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X220 FHD Upgrade?

X200/X201/X220 (including equivalent tablet models) and X300/X301 Series
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Quantumcross
Posts: 32
Joined: Mon Jan 16, 2017 7:06 pm
Location: NY

Re: X220 FHD Upgrade?

#511 Post by Quantumcross » Tue Aug 08, 2017 12:05 pm

I got my mod today and failed miserably.

I didn't get any wire to use for sense/power but I found some suitable wire on my bench.

I carefully soldered the sense wire, applied liberal flux to the plated holes, and dropped some solder down each of the 7 holes.

After turning on, the backlight of the display worked and I could control the backlight, but xrandr reported that none of the eDP "ports" were connected. So I tried more flux and more solder on the holes. I made sure that the holes were connected to the eDP port pins. I did this back and forth about 3 times until a small pit in my iron tip caught the edge of the trace and pulled it right up.

RIP my mod.

I guess LVDS still works.... yaaaaaaay 1366x768...

note to nitrocaster: I understand this kind of design is convenient in a situation like this where there really isn't any room for wires
<rant> I honestly hate these types of mods where you put a board on pins and let solder get sucked into them, it's impossible to know when you actually have a solid connection to the underlying pins and it's near impossible to reverse, diagnose, or fix the mod. I consider myself pretty decent at hand soldering, I've done 144+ QFP chips plenty of times no problem.

I agree with Rossman that the PCB should have been thinner so that the pins would stick up a little bit so you can heat both the pins and the board and ensure a proper bond between them. Maybe you can use castellated holes to ensure good connections? This would also allow room for rework. I'm not sure if castellated holes are possible when you need them on both sides of an internal hole.</rant>

nitrocaster
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Re: X220 FHD Upgrade?

#512 Post by nitrocaster » Tue Aug 08, 2017 2:32 pm

1) So far there was no one single case that I'm aware of when bad soldering caused 'no image' issue.
2) In your case the actual issue was that you soldered aux power wire to old pad and ignored the warning in the first message of the original topic. Although I can not be 100% sure, this reason is the most probable one.
3) Ripped traces are caused by physical stress applied to hot board. You should never do that unless you're intentionally destroying something.

I will update the manual ASAP with new aux power pad and some troubleshooting guidelines to help avoid such mishaps.

Also, your adapter might be repairable - take a close picture to let me understand what's going on there.
Want to buy X220/X230 FHD mod kit? Read this before sending me a PM!
T60 | X230 i7-3520M FHD Win10

boutch55555
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Re: X220 FHD Upgrade?

#513 Post by boutch55555 » Tue Aug 08, 2017 2:40 pm

Quantumcross wrote:
Tue Aug 08, 2017 12:05 pm
my iron tip caught the edge of the trace and pulled it right up.
[...]
I've done 144+ QFP chips plenty of times no problem.
Would you able to bridge the trace ? Which one is it ? It shouldn't be that hard if you have plenty soldering experience.

Quantumcross
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Location: NY

Re: X220 FHD Upgrade?

#514 Post by Quantumcross » Tue Aug 08, 2017 3:56 pm

nitrocaster wrote:
Tue Aug 08, 2017 2:32 pm
1) So far there was no one single case that I'm aware of when bad soldering caused 'no image' issue.
2) In your case the actual issue was that you soldered aux power wire to old pad and ignored the warning in the first message of the original topic. Although I can not be 100% sure, this reason is the most probable one.
3) Ripped traces are caused by physical stress applied to hot board. You should never do that unless you're intentionally destroying something.

I will update the manual ASAP with new aux power pad and some troubleshooting guidelines to help avoid such mishaps.

Also, your adapter might be repairable - take a close picture to let me understand what's going on there.
Thanks for the reply, sorry for my bit of venting at first. I was mostly dissapointed in my work after waiting so long for this mod.

1) Linux reported that the eDP ports were disconnected
2) I was totally not aware that something was changed from the manual. It's less of an "ignored" and more of a "didn't see".
3) Yeah I was pee'd at myself, I stuck the point of my iron in the hole to try and heat the pin and draw the solder down and my tip snagged on the plated hole and it grabbed on the annular ring.

I will try and rework it and repair the trace when I am home.

If I cannot fix it, I would be interested in trying a round 2, I have another x230 laying around. Would it be possible to get another board from a "non-payer" of batch 2 or will I have to go back to the end of the line for batch 3?

nitrocaster
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Re: X220 FHD Upgrade?

#515 Post by nitrocaster » Tue Aug 08, 2017 4:27 pm

1) When the display is not getting power (which is exactly the case) eDP port is 'disconnected'.
2) I agree and I'm sorry.
3) If you didn't remove the adapter board - chances are high that you can fix it. But I have some spare boards anyway.
Want to buy X220/X230 FHD mod kit? Read this before sending me a PM!
T60 | X230 i7-3520M FHD Win10

Quantumcross
Posts: 32
Joined: Mon Jan 16, 2017 7:06 pm
Location: NY

Re: X220 FHD Upgrade?

#516 Post by Quantumcross » Tue Aug 08, 2017 4:57 pm

boutch55555 wrote:
Tue Aug 08, 2017 2:40 pm
Quantumcross wrote:
Tue Aug 08, 2017 12:05 pm
my iron tip caught the edge of the trace and pulled it right up.
[...]
I've done 144+ QFP chips plenty of times no problem.
Would you able to bridge the trace ? Which one is it ? It shouldn't be that hard if you have plenty soldering experience.
Thanks for the vote of confidence, you inspired me to crack it open again.

@nitrocaster, good news and bad news --
Good news: http://i.imgur.com/gnc39Cn.jpg
Bad news: http://i.imgur.com/iYRTHJR.jpg (I [censored] with the sense wire, thought it would be a great idea to rework it, but there is NO room after the board is in.)

I'm going to mount the new panel now, what are the ramifications of not having a working sense wire? I'm using linux exclusively and I have am running seabios if that makes a difference.

nitrocaster
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Re: X220 FHD Upgrade?

#517 Post by nitrocaster » Tue Aug 08, 2017 5:12 pm

Really, you should solder a tiny jumper wire instead of that huge one. It's not meant to be like that. As for the sense wire - it's not required if you install kernel patch to enable brightness control in single display mode.
Want to buy X220/X230 FHD mod kit? Read this before sending me a PM!
T60 | X230 i7-3520M FHD Win10

Quantumcross
Posts: 32
Joined: Mon Jan 16, 2017 7:06 pm
Location: NY

Re: X220 FHD Upgrade?

#518 Post by Quantumcross » Tue Aug 08, 2017 7:44 pm

nitrocaster wrote:
Tue Aug 08, 2017 5:12 pm
Really, you should solder a tiny jumper wire instead of that huge one. It's not meant to be like that. As for the sense wire - it's not required if you install kernel patch to enable brightness control in single display mode.
So everything seems to work fine, brightness control and all. I'm just getting some little video "glitches" (single line glitches) every once in a while, probably from my terrible bodge wire. It would be difficult to scrape off some solder mask, the traces are quite small. I don't have any wire thinner than that shown in the picture, unless you count single strands of a multi-strand wire. I would like to buy some 30 AWG Kynar wire (that's what I was thinking of). Would this be thin enough?

How would you suggest I do a better fix?

nitrocaster
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Re: X220 FHD Upgrade?

#519 Post by nitrocaster » Wed Aug 09, 2017 2:07 am

Pull a strand from multi-strand wire or wick. I did that type of stuff without microscope just a couple of months ago.
Want to buy X220/X230 FHD mod kit? Read this before sending me a PM!
T60 | X230 i7-3520M FHD Win10

Quantumcross
Posts: 32
Joined: Mon Jan 16, 2017 7:06 pm
Location: NY

Re: X220 FHD Upgrade?

#520 Post by Quantumcross » Wed Aug 09, 2017 11:11 am

Ok, I managed to carefully scrape away some mask on the trace and soldered a single strand to it. No more glitches!

Last question -- for the kernel patch, is there a way to apply it to more recent kernels, or is everyone using the patch sitting on 4.1.3?

Fusion
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Re: X220 FHD Upgrade?

#521 Post by Fusion » Fri Apr 27, 2018 1:00 pm

Edit double post.
Last edited by Fusion on Sat Apr 28, 2018 11:36 am, edited 1 time in total.
ThinkPad X220, i7-2640m, 16GB RAM, 120GB Kingston SSD, Intel HD3000, 12.5" WQHD, MacOS Sierra 10.13.2
ThinkPad W500 4063-VA4 CD2 Penryn 2,80GHz, 4GB RAM, 320GB HDD, 15.4" WUXGA, FireGL V5700, Win7u
ThinkPad R60 9461-DXG P-CD2 1,83GHz, 2GB 667MHz, 100GB HDD, ATI X1400@512MB, XP2 Pro

Fusion
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Re: X220 FHD Upgrade?

#522 Post by Fusion » Fri Apr 27, 2018 1:03 pm

Sooo VCC3B is shorted to ground. What I don't understand is at first it was 4R to ground, now it's 25R to ground.
Can the change in resistance mean anything? The motherboard runs fine without errors via the display port. Baffles me.
Is it likely to short VCC3B while hot swapping the ribbon cable? The VCC3B input to the LVDS connector goes through Fuse 6 and there aren't any grounds near it on the ribbon.
ThinkPad X220, i7-2640m, 16GB RAM, 120GB Kingston SSD, Intel HD3000, 12.5" WQHD, MacOS Sierra 10.13.2
ThinkPad W500 4063-VA4 CD2 Penryn 2,80GHz, 4GB RAM, 320GB HDD, 15.4" WUXGA, FireGL V5700, Win7u
ThinkPad R60 9461-DXG P-CD2 1,83GHz, 2GB 667MHz, 100GB HDD, ATI X1400@512MB, XP2 Pro

radostzohany
Posts: 19
Joined: Tue Aug 29, 2017 6:40 am
Location: Žilina, SK

Re: X220 FHD Upgrade?

#523 Post by radostzohany » Thu Aug 09, 2018 7:55 am

What would be the best IPS screen for x230 with least ghosting/hotspot problem and how should I carefully recognize it when looking on online listings please?
Is there a huge price gap when it comes to FHD/2k 12,5 mods? does they require nitrocaster board or some kind of modding, how much are they going for compared to standart ips screens ?

https://item.taobao.com/item.htm?id=43600546862

Your advice would be much appreciated, have a great day

WarhawkCZ
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Re: X220 FHD Upgrade?

#524 Post by WarhawkCZ » Sat Sep 29, 2018 4:13 am

Guys, I've read quite a lot about this mod but could somebody confirm, if there is still a chance to connect two external LCD screens using a dock (I have both types). I know that the mod takes signals from the docking port. What If I use two DVIs? Naturally, I don't care for the internal LCD when the laptop is docked with two external LCDs.
Is there a different behavior between x230 and x220 and also between Windows and Linux?

And the last question: Which is the most reliable adapter in October 2018?

Thanks!

ProFfeSsoRr
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Joined: Mon Nov 27, 2017 2:58 am
Location: Novosibirsk, Russia

Re: X220 FHD Upgrade?

#525 Post by ProFfeSsoRr » Sat Dec 15, 2018 1:59 pm

WarhawkCZ wrote:
Sat Sep 29, 2018 4:13 am
if there is still a chance to connect two external LCD screens using a dock
No, only 1 in dock and second from left side of the notebook.

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