X30 HDD in X31

[schen]

I'm about to transform my daughter's "Princess Edition" X30 into an X31. I've got a the "base" of an X31 coming and just planning on moving all the upper parts over from her X30 which shouldn't be an issue. This is actually my first X30, but have had a couple of X31s over the years. However, I've never moved a drive over directly.

My question to those of you who have had both of the machines at the same time, is whether anyone has tried to move the HDD over without a reload? I'm not certain whether the chipset is close enough that its possible. Whether its possible, but I would just need to uninstall some of the drivers/devices before the move.

Any other thoughts would be welcome too!

[topmahof]

I did try this once from an x30 to an x32 and I got a BSOD right away.

I think it was because of the ati graphics in the x32, and at the time I didn't know how to get the drivers into the x30. (I was just starting out with Thinkpads). Thinking back, if I could have got the ati graphics drivers in the x30, I probably could have switched the drives and then booted up an xp os disc and done a repair. But, not knowing back then, I just reinstalled xp in it.

Dave

[Thinkpad Lover]

Hi Stan,

I have thoroughly checked the x31 base I will be sending you. USB ports, pcmcia slot, ethernet, wifi will conect, video displays when connected to LCD, IDE Hard drive connection OK, audio, both memory slots, etc. For fun I set up XP pro (I will just use that hard drive on another x31 I have).

As for switching your x30 hard drive onto the x31 base one possible workaround (I've never tried this myself but...): Since the ATI driver usually seems to be one of the main culprits in swapping hard drives from one model to a slightly different model, maybe you can uninstall the ATI graphics driver and let the laptop resort to the built-in generic display driver before swapping it onto the x31. When you uninstall the ATI driver it may return to 800x600 resolution instead of 1024x768. The purpose is just to avoid driver conflicts with the new hardware so it doesn't blue screen. Maybe it'll work and you don't have to do a fresh install

One thing you should double-check is if the palm rest from your daughter's x30 will definitely fit onto an x31 base. As I told you I will be including the palm rest, but it's not in the best of shape. You said you will use the palm rest from the x30. But something I just noticed as I was browsing some Ebay listings is the x30 palm rest/keyboard bezel looks different from the x31 palm rest/keyboard bezel.

Enlarge the pictures in these 2 listings and you will see what I mean:
x30 keyboard/palm rest assembly: http://cgi.ebay.com/IBM-KEYBOARD-BEZEL- ... 5d2a039de1
x31 keyboard/palm rest assembly: http://cgi.ebay.com/Keyboard-Bezel-Asse ... 3a6948d3d4

There are a few slight differences if you look carefully. One of those (the x30) is a new palm rest they're selling, so maybe they have redesigned it slightly? Or maybe it will fit with a little help from a hacksaw LOL ? From the Ebay listings I can see x31/32 palm rests are completely interchangeable, but x30 palm rests are listed separately for some reason. Does anyone else on the Forum know about this, as Stan will be getting the base from me soon.

By the way, what is a "Princess edition"?

Daniel.

[RealBlackStuff]

By the way, what is a "Princess edition"?

An X30 lovingly modified to suit his young daughter, probably to match her "My Little Pony".
http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... 38&start=0

[Thinkpad Lover]

An X30 lovingly modified to suit his young daughter, probably to match her "My Little Pony". http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... 38&start=0

Ahh... Thanks for the link. I thought it might've been something like that. Now I know the history of that laptop. He (Stan) did a beautiful job. Very impressive results looking at the before and after pics. A labor of love for his precious little daughter

After seeing that, now I really hope he will be able to re-use that x30 palmrest. Took a lot of work. Anyone out there know if an x30 palmrest/keyboard bezel will fit onto an x31?

And I learned something new from that thread: http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... 38&start=0 I always thought the color lavender only applied to a pale tint of violet. Now I see that lavender can refer to a light pink color like the Princess Edition x30 (I love purple/violet type colors by the way. Majestic robes of purple/violet were worn by royalty/kings/queens/princes and princesses and also priests and prophets in the Bible).

Daniel,
the little YP in NYC.

[jronald]

X30 palmrest will not fit an X31, I have both. I dont have a 30 handy, but I believe the 30 only has 1 USB port also.

Ron

[Thinkpad Lover]

X30 palmrest will not fit an X31, I have both. I dont have a 30 handy, but I believe the 30 only has 1 USB port also.

Ron

Thanks for the confirmation Ron. It looks like an x30 palmrest/keyboard bezel will not fit an x31 without a little help from a hacksaw LOL. As for the USB ports, I just checked the Lenovo website for fun: http://support.lenovo.com/en_US/product ... MIGR-58299

Thinkpad x30 has 2 USB ports just like the x31. The problem is that the USB ports are located: one on right side, one in back. The x31 I have in front of me has USB ports: one on left side, one in back. I.B.M. switched the design around So that is probably part of the reason why the palm rest cutout is different between the x30 and x31.

I still think Stan can handle such a project with a hacksaw LOL. They look similar enough. Painting that x30 palmrest was a lot of work... Hate to think the poor chap will have to paint an x31 palm rest now Getting an x30 palm rest onto an x31 base should be easy after anodizing z61 covers. (Yep, I've been reading some of his other threads about the titanium lid on a z61 )

Daniel.

P.S. Off topic: I didn't know what anodizing was until reading that z61 thread made me curious. But I love to learn. I'm learning a lot from this Forum:

Anodizing, or anodising in British English, is an electrolytic passivation process used to increase the thickness of the natural oxide layer on the surface of metal parts. The process is called "anodizing" because the part to be treated forms the anode electrode of an electrical circuit. Anodizing increases corrosion resistance and wear resistance, and provides better adhesion for paint primers and glues than does bare metal.

Full article here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anodizing

[jronald]

DONT buy all of these, I need a couple still.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... 1438.l2649

Ron

[Thinkpad Lover]

DONT buy all of these, I need a couple still.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... 1438.l2649

Ron

Don't worry, Ron, they're all yours. I don't have any x30 projects right now. Great price, isn't it? And they're brand new. Otherwise I would buy a bunch of those

Daniel.

[schen]

Guys; thanks for your input and please accept my apologies for the tardy reply. We are in the last few days of getting back to school and football has started, so I've been quite tied up this last week.

As you guys have found re: the thread about my daughter's "Princess" X30; I am intending on converting that machine over to an X31 as soon as the base shows up. My intention was to move the screen over in its entirety as well as the KB bezel, unfortunately, that doesn't look like its going to be possible. Lucky for me though, painting the bezel isn't nearly as difficult as the LCD lid and it's bezel, so I'm lucky in that at least! In any case, she had marked on the palmrest area of X30 with some sort of permanent marker, so I'm not going to be completely spinning my wheels here.

@ Daniel. Lavender is a very light shade of purple and you can see it better in the last picture in the series. It's just that the others were shot under incandescent light and I was too lazy to fiddle with the white balance so the yellow/orange lighting made the lavender look pink.