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T21 or T22, how to tell?

T20-T23 Series and T30. NOT for T25-Retro.
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T3f4l
Posts: 44
Joined: Sat Dec 31, 2016 10:06 am
Location: Exeter, UK

T21 or T22, how to tell?

#1 Post by T3f4l » Mon Feb 20, 2017 1:44 pm

Hi All

I have a mystery, I have just received a T2? laptop which is meant to be un-working and spares only. I plugged it in and it works (Well boots to bios)
But I'm not sure what it is, It has a T21 keyboard on it, but also has a 900mhz processor and 128mb of IBM branded PC133 ram in it. It only has 1 USB so it isn't a T23.
The only sticker on the base apart from the COA says model 2648.

Im thinking its either a T21 with a 900mhz processor fitted, OR more likely a T22 with a T21 keyboard.

Here is a photo of the bios, anyone spot anything telling?
http://www.noob4life.com/T20Build/t2x.gif
X220, 2.8 i7, 16gb 1866mhz, 512gb Samsung msata boot and 480gb Sandisk ssd storage
T22, 1ghz PIII, 512mb PC100 Ram, 128gb ssd boot and 320gb Weston Digital Storage
T21, ???ghz PIII, ???mb PC100 Ram, Its a parts donor that may see life again!

Cigarguy
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Re: T21 or T22, how to tell?

#2 Post by Cigarguy » Mon Feb 20, 2017 1:55 pm

Checking 26488eg using the MTM link above it comes up with:

ThinkPad T Series laptops ThinkPad T22 2648-8EG PIII 900MHz (256KB), 128MB RAM, 20.0GB HDD, 14.1 XGA(1024x768) TFT LCD, 8x-2.3x DVD, Intel combo, TV out, Li-Ion battery, Win2000

However, it sounds like lots of parts have been swapped/changed out so it could be anything.

RealBlackStuff
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Re: T21 or T22, how to tell?

#3 Post by RealBlackStuff » Mon Feb 20, 2017 2:06 pm

That's indeed a T22.
You can exchange the keyboard plastic around Power and sound buttons for T20/T21/T22/T23, they are all the same.
Lovely day for a Guinness! (The Real Black Stuff)
Lenovo: X240, X250, T440p, T480, M900 Tiny.

PS: the old Boardroom website is still available on the Wayback Machine
.

T3f4l
Posts: 44
Joined: Sat Dec 31, 2016 10:06 am
Location: Exeter, UK

Re: T21 or T22, how to tell?

#4 Post by T3f4l » Mon Feb 20, 2017 2:20 pm

Well I guess that's kind of a result? Tempted to fix it up now using my box of spares, I'll keep telling myself just a simple rebuild (will probably end up maxing it out like the other one)
X220, 2.8 i7, 16gb 1866mhz, 512gb Samsung msata boot and 480gb Sandisk ssd storage
T22, 1ghz PIII, 512mb PC100 Ram, 128gb ssd boot and 320gb Weston Digital Storage
T21, ???ghz PIII, ???mb PC100 Ram, Its a parts donor that may see life again!

RealBlackStuff
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Re: T21 or T22, how to tell?

#5 Post by RealBlackStuff » Mon Feb 20, 2017 2:30 pm

With max. 512MB RAM, there's not much you can do, other than perhaps Linux.
Flog it to a Merc or Bimmer fan, to install their engine tuning software on.
It's one of the few Thinkpads with a Serial port.

T3f4l
Posts: 44
Joined: Sat Dec 31, 2016 10:06 am
Location: Exeter, UK

Re: T21 or T22, how to tell?

#6 Post by T3f4l » Mon Feb 20, 2017 2:38 pm

Kinda enjoying playing all the old dos games on my existing T22, think I'll freshen it up and sell it on
X220, 2.8 i7, 16gb 1866mhz, 512gb Samsung msata boot and 480gb Sandisk ssd storage
T22, 1ghz PIII, 512mb PC100 Ram, 128gb ssd boot and 320gb Weston Digital Storage
T21, ???ghz PIII, ???mb PC100 Ram, Its a parts donor that may see life again!

T3f4l
Posts: 44
Joined: Sat Dec 31, 2016 10:06 am
Location: Exeter, UK

Re: T21 or T22, how to tell?

#7 Post by T3f4l » Mon Feb 20, 2017 4:25 pm

Well, seems it could be dead, put a hard drive in (not in the caddy just pushed in, onto the connector and booted it. Getting a red box on the screen saying "Hard drive not installed" I know the hard drive is good (just formatted it connected to the mac and checked drive for errors)
Can hear it spinning but doesn't seem like computer can see it.
Any suggestions? The CMOS battery is toast could that be doing it?

Thanks in advance!
X220, 2.8 i7, 16gb 1866mhz, 512gb Samsung msata boot and 480gb Sandisk ssd storage
T22, 1ghz PIII, 512mb PC100 Ram, 128gb ssd boot and 320gb Weston Digital Storage
T21, ???ghz PIII, ???mb PC100 Ram, Its a parts donor that may see life again!

RealBlackStuff
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Re: T21 or T22, how to tell?

#8 Post by RealBlackStuff » Mon Feb 20, 2017 4:27 pm

I don't think a T22 can recognize a mac-formatted HD.
And a working CMOS always helps.

T3f4l
Posts: 44
Joined: Sat Dec 31, 2016 10:06 am
Location: Exeter, UK

Re: T21 or T22, how to tell?

#9 Post by T3f4l » Mon Feb 20, 2017 4:58 pm

Well it was formatted as FAT so should work, will format one on the other t22 tomorrow. I've ordered a cmos battery so will switch that over too
X220, 2.8 i7, 16gb 1866mhz, 512gb Samsung msata boot and 480gb Sandisk ssd storage
T22, 1ghz PIII, 512mb PC100 Ram, 128gb ssd boot and 320gb Weston Digital Storage
T21, ???ghz PIII, ???mb PC100 Ram, Its a parts donor that may see life again!

ajkula66
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Re: T21 or T22, how to tell?

#10 Post by ajkula66 » Mon Feb 20, 2017 11:42 pm

I would *strongly* suggest placing the drive into the caddy, securing it with all 4 screws and the HDD cover and then re-inserting it...it doesn't take much for a HDD not to be recognized, especially the old IDE ones.
...Knowledge is a deadly friend when no one sets the rules...(King Crimson)

Cheers,

George (your grouchy retired FlexView farmer)

One FlexView to rule them all: A31p

Abused daily: T520, X200s


PMs requesting personal tech support will be ignored.

T3f4l
Posts: 44
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Location: Exeter, UK

Re: T21 or T22, how to tell?

#11 Post by T3f4l » Tue Feb 21, 2017 3:39 am

I have a spare caddy on order for my other one, only connected it the way I did to test if it was working. Will wait until the caddy and new cmos arrives and then try again!
X220, 2.8 i7, 16gb 1866mhz, 512gb Samsung msata boot and 480gb Sandisk ssd storage
T22, 1ghz PIII, 512mb PC100 Ram, 128gb ssd boot and 320gb Weston Digital Storage
T21, ???ghz PIII, ???mb PC100 Ram, Its a parts donor that may see life again!

cadillacmike68
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Re: T21 or T22, how to tell?

#12 Post by cadillacmike68 » Sat Feb 25, 2017 8:30 pm

T3f4l wrote:Kinda enjoying playing all the old dos games on my existing T22, think I'll freshen it up and sell it on
That's why I keep my old T-20 series systems around. I have a maxed out T21, T22, and T23, and a dozen ore ore"spares" The 3 best ones have 80-120GB HDDs pretty much the max for these systems.
600 600X
760LD FUBARd
T21 2647 T22 2647 1@ 1GHz SXGA+ 4 more; T23 2647 1@ 1.2GHz SXGA+ 3 more
T30 2366-88U 2GHz; 2366-83U 1.8G; 5@ 2366-LU0/66U; 2367-KU6 FUBARd
T41 T42 T43
T60 T61 8897 2.4GHz SXGA+; 8898 2.4Ghz; 6463 2@ WSXGA+; 7658 2.5GHz; T61p; 6 more T61s
T500 2
T530 W530

Mike Pickwick
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Location: Covington, Virginia

Re: T21 or T22, how to tell?

#13 Post by Mike Pickwick » Wed Apr 05, 2017 9:59 pm

cadillacmike68 wrote:
T3f4l wrote:Kinda enjoying playing all the old dos games on my existing T22, think I'll freshen it up and sell it on
That's why I keep my old T-20 series systems around. I have a maxed out T21, T22, and T23, and a dozen ore ore"spares" The 3 best ones have 80-120GB HDDs pretty much the max for these systems.
I'm the proud owner of a yard sale $15 T21 2647-8au. It has a huge 32GB hard drive, a P III 800mhz proc and I've thrown 512 mb of ram, Win XP and a couple of covers for the ram and lan card. I plan on using it to write, and Word 2007 and XP leave me plenty of room. BTW, it fires right up, the screen is bright and sharp, and the speakers blow my w520 out of the water. Not that I'm thinking about tossing the Home Theater.

But of course, I want to play with it to see how far it can be upgraded. I understand that there is a 1400x1050 screen that was offered, and there are cardbus wifi solutions. I'm really intrigued by the Ultra Port on the top. And a 1.8" ssd fitted to a PATA / SATA adapter?

I have a sinking feeling that I've posted in the wrong place, or hijacked. If I screwed up, just give me a shove in the right direction. If not, I'd sure like to hear what others have done with these machines. The keyboard is terrific and the size is perfect.

Any suggestions are gratefully received.
Mike

Currently the proud owner of a 600E, a pair of T60's, one with IPS, a 14.1 4:3 T61, a wide screen 15.4" T61, and my beloved W520. I'll probably not move beyond that one has I am not evolved enough to use the later keyboards. And because my wife gets the fancy stuff, I'm also the keeper of a Dell m6500 with the 920XM cpu (the most beautiful screen I've ever seen), and an HP Elitebook w/ Dreamcolor (another really nice display), and a Q9000 core 2 quad cpu.

RealBlackStuff
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Re: T21 or T22, how to tell?

#14 Post by RealBlackStuff » Thu Apr 06, 2017 2:05 am

The Ultra Port (USB actually) on the lid is for a webcam.
You can upgrade to max. 1.00GHz CPU, SXGA+ and 2x256MB RAM (which you have already).
Biggest PATA HD is 320GB.
For other drives in the HD-Bay check the T4x Forum.
The Ultrabay can hold a CD/DVD, Floppy or SATA/PATA 2nd-HD-adapter.
Lovely day for a Guinness! (The Real Black Stuff)
Lenovo: X240, X250, T440p, T480, M900 Tiny.

PS: the old Boardroom website is still available on the Wayback Machine
.

kfzhu1229
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Re: T21 or T22, how to tell?

#15 Post by kfzhu1229 » Thu Apr 06, 2017 2:16 pm

Mike Pickwick wrote:I'm the proud owner of a yard sale $15 T21 2647-8au. It has a huge 32GB hard drive, a P III 800mhz proc and I've thrown 512 mb of ram, Win XP and a couple of covers for the ram and lan card. I plan on using it to write, and Word 2007 and XP leave me plenty of room. BTW, it fires right up, the screen is bright and sharp, and the speakers blow my w520 out of the water. Not that I'm thinking about tossing the Home Theater.
Well sure it is certainly better than today's laptops sound at least in my preferences. However, from what sound my T23 produces, it seems to sharpen the higher pitches that it kinda hurts my ears. I am pretty sure it is not because of a defective pair of speakers or anything because it is not the kind of rattle sound you get with typical defective speakers. Does yours have that same thing? I personally prefer my A30p's speakers much better, its sound production is very great and the speakers are in very excellent condition.
Dell Lat CP MMX-233 64mb 40gb W2k
600 PII-266 416mb 40gb WXP
T23 PIII 1.13ghz 1gb W7
Precision M4300 X9000 8gb 160gb WUXGA Ultrasharp fp W10
T530i 15.6" i7 16gb fp W10
UXGA:
A30p PIII 1.2 1gb W7 (IDTech)
T43p 2.26 2gb fp W10 (Sharp)
Lat C840 P4-2.5 2gb 60gb W7 (Ultrasharp)

Mike Pickwick
Posts: 28
Joined: Mon Dec 15, 2014 5:14 pm
Location: Covington, Virginia

Re: T21 or T22, how to tell?

#16 Post by Mike Pickwick » Thu Apr 06, 2017 8:12 pm

kfzhu1229 wrote: Well sure it is certainly better than today's laptops sound at least in my preferences. However, from what sound my T23 produces, it seems to sharpen the higher pitches that it kinda hurts my ears. I am pretty sure it is not because of a defective pair of speakers or anything because it is not the kind of rattle sound you get with typical defective speakers. Does yours have that same thing? I personally prefer my A30p's speakers much better, its sound production is very great and the speakers are in very excellent condition.
Yes, the speakers at their highest volume are harsh. But they're perfectly useful for watching youtube videos or checking out the news if turned down just a little. I'm having fun with it, and thank you to RBS for the tips as well.

I've always been a "bleeding edge" guy when it comes to electronics, so it is a rather strange feeling that I have no desire to move past whenever the W520 was released. It's amazing that the usable portion of the T21's 14.1" screen is taller than the 15.6" FHD W520, and less than an inch shorter than the 17.3" 1920x1200 m6500 beast. That means a lot when you're writing.
Sorry about the ramble,
Mike

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