W520 heatsink and memory compatibility.

[antonrozanov]

Hello! Now i'm owner of W520 (2640m, 1000 quadro)
Want to upgrade cpu 2820qm or 2960xm.
a) Do i need to upgrade heatsink? If yes - which one? 04w0437, 04w1574, 04w1575 for 2960xm, 04w0438, 04w1576, 04w1577 for 2820qm?
b) Will 1600 mhz memory work on it? If not, how to make it work? Some BIOS mod?

Thank you in advance!

[RealBlackStuff]

Welcome to the forum.
What is the TYPE XXXX-YYY on the bottom label?
How many RAM slots does your machine have, 2 or 4? (Judging by the 2-core CPU, probably only 2)
If you put in a quad-core, get the 55W heatsink 04W0437, 04W1574 or 04W1575
Faster RAM might work, but its speed will go down to the "standard" PC3-10600 1333MHz speed of the W520.

[antonrozanov]

Welcome to the forum.
What is the TYPE XXXX-YYY on the bottom label?
How many RAM slots does your machine have, 2 or 4? (Judging by the 2-core CPU, probably only 2)
If you put in a quad-core, get the 55W heatsink 04W0437, 04W1574 or 04W1575
Faster RAM might work, but its speed will go down to the "standard" PC3-10600 1333MHz speed of the W520.

Thank you!
TYPE 428255g-R9m4rpv.
Yes, it looks like there is two dummy DIMM cards.... Its not possible to insert memory modules on these slots?
Which one of this three heatsinks i need to install? Or its just depend mainboard type/model?
I find some thread on bios-mods about BIOS unlock frequency and white-list remove, but there is only some confusing instructions, and i'm "not so strong" about bios modifications and asm knowledge... There is no modded/patched bios already?

[RealBlackStuff]

Any of those 3 55W heatsinks will do.
You'll not gain any noticeable speed increase from using faster RAM.
Unless you have a masters-degree in soldering, you can only use the 2 slots you have now.
They can take up to 16GB (2x8GB). total.

Modded BIOS: Lenovo ThinkPad W520_1.42-(8BET62WW)-8buj21us__WL.rar (Slic added, WL removed)
https://www.sendspace.com/file/qvhg0y

Flash from within Windows. Run WINUPTP.EXE /s as Administrator.

[jdrou]

Modded BIOS: Lenovo ThinkPad W520_1.42-(8BET62WW)-8buj21us__WL.rar (Slic added, WL removed)
https://www.sendspace.com/file/qvhg0y

Just to clarify, does this mod not include the RAM speed unlock?

For the OP, the only place you'd likely see an improvement from increasing the RAM speed would be when running on the integrated Intel graphics. If that is really important you could stick with a BIOS version 1.36 or lower if a modded "unlock" BIOS isn't available. 1.37 is when Lenovo throttled the RAM speed. I never upgraded from 1.36 and am running memory at 1600MHz.