New IPS FHD Upgrade Kit for thinkpad T420 T430 ,And T430S T420S

[Yao2000]

I recently upgraded my T430s to IGZO low-power 400 nits FHD panel from T490 / T495 / X1 carbon and it is FANTASTIC.

i dont recommend the WQHD panel. it sucks up too much power and FHD is perfect for 14 inch screen.

[TPFanatic]

What version of the adapter do you have? I'm surprised that panel is compatible. I'm doing the FHD mod on a T430 with an old version of the adapter, I just need an LCD.

[Yao2000]

What version of the adapter do you have? I'm surprised that panel is compatible. I'm doing the FHD mod on a T430 with an old version of the adapter, I just need an LCD.

i honestly do not know what version. i ordered from a guy on taobao china and i was told it was the version from year 2018.
i believe the same version that works with the B140HAN01.3 panel will also work with the new IGZO low-power panels.

[stingray_SIX_TWO]

Just an update from my which may be relevant for you guys out there who haven't yet installed the kit or are thinking about other display options. I had the original Majestic kit running with a matte AUO B140HAN1.2 matte display for the past 2 years with no issues. I did buy this new kit like 2 years ago and never installed it, kept it originally for my T420s but that since got stripped for parts.

When I got a really good deal on a mint case T430s i7 I figured I'd try out the kit and ordered an originally unsupported display: AUO B140HAN1.8, this is the glossy variant of the 1.2. The dealer did not have the 1.3 and the listing for 1.8 said it is a matte display but after some research I was pretty sure it is glossy so I went for it and in fact got a B140HAN1.8 glossy display and this greeted me after roughly plugging it into the case and connecting the kit:

https://i.imgur.com/YcLZatM.jpg

It works! The display does not have the original 4 hinges to arrest it in the lid so I used thin tape and some rubber pieces to fix it in place...

https://i.imgur.com/Vo0MrR9.jpg

The display quality so far looks outstanding, no dead pixels and viewing angles are fantastic. Compared to the matte display I would say color representation is a bit less intense/full, clarity is superior, brightness about the same.

https://i.imgur.com/o8vMtcE.jpg

All functions including auto-dim, display brightness settings etc. are working as intended.

https://i.imgur.com/WjHW5jz.jpg

While the main tasks of text, spreadsheets and emails work flawlessly watching FHD video is a real pleasure on this display and feels better looking than the matte one. I still run the original kit with the matte FHD on the i5 430s and I can't quite part with it so I'll probably use it to experiment with getting the Sierra Airprime LTE card working

https://i.imgur.com/6JpPoiI.jpg

FORUM warning:
picture(s) WAY too big, tags removed. Please read the Forum Rules, especially Section 5: viewtopic.php?f=16&t=14339

[stingray_SIX_TWO]

FORUM warning:
picture(s) WAY too big, tags removed. Please read the Forum Rules, especially Section 5: viewtopic.php?f=16&t=14339

Sorry about the pics, have resized them and would edit the post but somehow unable to.

[Fry34]

Hello,
I have a b140han04.0 from a t490 that i replaced by low power one, and thinked to use it on my t420.
It may be compatible with this kit ?

[jamisnemo]

Is there any chance of these controller boards working with either a B140HAN01.5 or B140HAN01.4?

[jamisnemo]

I'm answering my own question since I've learned a lot since my last post and figured I'd share.

I purchased a similar board and, from what I can tell, it does not work with either the B140HAN01.4 or B140HAN01.5 panels that are currently being sold as B140HAN01.3 "compatible" panels. But since I didn't have very many guarantees about what was working and what wasn't, I ordered a second upgrade board from the ebay auction at the top of this thread. But that'll take forever to get here...

Meanwhile, I've reverse engineered the board, sniffed the I2C bus between the STC15W401AS and the LVDS to eDP converter, and realized that the publicly available datasheets are incomplete.

Sadly, some registers are not listed despite being present in more than one set of driver source code for NCS880X chips. Interestingly enough, the chip on my board is a NCS8805 assuming the registers and data values are actually legit. It's not an NCS8801 like I thought it was 4 years ago when I dug around over on 51nb the first time. Nor is it a NCS8801S based on the configuration that disables the hi-fi scaler feature of the newer chip.

Also missing is the register/interface for accessing the EDID data directly from the panel itself over the eDP AUX channel. I found at least one pile of source code that suggests the NCS8805 exposes this to the I2C bus that's accessible from the STC MCU. From my poking around, the I2C device id is 0x40 with 0x80 as the write address, and 0x81 as the read address. But reading 128 bytes starting from 0x00 returns almost nothing but 0x00 values. Without more information and/or digging, that's as far as I got on that.

The version of the board I got also sets a few registers that are not present in the NCS8805 datasheet but that ARE in the NCS8801 datasheet. It wasn't really clear why. Specifically, the register at address 0x09 which is used for toggling the video mode on the NCS8801.

In any case, as far as I can tell, the NCS8805 on these boards is perfectly capable of driving most of these panels along with a wide variety of other panels as well. I'm new to all this LVDS and eDP stuff, but from what I can tell, these chips are pretty sweet and it's a shame we don't have a more open project for them.

So, that said: if anyone would like to help throw down on assembling something other than close source version of this stuff... or if anyone can provide more information on the original design of these boards (source code? datasheets? hints about the missing registers? a clean way of dumping the firmware from the STC15W401AS without using some special tool?)... or if you'd like to know more about what I'm doing... then PLEASE let me know!

When I'm done sorting out all my notes, I'll do what I can to post what I've learned somewhere more organize than a random post at the end of a long thread like this.

[Impys]

The Innolux's low power panel for the t490 seems to be getting some rave reviews lately, and there seems to be a reliable seller for this panel: https://www.aliexpress.com/item/4001356570163.html

Has anyone tried that one with this kit? I am thinking the kit should be updated to work with all of the new t490 low power panels if it doesn't yet.

Another alternative I would have liked would be the sharp LQ140M1JW31, which is also supposed to be a top of the line IGZO panel.

I recently upgraded my T430s to IGZO low-power 400 nits FHD panel from T490 / T495 / X1 carbon and it is FANTASTIC.

Which model number would that be?

[7rowsforlife]

So, that said: if anyone would like to help throw down on assembling something other than close source version of this stuff... or if anyone can provide more information on the original design of these boards (source code? datasheets? hints about the missing registers? a clean way of dumping the firmware from the STC15W401AS without using some special tool?)... or if you'd like to know more about what I'm doing... then PLEASE let me know!

When I'm done sorting out all my notes, I'll do what I can to post what I've learned somewhere more organize than a random post at the end of a long thread like this.

I would be interested in pursuing this further.

I wonder if the IT6251 would be a more fruitful path to go down. The datasheet I found leaves a lot to be desired, but owing to the Kosagi Novena, it appears that one can find code for driving this chip in the Linux kernel (or patches for it, at a minimum).

[Impys]

An answer to my own question: The kits linked to at the start of this thread will not work. However, if the kit has a generic definition for the screen interface definition it should be able to work with any edp 1080p lcd.

I have confirmed this to be working with the T420s kit from https://www.aliexpress.com/item/4001084108485.html together with the innolux and sharp panels (though for the latter it is a bit of a bother to get it to fit properly)

[daniel_andrei1996]

I'm answering my own question since I've learned a lot since my last post and figured I'd share.

I purchased a similar board and, from what I can tell, it does not work with either the B140HAN01.4 or B140HAN01.5 panels that are currently being sold as B140HAN01.3 "compatible" panels. But since I didn't have very many guarantees about what was working and what wasn't, I ordered a second upgrade board from the ebay auction at the top of this thread. But that'll take forever to get here...

Meanwhile, I've reverse engineered the board, sniffed the I2C bus between the STC15W401AS and the LVDS to eDP converter, and realized that the publicly available datasheets are incomplete.

Sadly, some registers are not listed despite being present in more than one set of driver source code for NCS880X chips. Interestingly enough, the chip on my board is a NCS8805 assuming the registers and data values are actually legit. It's not an NCS8801 like I thought it was 4 years ago when I dug around over on 51nb the first time. Nor is it a NCS8801S based on the configuration that disables the hi-fi scaler feature of the newer chip.

Also missing is the register/interface for accessing the EDID data directly from the panel itself over the eDP AUX channel. I found at least one pile of source code that suggests the NCS8805 exposes this to the I2C bus that's accessible from the STC MCU. From my poking around, the I2C device id is 0x40 with 0x80 as the write address, and 0x81 as the read address. But reading 128 bytes starting from 0x00 returns almost nothing but 0x00 values. Without more information and/or digging, that's as far as I got on that.

The version of the board I got also sets a few registers that are not present in the NCS8805 datasheet but that ARE in the NCS8801 datasheet. It wasn't really clear why. Specifically, the register at address 0x09 which is used for toggling the video mode on the NCS8801.

In any case, as far as I can tell, the NCS8805 on these boards is perfectly capable of driving most of these panels along with a wide variety of other panels as well. I'm new to all this LVDS and eDP stuff, but from what I can tell, these chips are pretty sweet and it's a shame we don't have a more open project for them.

So, that said: if anyone would like to help throw down on assembling something other than close source version of this stuff... or if anyone can provide more information on the original design of these boards (source code? datasheets? hints about the missing registers? a clean way of dumping the firmware from the STC15W401AS without using some special tool?)... or if you'd like to know more about what I'm doing... then PLEASE let me know!

When I'm done sorting out all my notes, I'll do what I can to post what I've learned somewhere more organize than a random post at the end of a long thread like this.

So your version of the board has STC15W401AS MCU? From what I see online that's a very different package from the square chip on most of the boards (somebody said EFM8BB1 maybe)
Recently I've been looking into using the 400nit low power NE140FHM-N61 or, more interesting, the 500nit N140HCR-GL2 with my T430, as the B140HAN01.3 is a bit dimmer than I'd like . The NE140FHM-N61 is a 30pin 2 lane 1080p and might work on the FHD boards with little to no modification, but I don't have one to test right now. The N140HCR-GL2 uses a 40pin eDP connection, same as the screens for the WQHD kits, but only 2 eDP lanes since it's 1080p. If we can get the N140HCR-GL2 to work it would also be interesting to experiment with the EPrivacy and touch interface (USB 2.0-based) that is built into this display.

I'd love to hear from you if you've gotten any further with your reverse engineering.

[CPC464]

i'm using the evanjoo kit since september '18, without any issues at all, it keeps working flawlessly. No flickering or any other strange things.
I'm using an i7 2640m T420s with 16 Gb RAM, Nvidia Optimus and msata+hdd.

I purchased one of these kits from evanjoo as well for my T420s with an i7 2640m and 16gb ram, installed worked for a day then screen turned off and computer rebooted, evan sent me a new one installed worked fine for about half an hour after a pretty delicate install then the screen flickered, went blank then laptop rebooted. Has anyone else had this issue? I have it placed under the keyboard.

Mine is still working well after almost 4 years of having installed it. I'm still using my modified T420s as my main laptop, and I had no problems at all with the FHD pcb. Maybe you have got a defective unit, or your IPS panel is not compatible

I tried a second PCB from that seller, the version for 2560 × 1440 panels. I installed it a couple of years ago and worked fine with a 2560 × 1440, but the panel colors were worse than these from the FHD, and I ended unmounting it and installing the FHD again. The only issue I had with the QHD adapter is that it seems to heat more than the FHD version.

I have found some parts to build another T420s and install the QHD panel in it, mostly as backup laptop.

[Impys]

My T420s with fhd kit also was exhibiting the dreaded flickering screen problem.

It definitely looks like some kind of power issue to me, as restricting the cpu's maximum clock to 1.6Ghz fixed the problem on my system. I don't mind too much, since I was already down-clocking the manure out of this system to keep fan noise at dead silence during browsing and office usage.

[ayomae]

A thank you to all for the guides, knowledge and experiences.
Took the plunge, love it.

https://i.imgur.com/gk9fCub.jpeg

[strider]

Hi,

Looking for recommendation on specific adapter for FHD (1080p is plenty) and MATT/Anti-Glare IPS LCD panel for T430s.
Both ebay and Ali works, but looking for specific seller/links.
As long as its IPS panel (or other not TN), even around 1600x900 is OK, do NOT need 2K or higher at all (no flickering etc is way more important).
Not considering GLARE/Mirror panel.

CPU i5-3320m, 16GB RAM.
Thank you!