It's usually built into the motherboard. If you are handy with tools, you can do what I did... take the power supply apart, find the two wires running to the fan. Cut them and then splice them onto any pair of red and black wires in the main wiring harnesses. Then, the fan will stay on all the time at its high speed. This makes the machine a lot noisier, but it does keep things running cool.