Thinkpads Forum

A few people have been asking me to see if the Core 2 Quad Mobiles you find in the W700, will work in the W500. By all technicality, it should work... they're the same bus speed, same generation of processor, same architecture.

Please note that because I'm doing this with a bare motherboard and rollcage(so I could easily go between CPUs), I'm doing this all on an Advanced Dock.

I used the original CPU in the board as a reference CPU: A T9400, 2.53 GHz Dual-Core. In Windows, it idles at about 40-45C, and doing a 4 min stress test resulted in it warming up to 65C at the highest.

I tried installing a Q9000(2.0 GHz Core 2 Quad), and it powered on with no video, and no error beeps. It spun up the fan, but nothing else. Repeated tries to power on the machine produce the same result.

I don't know if it's something I'm doing wrong, if there's a BIOS update for the W500 that adds support for Quad core CPUs, or if there's a modded BIOS necessary

I tried an X9100, a CPU that apparently was never a factory-equipped option in the W500(despite that all following W-series laptops offered the extreme CPUs as an option... can someone confirm this?). The X9100 boots just fine and is read in the BIOS exactly as it is in the W700, as "Intel Core 2 Duo Extreme X9100", at 3.06 GHz. Running the stress test in Windows gives a similar trend to the T9400, just 5-7C hotter. It runs at 50C consistently when idling most of the time, and peaks at 75C when the 4-min stress test was run.

If you guys have any suggestions, I might be willing to apply it to try again.

You have to assemble the system before testing, or the temps won't have any relevance, my W510 doesn't go above 60C while open, no matter what I do, assemble it and temps go MUCH much higher.

There are three tests to do.

1. Prime95 on all cores.

2. Prime95 on all cores + Furmark.

3. Prime95 + Furmark on the ONE core.

To get the Quad core CPU to work a modded BIOS may be required.

The main point of this experiment was to see if I could get the QC to boot, since you mentioned you need a modded BIOS for this to happen(which I suspected anyway... I've seen reports of this working, but a mod BIOS has been mentioned in every stead), I may have to do some hunting to see what I can find.

I understand that having the mobo in a rollcage and running it like that is not very fair, however the rollcage I'm using is one I modified for my T43p-case/W500 rollcage experiment, and I don't have any W500 plastics at the moment. My roommate and I have just bought a T500 with ATI switchable graphics off ebay, so we can use that when I get it in to do some proper temp tests, according to the specifications you've written out. The working ATI graphics will also provide a much more realistic temperature profile for the test.

I'll see what I can do.

As far as I understand, it is possible to put T/W500 boards in to T60's if you apply ninja tricks.

Do that and look in to undervolting the CPU and maybe the ATi GPU too if you plan on using it.

The result might be pretty interesting.

As far as i know, there is no limit in the BIOS. But im probably wrong. Its seen a billion times before: Mobos need BIOS updates for some Cpus to work correctly.

The W700 should have a higher amount of voltage regulators, that could be the problem too..

Would it be possible to port the W700 BIOS to the W500, by taking it apart and transfer the blocks?

Would it be possible to port the W700 BIOS to the W500, by taking it apart and transfer the blocks?

I'd imagine it's possible, but I've read elsewhere that people sharply consider against it... because the W700's hardware is "significantly different". It would have to be very specific components in the W700's BIOS, because the W700 uses completely different HDD/SATA controllers that support RAID, as well as code for the higher-class G94-core MXM-II Quadro graphics cards with no switchable graphics.

I'll see if I can flash the absolute latest BIOS on that board, then try the CPU again.

Also-just a quick question off-topic, Windows does pick up the V5700 chip as "Radeon HD 3650", but it throws a "Code 10" error, "Cannot Start." This means the chip is toast, right? When I first got it, the machine black-screened on startup until I yanked the CMOS battery to reset the settings. Now it powers on and dxdiag always shows the Intel Q-series graphics, so I assume the board has a bum ATI chip.

Medessec wrote:

Would it be possible to port the W700 BIOS to the W500, by taking it apart and transfer the blocks?

I'd imagine it's possible, but I've read elsewhere that people sharply consider against it... because the W700's hardware is "significantly different". It would have to be very specific components in the W700's BIOS, because the W700 uses completely different HDD/SATA controllers that support RAID, as well as code for the higher-class G94-core MXM-II Quadro graphics cards with no switchable graphics.

I'll see if I can flash the absolute latest BIOS on that board, then try the CPU again.

Unless you're willing to kiss that board goodbye, I wouldn't try flashing W700's BIOS.

Also-just a quick question off-topic, Windows does pick up the V5700 chip as "Radeon HD 3650", but it throws a "Code 10" error, "Cannot Start." This means the chip is toast, right? When I first got it, the machine black-screened on startup until I yanked the CMOS battery to reset the settings. Now it powers on and dxdiag always shows the Intel Q-series graphics, so I assume the board has a bum ATI chip.

I'd try a different driver - or several of them - before I'd pronounce that chip to be toast.

Good luck.

Medessec wrote: I'd imagine it's possible, but I've read elsewhere that people sharply consider against it... because the W700's hardware is "significantly different". It would have to be very specific components in the W700's BIOS, because the W700 uses completely different HDD/SATA controllers that support RAID, as well as code for the higher-class G94-core MXM-II Quadro graphics cards with no switchable graphics.

I meant something like: "Split the BIOS in Blocks, take the relevant ones (processor dependant), move them over and compress a new BIOS". A W700 BIOS migth Work, but who knows? Its probably unlikely.

Medessec wrote:I'll see if I can flash the absolute latest BIOS on that board, then try the CPU again.

There is one of the BIOS changelogs mentioning something like "added CPU microcodes". Noone ever, never knew what it meant

Medessec wrote:Also-just a quick question off-topic, Windows does pick up the V5700 chip as "Radeon HD 3650", but it throws a "Code 10" error, "Cannot Start." This means the chip is toast, right? When I first got it, the machine black-screened on startup until I yanked the CMOS battery to reset the settings. Now it powers on and dxdiag always shows the Intel Q-series graphics, so I assume the board has a bum ATI chip.

What OS? Without the proper driver, it should show up as an "Engineering sample ATi HD3650". I would first try to activate ONLY the dedicated chip in BIOS, and see what happend.

So; Quad Core seems to Work: http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... 71#p728271

Some modifications still have to be done, thou