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500 series Sata-II fix?
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500 series Sata-II fix?
If this topic has already been exhausted on previous threads I'd appreciate it if someone can point me to the old discussion---but is there a fix for my W500 similar to the Middleton BIOS for the T61 that will enable the Sata-II transfer rates on the controllers? Mine doesn't seem to go beyond UDMA 5 with a SATA-II hard drive.
Re: 500 series Sata-II fix?
The *61 series had a SATA II controller which was limited to SATA I speed in BIOS. Pretty sure newer models are not throttled like that.
How are you testing? Actual benchmarking with an SSD or just a report that says 'UDMA5'?
Just to make sure, is the SATA controller set to AHCI mode in BIOS? UDMA5 would be 100 MB/sec which would suggest you aren't in AHCI mode. If it's set to compatibility mode you'll need to change some registry settings in Windows before you change the BIOS or it won't boot.
How are you testing? Actual benchmarking with an SSD or just a report that says 'UDMA5'?
Just to make sure, is the SATA controller set to AHCI mode in BIOS? UDMA5 would be 100 MB/sec which would suggest you aren't in AHCI mode. If it's set to compatibility mode you'll need to change some registry settings in Windows before you change the BIOS or it won't boot.
Current Thinkpads:
X31, X40, X61T, X61, X201, X220 (i7 IPS), W520 (FHD), T440p (FHD),
T480 (QHD)
Dells: Latitude C840, Precision M70, Precision M4400, M6400 (WUXGA), M6600, M6700, 7730, XPS 13
Daily driver: MS Surface Pro 7 (i7)
X31, X40, X61T, X61, X201, X220 (i7 IPS), W520 (FHD), T440p (FHD),
T480 (QHD)
Dells: Latitude C840, Precision M70, Precision M4400, M6400 (WUXGA), M6600, M6700, 7730, XPS 13
Daily driver: MS Surface Pro 7 (i7)
Re: 500 series Sata-II fix?
W500 is SATA II ex-factory. You'll need an SSD to take full advantage of these speeds, though.
...Knowledge is a deadly friend when no one sets the rules...(King Crimson)
Cheers,
George (your grouchy retired FlexView farmer)
One FlexView to rule them all: A31p
Abused daily: T520, X200s
PMs requesting personal tech support will be ignored.
Cheers,
George (your grouchy retired FlexView farmer)
One FlexView to rule them all: A31p
Abused daily: T520, X200s
PMs requesting personal tech support will be ignored.
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Re: 500 series Sata-II fix?
Well, my W500 is in AHCI mode and this is a real issue that was discussed back in the day. And my Middleton Bios equipped 61s do report UDMA6 mode for the controllers. Anyway, here are a couple of threads on the Lenovo forums from about 10 years ago: https://forums.lenovo.com/t5/ThinkPad-T ... 1948#M6012 and also https://forums.lenovo.com/t5/ThinkPad-T ... d-p/234741
Quote:
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MrPeter1985
Guru
Posts: 1,525
Registered: 04-20-2010
Location: US
Message 3 of 12 (13,955 Views)
Re: Can a T500 run SATA 3.0 Gbit/s? [ Edited ]
05-27-2010 06:50 AM - edited 05-27-2010 06:52 AM
Per http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... MIGR-71784 it is SATA not SATA II. But if SATA 3.0 does not run at 3 then it will run under 1.5, that is not a problem. People can confirm that the difference between 1.5 and 3 is not that much. The only huge difference is between a HDD and SSD drive.
IT Specialist and Consultant
Lenovo Tablet Evangelist
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On the other hand, Sandra says the controller is in SATA-300 mode. I'll have to put an SSD on this and benchmark it.
Quote:
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MrPeter1985
Guru
Posts: 1,525
Registered: 04-20-2010
Location: US
Message 3 of 12 (13,955 Views)
Re: Can a T500 run SATA 3.0 Gbit/s? [ Edited ]
05-27-2010 06:50 AM - edited 05-27-2010 06:52 AM
Per http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... MIGR-71784 it is SATA not SATA II. But if SATA 3.0 does not run at 3 then it will run under 1.5, that is not a problem. People can confirm that the difference between 1.5 and 3 is not that much. The only huge difference is between a HDD and SSD drive.
IT Specialist and Consultant
Lenovo Tablet Evangelist
******************************************************************************************************
On the other hand, Sandra says the controller is in SATA-300 mode. I'll have to put an SSD on this and benchmark it.
Re: 500 series Sata-II fix?
Read the full thread that post was in:
https://forums.lenovo.com/t5/ThinkPad-T ... d-p/234741
The drives that were shipped with T400/T500 generation were only SATA I. The system supports SATA II speed.
https://forums.lenovo.com/t5/ThinkPad-T ... d-p/234741
The drives that were shipped with T400/T500 generation were only SATA I. The system supports SATA II speed.
Current Thinkpads:
X31, X40, X61T, X61, X201, X220 (i7 IPS), W520 (FHD), T440p (FHD),
T480 (QHD)
Dells: Latitude C840, Precision M70, Precision M4400, M6400 (WUXGA), M6600, M6700, 7730, XPS 13
Daily driver: MS Surface Pro 7 (i7)
X31, X40, X61T, X61, X201, X220 (i7 IPS), W520 (FHD), T440p (FHD),
T480 (QHD)
Dells: Latitude C840, Precision M70, Precision M4400, M6400 (WUXGA), M6600, M6700, 7730, XPS 13
Daily driver: MS Surface Pro 7 (i7)
Re: 500 series Sata-II fix?
Are SATA III drives backward compatible?
A31p P-IV 2Ghz, 2MB, 2653-R6U
T500 T9600 2055-BE9
T510 i5 4384-DV7
T510 i7 4349-A64
T520 i7QM 4242-4UU Highly Modified
T16 i7 1260P 21BV000SUS
T500 T9600 2055-BE9
T510 i5 4384-DV7
T510 i7 4349-A64
T520 i7QM 4242-4UU Highly Modified
T16 i7 1260P 21BV000SUS
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Re: 500 series Sata-II fix?
Planned Purchase: T480s i5-8350 FHD Touch
Impulse Buy: Thinkpad not named for safety reasons
RIP: X220 4291-C91 X61 7676-A24 760XD-U9E
Impulse Buy: Thinkpad not named for safety reasons
RIP: X220 4291-C91 X61 7676-A24 760XD-U9E
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Re: 500 series Sata-II fix?
For the Tx00 units, will SATA I vs II make a big difference? I dont think it is dramatically faster, but probably has some signifcance. Isnt the CPU and GPU still going to bottleneck the system, to what degree, I dont know.
Thinkpad4by3's Law of the Universe.
The efficiency of two screens equally sized with equal numbers if pixels are equal. The time spent by a 4:3 user complaining about 16:9 is proportional to the inefficiency working with a 16:9 display, therefore the amount of useful work extracted is equal.
The efficiency of two screens equally sized with equal numbers if pixels are equal. The time spent by a 4:3 user complaining about 16:9 is proportional to the inefficiency working with a 16:9 display, therefore the amount of useful work extracted is equal.
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Re: 500 series Sata-II fix?
Thinkpad4by3:
Subjectively, having Sata-II working makes a huge difference for me with a good SSD, like the Samsung EVO 850 Pro I have at the moment on a T61. I thought it seemed a bit slow, and then discovered it was only working in Sata. It had been sitting around for a while and I couldn't remember if I'd never applied Middleton's BIOS or whether, perhaps, the automated updates might have reflashed it to a stock BIOS unbeknownst to me. In any case, I reflashed it to the Middleton BIOS and it seemed lightning fast after that. That T61 system is subjectively faster than my W-500 with the stock, mechanical Seagate 500GB Sata-II drive on it. But I just use the 500 for web development, since you can't use a 4:3 screen for that anymore, and I don't think I'd waste one of my good SSD's on it.
Subjectively, having Sata-II working makes a huge difference for me with a good SSD, like the Samsung EVO 850 Pro I have at the moment on a T61. I thought it seemed a bit slow, and then discovered it was only working in Sata. It had been sitting around for a while and I couldn't remember if I'd never applied Middleton's BIOS or whether, perhaps, the automated updates might have reflashed it to a stock BIOS unbeknownst to me. In any case, I reflashed it to the Middleton BIOS and it seemed lightning fast after that. That T61 system is subjectively faster than my W-500 with the stock, mechanical Seagate 500GB Sata-II drive on it. But I just use the 500 for web development, since you can't use a 4:3 screen for that anymore, and I don't think I'd waste one of my good SSD's on it.
Re: 500 series Sata-II fix?
I could very well see this as an objective truth. The difference in response between a spinning drive and an SSD is likely to weigh more on overall performance than one generation gap between the CPUs...Mindfulness Quebec wrote: ↑Sat Oct 14, 2017 8:14 pmThat T61 system is subjectively faster than my W-500 with the stock, mechanical Seagate 500GB Sata-II drive on it.
SSDs are so darn inexpensive nowadays...you should really go for that upgrade IMO.But I just use the 500 for web development, since you can't use a 4:3 screen for that anymore, and I don't think I'd waste one of my good SSD's on it.
Your machine, your call.
...Knowledge is a deadly friend when no one sets the rules...(King Crimson)
Cheers,
George (your grouchy retired FlexView farmer)
One FlexView to rule them all: A31p
Abused daily: T520, X200s
PMs requesting personal tech support will be ignored.
Cheers,
George (your grouchy retired FlexView farmer)
One FlexView to rule them all: A31p
Abused daily: T520, X200s
PMs requesting personal tech support will be ignored.
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Re: 500 series Sata-II fix?
SSDs can make a surprising amount of performance come back to a computer. I tried W7 on a T42 and it was unbearably slow. I added an Ultrabay SSD it actually was quite snappy though web performance was as good as you would expect, awful.
Thinkpad4by3's Law of the Universe.
The efficiency of two screens equally sized with equal numbers if pixels are equal. The time spent by a 4:3 user complaining about 16:9 is proportional to the inefficiency working with a 16:9 display, therefore the amount of useful work extracted is equal.
The efficiency of two screens equally sized with equal numbers if pixels are equal. The time spent by a 4:3 user complaining about 16:9 is proportional to the inefficiency working with a 16:9 display, therefore the amount of useful work extracted is equal.
Re: 500 series Sata-II fix?
Yeah, we concur, adding a SSD greatly extends our own T42 aging notebook's useful life!
We also maxed out our RAM, especially useful if you are using 64-bit Win7.
We only got rid of our T42 when it started with the USB2>>USB1.1 speed gremlins which need motherboard soldering.
(We should have thought of using a PCMCIA USB2 !).
Greatly miss our T42 LCD which was 4:3 superior aspect ratio.
- - - - - - - - - -
Moral of the story: Adding SSD and maxing out your RAM greatly extends the useful life of your notebook computer!
(We tend to start maxing out these 3-5 years after purchase, when prices go down over time!)
We also maxed out our RAM, especially useful if you are using 64-bit Win7.
We only got rid of our T42 when it started with the USB2>>USB1.1 speed gremlins which need motherboard soldering.
(We should have thought of using a PCMCIA USB2 !).
Greatly miss our T42 LCD which was 4:3 superior aspect ratio.
- - - - - - - - - -
Moral of the story: Adding SSD and maxing out your RAM greatly extends the useful life of your notebook computer!
(We tend to start maxing out these 3-5 years after purchase, when prices go down over time!)
Daily Driver: (X1E3) X1 Extreme 3rd Gen | mobile broadband (WWAN)
Current Thinkpads: X1E3 | X1E1 | X1C10 | X1C9 | X1C4 | X1C3 | X230
Retired Thinkpads: X250 | T410 | T42 | 560 (circa 1996)
Current Thinkpads: X1E3 | X1E1 | X1C10 | X1C9 | X1C4 | X1C3 | X230
Retired Thinkpads: X250 | T410 | T42 | 560 (circa 1996)
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Re: 500 series Sata-II fix?
Well, I put an Intel SSD in the W500 and it's absolutely giving me Sata-II speeds: about 255 MBps read and 220 MBps write, according to the benchmark utility I tried. The HD controller reports UDMA mode 6. So it is NOT intentionally throttled as the 61 series were.
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