Thinkpads Forum

Hello, I have a lenovo t500 that i absolutely love. For me its the right combination of new performance and old features. Anyway I am using my laptop to tune my vehicle and i need a serial port. Either the 2503 or the 2504 docking station will give me that feature. I am interested in the 2503 docking station for the pcie slot. I was wondering if these docking stations need to be plugged in in order to use the serial port? The 2503 looks pretty beefy and with its own fan i am concerned it needs to be plugged into a power supply in order to use it. The 2504 is a lot slimmer and i am hopping i can dock my laptop into it and use the added ports without having the docking station plugged in. So can i plug my laptop into either of these docks and use it off the laptops battery. Also i see on ebay people have some docks cheaper but they are missing the key. What is the point of the key? is it so someone cant seperate the docking station and the laptop. If the key is missing can i still use the docking station? Thanks

Welcome to the forum, joegreen!

I am typing on my T500 right now docked in aforementioned docking station (2504) with missing key
Key does nothing, just locks laptop in place, but is very easy to remove if one looses it. Here you go, watch this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PFLiyzZ_FyQ

Ok cool. Now my big question. I need a serial port in order to hook up to my trucks computer to get data. I can only get data while i am driving down the road with the laptop connected. I need to use the docking station without the power cors being plugged in. Is this possible?

This may work:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/USB-to-RS232-Se ... 5412387288

joegreen wrote:Ok cool. Now my big question. I need a serial port in order to hook up to my trucks computer to get data. I can only get data while i am driving down the road with the laptop connected. I need to use the docking station without the power cors being plugged in. Is this possible?

You know, I don't think it is, otherwise they would not have needed to do something like this:
http://support.lenovo.com/us/en/documen ... =Solutions

So thier is a possibility it could work. I tried a usb converter but i was getting interference problems. Plugging right into the serial port on my friends lenovo allowed me to have a perfect connection.

The last Thinkpads with a physical Serial Port were the T20/T21/T22/T23 and T30.
(I have a few T23 machines for sale, great for tuning cars)
In the T60/T61 series you could put an adapter (P/N or FRU 40Y8121) with Serial and Parallel ports in it instead of the Ultrabay CD/DVD drive.

If your machine came with an Expresscard slot, you could try:
Expensive (34mm): http://www.startech.com/Cards-Adapters/ ... xpressCard
Cheap (34mm): http://www.ebay.com/itm/400900528711
Cheap (PCMCIA): http://www.ebay.com/itm/200715822736
Whether either of them works in your case? Dunno...

I tried my friends docking station without the power supply hooked up and it seemed to work fine with the serial port. I am going to pick up a 2504 dock from ebay. I can get a working dock for $10 without a key or power cord or i can spend a couple more dollars and get one with a set of keys. Is it worth it to get one with the keys? If i don't will i miss them and want keys in the future? Why would i want to lock the dock to the laptop? Thanks for all your help so far.

My experience with keys and docks is that it's a useless combination, unless your dock is attached to an immovable object, and you're in an area where theft is an issue. Otherwise, someone could lift the dock and ThinkPad together. I've seen stories of lost keys, how do I get the laptop off? As long as it is unlocked when you get it, no need for a key.

Get the key-less one and no, you do not need a separate power supply for 2504.
Hope this helps

thanks guys. I posted over on the lenovo forum 2 days ago on lenovo's website but got no help. You guys seem to be a lot more active. I thought the locking system was a little weird because if i were a bad guy i would want to take the laptop and dock together. I understand they locking system is good for some places just not next to me on the seat of my truck.

I managed to score a 2504 docking station on ebay without keys for 7 dollars free shipping.

A key for a docking station is so you can lock the laptop to the docking station. It's implied that the docking station is itself locked down to an immovable object via the Kensington security slot.

oh okay. thanks

Question: I can only use the serial port on the dock when the power adapter is connected. When i look in the device manager the communications port 1 will appear only when plugged in. If i connect my trucks ecm to the serial port while the power supply is plugged in everything works fine. I cannot connect to the ecm without power being supplied to the dock. Here is the catch. If i connect to my trucks ecm while the dock is plugged in and then i unplug the power adapter the computer will say the dock is still in use and i can continue to use the serial port without the power adapter being hooked up. If i am able to continue to use the dock after it is unplugged is their any way to have the computer recognize the serial port without plugging in the dock to begin with. Hope that was not to confusing.

When I had my 2000 VW TDI diesel I started out with the "free" software and only needed the USB to OB2 ?? connector on the other end. I don't have any idea of that car end connector would work with your make/model but I suspect they are all about the same. It worked fine, less than $15 on eBay if you were close to me you could borrow.

PS I thought the docking station only worked on the W500 and I think you said a T.


The car end of the cable says OBD II and it fits perfectly into the one on my 2006 Silverado pickup. Took apart chip only good for TDI diesels.

This one off Amazon seems to work. http://www.amazon.com/ScanTool-423001-D ... obd2+cable I suspect the free software is limited and they want you to pay to upgrade .

I connect to my obd1 ecm using a serial cable. It is a fuel injection retrofit i did on my 78 chevy k20.