Thinkpads Forum

I pulled out my one remaining 14-inch SXGA+ T61 and remembered how much I like this machine. It's an 8892-02U with nVidia graphics, a Merom T7500 CPU, but with a motherboard that can take a Penryn CPU like the T9300.

I installed an SSD and it's reasonably speedy under Windows 7. I'd like to consider replacing the motherboard with one that has Intel graphics and a Penryn CPU. If anyone has such a board, or has any idea of how to find one cheaply, I'll be glad to hear about it. (And should I be asking this in the marketplace forum?)

Why don't you just throw in a T9300 which is $30 or so nowadays, and ride the machine "as-is"...the board might fail tomorrow, or it may last for another ten years...that's the nature of the beast, as you know yourself...

Obviously, should the current board fail, then we could look into sourcing one, but I don't quite see the necessity for such a move right now...

My $0.02 only...

But before you put in the T9300, please apply Middleton's BIOS.
D/L it from here: http://ali.dj/blog/sata-ii-support-for- ... 61-x61-r61
Scroll down to where it says (under "Thinkpad Model"): T61, T61pR61 etc. and click on Version 2.29/1.08 next to it.

Excellent advice in both posts. I already applied the Middleton BIOS to get the extra SATA speed and will spend $30 on the T9300 and worry about failure later. Thanks (again) to you both.