I have fallen heir to a TP X20

[Olde Man]

IBM type daughter cleaning out the basement and I got this.

Looks like a 'light horse' version of the 600 "heavy horse'. Has Win 2000 on it. Now all she has to do is figure out what her password was.

Is RAM and the HD interchangeable with the 600 series TP?

[Neil]

Yup, same PC100 RAM and PATA hard drives. However, if you are talking about just swapping drives from one to the other, you may have some issues. Won't hurt anything to try, but a fresh install of the OS would seem to be in order. Especially if you can't come up with the password. Oh wait! What kind of password is she trying to remember? Windows? Or, HDD, BIOS or Supervisor?

[Olde Man]

Windows 2000 password.

I would use a formated HD, which I have a spare (doesn't everybody?) put 98SE and Linux Mint8 on it.

But I thought if the Win 2000 could be retrieved.....

[Olde Man]

Just got hold of the manual (Thanks to GOOGLE) and there seems to be a 'workaround' for the Windows password, which I think is the only one on there. We shall see.

In the excitement, I had to change the CMOS battery. Naturally, when I pulled the battery, it refused to let go of the female portion (sexual attraction there?) and the whole [censored] connection came out.

Hmmm! So I stuck it back in with a new battery and gee! It seems to work. Wonders will never cease.

Unfortunately, the workaround requires that I disconnect the CMOS battery. I am not too sure I will be lucky in making the connection the next time. Might be best to wipe the HD and instal Linux and Win98SE.

Sure nice to have a new hobby.

[Olde Man]

The clock/date error appeared the first time I booted, so I replaced the CMOS battery.

However, the rig seems to run awful hot, a lot hotter than any others.

There is no fan noise that I can hear (my hearing is not good, but I think I would hear because I hear fans start up on the others) and no sign of air moving either.

However, no 'fan erro'r noted on the screen even though there is no evidence of a fan.

Is that unusual, or is there something else going on here?

[pkiff]

There is no fan noise that I can hear [....] Is that unusual, or is there something else going on here?

I wouldn't worry about unless the system freezes up. My 600 machines often run without the fan for long stretches, including during startup. I don't have experience with the X20 series, but I would expect similar. The CPUs run pretty slowly compared to current CPUs and the graphic cards rarely needed any cooling at all...

Phil.

[Olde Man]

I only noticed when I noted that the case got a lot hotter than any of the 600's I have.

Anyway, I have decided to trash the rig, the CMOS connector busted off so.....I now have a door stop.

My daughter, who worked for IBM at the time, got it as a 'try-out before production', apparently their first 'light' model. I don't need 'light' and it had few of the features I wanted so no loss there.

I am now trying to figure out how to change the HD from NTFS to FAT. It was claimed that a Linux format would do it, I checked FAT in the Linux format specs, and ran Format. But if I got FAT, it is cleverly hidden from me.

Oh well, it keeps me off the street and out of the VFW.

[ozzymud]

mkdosfs...

This is the mkdosfs package. You can use this under Linux to create MS-DOS FAT file systems. It can create FAT12, FAT16 and FAT32 added a link for mkfs.vfat and a script for mkfs.umsdos and mkfs.uvfat (this last one needs the uvfat support to work). (from rpm description)

Code: Select all

mkdosfs -F 32 /dev/sda1

[Olde Man]

Thanks for the quick response. I ran across the 'formula' you suggest along with several others, although this one seemed the simplest. My problem is that Mint does not tell me the 'ID' of the HD that I want to format. I have no proof that 'sda1' is it.

No doubt it is in there somewhere.

[ozzymud]

"fdisk -l" or possibly "sudo fdisk -l" (<-- lower case L for list) will list available hard disks... look for the one with the NTFS filesystem...

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Disk /dev/sda: 74.3 GB, 74355769344 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 9039 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 1 9040 72610816 7 HPFS/NTFS

Disk /dev/sdb: 80.0 GB, 80000000000 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 9726 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdb1 1 9725 78116031 7 HPFS/NTFS

Disk /dev/sdc: 203.9 GB, 203928109056 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 24792 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdc1 1 24792 199141708+ 5 Extended
/dev/sdc5 2573 24792 178482118+ 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sdc6 1 124 995935+ 82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sdc7 125 2572 19663528+ 83 Linux

Partition table entries are not in disk order

Disk /dev/sdd: 60.0 GB, 60011642880 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 7296 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdd1 1 7296 58602496 7 HPFS/NTFS

Disk /dev/sde: 163.9 GB, 163928604672 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 19929 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sde1 * 1 19929 160079661 7 HPFS/NTFS

You should be able to pick the correct drive from the sizes listed, you can also use mount... with it you can mount the drive/partition 1st to verify it is the one you intend to format and/or copy data from 1st...

Code: Select all

sudo mount -t ntfs -o nls=utf8,umask=0222 /dev/sda1 /media/c

The /dev/sdX will prolly be different in your system...

typically:
/dev/hda = primary master
/dev/hdb = primary slave
/dev/hdc = secondary master
/dev/sda,sdb,sdc = 1st, 2nd, 3rd SATA drives
/dev/tfa,tfb,tfc = transflash... SD, CF, MMC...
/dev/cdrom, cdrom0, cdrom1 = CD's
etc, etc

[Olde Man]

Thanks. As soon as I nerve myself, I will try it.