ThinkPad T23, SanDisk Extreme III (30MB/s), and UDMA-2

[slimwolf]

Hello everybody,

I have a question related to booting up a T23 with a Sandisk Extreme III CF card (the 30MB/s version). I was trying to do this using an adapter identical to this one (http://www.sourcingmap.com/dual-pin-inch-ide-hard-drive-adapter-p-36846.html), and was somewhat successful. I say somewhat because I can only get the card to work as UDMA-2, while it is supposed to work as UDMA-4. I tried both the 4GB and 8GB versions, with the same results. I would guess it is a matter of some incompatibility issue between the CF card controller and the computer BIOS (I have v1.20, the latest available for download). This is because I tried the exact same adapter and card on a Dell Inspiron 4100, and on this system the card works as UDMA-4, as it's supposed to, so the adapter should be fine. Both the T23 and the Inspiron 4100 use the same Intel 82801 CAM IDE controller, so that should not be the problem either.

I would appreciate if someone would have an idea about this or a workaround. Did anyone manage to have a CF card work as UDMA-4 or 5 on a T23? Any specific adapter and CF card?

Thank you in advance for your suggestions.

[sjthinkpader]

Do you have the latest BIOS? May be T23 is limited to UDMA-2.

[RealBlackStuff]

Maybe you need to tweak the Hard Disk DMA settings in Windows' Device Manager?
I noticed they have a connector for a second card. I assume this is the 'slave' on the same IDE channel.
You may need to hunt for any related settings in the Registry, because Thinkpads like T23 never have/had more than one drive per IDE channel.

[slimwolf]

Hi again,

And thank you for the replies. I should have mentioned that the HDD that came with the T23 (a 48GB IBM IC25T060ATCS05-0) works as UDMA-5, so the capability is there. However, that happened only after I updated the BIOS to the latest version (1.20), because before that it was working only as UDMA-4, so that it another reason to think that the problem might be with the BIOS.

As for the adapter, indeed, it has a slot for an additional card, that is the slave on the same channel. For now I kept that empty, but I was hopping to add additional storage capacity there. Interestingly, when I add a second card, even on Inspiron 4100 the UDMA of the master card drops to UDMA-2, so there might be indeed a problem with that too. I'm not sure what setting I'll need to change in the registry, maybe completely disable the slave drive, or use a single slot adapter instead. Maybe someone else managed to do this with a different combination of adapter and CF card, I would be really curious to know.

[RealBlackStuff]

There are some additional files for a T23 that you should load:
definitely this: http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... MIGR-40004
probably also this: http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... MIGR-40062

Do you have any Yellow or Red marks in your Device Manager?
Check for conflicts.

Look at the IDE/ATA Controller, then the Primary IDE channel.
Click Properties then Settings
Check that both devices are set to: DMA if enabled

[slimwolf]

Thanks again for the suggestions, I was not aware of those files. When I set up the system with the HDD, everything worked fine right after installation (w/ slipstreamed SP3), with no additional tweaking needed to make UDMA-5 work. No such success with the SanDisk Extreme III, even after I applied all the additional patches suggested. There are no resource conflicts between devices, and the "DMA if available" is enabled. I even tried to uninstall the primary IDE channel, as that should enable a higher UDMA mode upon restart if the new settings (i.e. those patches in this case) would permit this. I also tried to use the Hitachi Microdrive driver for the CF card, but the maximum UDMA mode is still UDMA-2. I find it odd that UDMA-5 works fine with the HDD, but UDMA-4 does not work for the SanDisk CF card. Interestingly, this CF card has conflicts with other computers too, e.g. it won't even boot on a Toshiba Portege 2000 or R100, which both freeze when this CF acts as the main drive (with a 1.8" CF to IDE adapter) - SanDisk Ultra II would work fine however (not sure about extreme IV as I don't have one). There might be something with the CF card controller that conflicts with the BIOS of certain machines.

[RealBlackStuff]

Flog that card on eBay and look for a card that is known to work in a T23 in UDMA-4 or better mode.

[slimwolf]

I actually meant that this type of cards seems to be problematic, not an individual one. I have several 4GB and 8GB SanDisk Extreme III (30MB/s version) cards, and all of them have identical behavior (only UDMA-2 on T23 2647-9KU). So yes, I would be very curious to know if someone managed to have a CF card work as UDMA-4 or 5 on a T23, and obviously with what combination of card/adapter. I searched online, but didn't find any specifics, thus any successful stories would be appreciated. Even with UDMA-2 the cards seem to work fine (that allows for 33MB/s which the cards don't reach anyway, but at ~27MB/s is still better than the HDD, not to mention the ~0.3ms access time), but the system seems a little snappier on an Inspiron 4100 where they work as UDMA-4 (the processor is the same 1.13GHz Intel PIIIm).

[sjthinkpader]

Here are a few CF card I and others had tested:

http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... 1&start=30