Thinkpads Forum

I hope I'm not bothering but i bought a 4 in 1 card reader for the t61 thinking that it was easy to install it.

Taking a look over the manual I saw that it's just like to put a bomb on it:
remove:
battery ok
ultrabay ok
hdd ok
palmrest ok
keyboard ok
modem daughter card ...ok
pci express mini card ....pk
sim card slot -----
backup battery ok
keyboard bezel -----
fan assebly
cpu ok
lcd assembly
base cover and more
structure frame

Is this worthwhile or it's better that i leaved the originals used card reader and use an external usb reader? (all the external peripheral bother me!)

Nobody tried this in the past? (i saw that there are some complex passages with conductivity paste and adesive panel to move...)

Might want to consider some of the readers I described here:
http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=111973

I think you should have the Cardbus slot at least. Try one of the Cardbus readers. Especially if the T61 built-in reader is as bad as that of the X61.

Thank you dr-st for the post indicated.
I have a Pcmcia (i hope that's the right name) slot.

And i was considering the installation of this one:

because I don't want to have separates accessories, but reading Your post about the performances (and the complexity of the installation) I think that it was a bad purchase.

Even without data on the performance of the card reader (as I said, I didn't test the T61, only the X61 which may be similar, then again it may not be), I still think that your best bet is staying with your original setup.

The reason being is that you can always use a Cardbus card reader in the Cardbus/PCMCIA slot which will give good performance, and be completely flush (I recommend the SDCBA-C01). And this way you are not sacrificing your existing ExpressCard slot, which can be very useful if down the road you want to add USB3/eSATA.

And not to mention the installation complexity.

Ok You convinced me, thank You for the suggestion.

0. Cardreader with FRU 42X3831 can't be installed to T60! It is for T61 (R61, T400, T500?) only. T60 Have different connector on mainboard to accept this cage.

A friend of mine tried to put such a cardreader to the Frankenpad (T61 mobo) and it has not worked.

And one more note.
All T61 4:3 14" mobos have place for FireWire (1394) connector. But I have not seen any where it has been soldered. In the schemes mentioned that the presence of this connector is connected to the type of RICOH R5C84x controller. This controller used for creating FireWire, PCMCIA and multimedia card interfaces. (Pins from cardreader connected directly to RICOH controller). I suspect that if there are mobos with a FireWire the cardreader must work on them.

Ok FryPpy, I was thinking to install it on my t61 i forgot to indicate it....but i changed the idea: too much complexity for a poor result.