Thinkpads Forum

Hi there folks,

Im a newbie at laptops and well computers in general. I have a question, I was reading somewhere, i think it was here, about upgrading my processor? I have a 770 9548 40U i bought it for almost nothing but would LOVE a bigger hard drive but am against spendign more for a hard drive than i did for the whole unit. It has 98 on it for about another hour or so, so that brings me to my question. How is this " processor" update done? Do I just take off the old processor and replace it with a faster one? Im not looking for much, Id be happy, extatic even with a 400mhz. And yes im getting 128 mb of SD, the 96 mb of EDO that it came with just doesnt cut it.

Thanks for all your help in advance.

John

well the sticky at the top of the forum would be the best place to go to get all the information (or atleast a good bit) that you need. I'm actually selling my PII-400 beast right now cause I don't get to use it much. It was more of a challenge to see if I could upgrade it since I focused mostly on my 770z upgrades. enough babble...

I'm guessing that you're computer right now is either a Pentium 200 or 233. I'm not sure what success has been had with upgrading the 200, but i know the 233 can go to 400 easily. Donor MMC1 Processor modules can be found on eBay, but getting the fastest (400 mhz) will be hard and somewhat expensive. I spent $75.00 for mine, but it was brand new and still sealed. Make sure it's MMC1 and not MMC2. MMC2 is a completely different pin grid array and will not fit into a MMC1 slot on the motherboard of the Thinkpad.

Far as ram goes, i think you're limited with what you can put in it too. Does 224 meg sound right to anyone else? maybe it's 288. I know you can't go above that. You're limited by the onboard 32 meg that's sodered directly to the motherboard. I haven't read anyone having success with using 256 meg modules, so you're limited to (2) 128 meg modules in the remaining slots.

As for the HD, with the latest bios you can atleast get 20 gigs, I'm currently running 40 on my 770z. I'll say that a 7200 rpm drive is nice for speed and silence, but they are more costly. Depending on what you plan to do with it, maybe 4200 or 5400 rpm would be a better choice.

There are 2 DVD roms for the 770's Get the Toshiba (fru 11j8952) if at all possible, since the other one sucks in comparison. The crappy M a t s u s h i t a drive fru is 05k9066. I just don't like this drive compared to the Toshiba!

To upgrade memory, hd, or dvd it's fairly simple. To upgrade the processor i recommend you download the Hardware Maintenance Manual for the 770. Print it out, or load it on another computer while you perform surgery on your laptop. It shows step by step teardowns and it's a great resource.


that about sums it up. Any more questions feel free to post and i'm sure someone here will reply

Nate

oh awesome thanks... this laptop is more for me to learn on than anything else that and to play my Civ3 game on at work, we cant play them on our screens. but you have summed ut up beautifully. And just out of curiosity hiow much for your laptop?
I see that u have various other thinkpads lying around, any luck u might have a 5-10G hd for really cheap? like I said i didnt pay much for this one and id love something bigger than the 2 g thats in it now. thanks

I've got several 4 gig drives, i might have a 6 gig (bare drive, no case) somewhere. I'll have to look. I'm selling my 770 on eBay right now for $200.00 I think it's fair being that its upgraded and in excellent condition. Add to that a good battery and a genuine IBM A/C adapter. Goodluck with your upgrades, i'll pm you if i find any 5 to 10 gig drives laying around

Peace Out
Nate

cool thanks. I have the case for the HD, and I was wondering, can this thing have more than 1? what id really love is a stick of 128 ram, the stuff i got is krap pm me with some prices for some stuff. thanks man. Oh and I think my cd rom is going kaput... when i was reinstalling windows it was going click click click... then it worked..wierd.

Your CD probably just needs cleaned. Nothing strange there. There is a 2nd Harddrive adapter that goes in the Ultrabay that allows you to add another hard disk. if I come across any HD's i'll pm you and let you know what i have and how much for them.

thanks
Nate