T400 & Windows 8

[lukee]

Hi,
I am considering to use Windows 8 on my T400 laptop (P8400, 8GB RAM, Intel X4500MHD graphics) and only supported drivers for Windows 8 which are applicable on T400 are: fingerprint software & drivers, UltraNav driver, HDD Active Protection System and Software Update application. Does somebody have experience with other features, i.e. Power Manager, PM Driver and TPM functionality on W8? Will be the T400/T500 series officially supported by Lenovo?

[QWERTY Andreas]

I use W8 on a W500, and it works just fine. Its the same specs as the T500, except the graphics card that is a FireGL V5700 which was hard to get working.

The only thing that ive come across that didnt work is the system update utility,

[lukee]

Does it mean, that this version of System Update will not recognize your ThinkPad SW packages on Windows 8?
http://support.lenovo.com/en_US/downloa ... MIGR-73695

[Neil]

System Update 5.00 should work fine. Back when I tried Win8 on my T60, like Adndrea said, everything worked except for System Update. But that was before 5.0 had been released, so all should be good now.

[lukee]

OK, thanks for the replies. If I understand correctly, I can use also Windows 7 drivers for TPM installation, right?
Because as I will use 'Pro' edition of W8 I would like to use the BitLocker feature contained there.

[dgyee]

System Update 5.00 should work fine. Back when I tried Win8 on my T60, like Adndrea said, everything worked except for System Update. But that was before 5.0 had been released, so all should be good now.

Are you sure System Update 5.0 works on a T400 machine with Windows 8? I couldn't get it to work. It states that "No Packages applicable to your system were found." I called Lenovo support on this and they told me they do not support Windows 8 on T400 machines..

[basturd]

System Update 5 didn't work for me on T400. So I have a couple of annoying things, like mute button not working, minimum brightness is far higher than it was in Win 7 with Lenovo drivers, etc.

[Speez]

I use W8 on a W500, and it works just fine. Its the same specs as the T500, except the graphics card that is a FireGL V5700 which was hard to get working.

The only thing that ive come across that didnt work is the system update utility,

QWERTY Andreas, I have a W500 that I just upgraded to Windows 8 and although I am very happy with it I am having trouble getting the video card to work as well. I finally set only the dedicated through the bios and got the drivers to install as the Radeon HD 3650 but were you able to get actual V5700 drivers to work? If so would you mind telling me because I can't get any GPU acceleration in CS6 with the 3650 drivers and its my one regret switching to W8. Thanks ahead of time!

-Speez

[emeraldgirl08]

Not sure if Lenovo or AMD will offer a fix for the graphics drivers. The WDDM is 1.1 for the T400 hardware. W8 now uses WDDM 1.2. There are incredibly resourceful and crafty people who might figure out something. If anyone who is reading this has switchable graphics working please chime in! TIA.

[precip9]

I got the 5700 drivers working. Please see this thread:

http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=67&t=105024

My experience was only with the RTM, not the actual "for-sale" version.

[precip9]

QWERTY Andreas, I have a W500 that I just upgraded to Windows 8 and although I am very happy with it I am having trouble getting the video card to work as well. I finally set only the dedicated through the bios and got the drivers to install as the Radeon HD 3650 but were you able to get actual V5700 drivers to work? If so would you mind telling me because I can't get any GPU acceleration in CS6 with the 3650 drivers and its my one regret switching to W8. Thanks ahead of time!

-Speez

I thought that CS6 supports only Nividia for GPU acceleration. When you were running W7, what parts of CS6 used the V5700 for acceleration ?

It would be really nice if Premiere supports the V5700, but the only support for ATI I have heard about is Photoshop in CS3.

[Speez]

Sorry I didn't mean acceleration like cuda rendering, photoshop has some gpu accelerated effects, as I believe after effects does too but i may be wrong. I do wish it had cuda-like render acceleration though. That'll come when I finally build a desktop Thanks for the help. If I get a chance at work today I will try and let you know how I make out on the retail version of W8

[Speez]

Also I had just enabled just the dedicated card in the bios so I'll have to try doing it the switchable way. Thanks!

[Speez]

Followed all the steps. After restart switchable graphics icon/program didn't appear and my V5700 in device manager has the same error as before I set it as dedicated only
"This device cannot start. (Code 10)

{Operation Failed}
The requested operation was unsuccessful."

*scratches head*
Intel GPU is selected and the "radeon" card can't be updated or anything, just has the error
Maybe i'll try a restart again, but its odd

[precip9]

Perhaps something changed between RTM and the actual release, but let's check the steps.

After the first reboot, did the power manager appear on the taskbar and in "Control Panel"?
Is the power manager device driver listed in "System-->Hardware-->Device Manager" ?

[Speez]

I don't see it in device manager or taskbar but I think I realize what I did wrong. I installed just the Lenovo Power Managenment Driver but I should have, and am going to install now the Power Manager and both "Patch Modules" it says are available. Don't know what they do but best install them. I realize now that I miss read between "management" and "Manager" so i'll try again and let you know after lunch. Thank you so so much btw.

[precip9]

Let's keep working on this. A lot of people care.

[Speez]

Installed both Lenovo Power Management and Power Manager. Tried to run both "patch" installs but it said my system didn't need them. *note I ran all of them in Windows 7 compatablity mode in order to work correctly"

After restart power manager runs fine, icon on taskbar and control panel.
Device manager still shows the Radeon HD 3650 with the same error as above .."operation failed.."
If I right click on the battery icon I have no switch video card options. I do remember having this way back with windows xp. Not sure where to go from here. Checked windows updated, video card driver is already WDDM v.11

[precip9]

You got the power manager up. Navigate to Control Panel-->System-->Device Manager-->System devices, and be sure the list includes "Thinkpad PM Device."

Now let's review how you installed the driver. Since it shows "3650", you do not have the ATI V5700 package installed. "3650" indicates it picked up the generic, Microsoft driver instead. So it seems you missed another step.

The XP/SP3 compatibility step requires that you work with the unpacked driver files.

1. To get those files, you need to run the switchable graphics driver package and let it fail. This unpacks the files.

2. Then, navigate to the Lenovo driver store, C:DRIVERS\WIN\VIDEO... The folder is not currently present on my system, or I would give you the exact path, but you should find the ATI switchable graphics driver folder in this area.

3. There will be a setup.exe in the folder. Right click on it, and set the compatibility mode to XP\SP3. Then, for good measure, right click on it again and select "Run as administrator."

4. The ATI switchable graphics driver install program should now run.

5. Reboot the machine.

6. Right click on the Power Manager battery icon, and select Switchable Graphics->High Performance. If the switchable graphics option does not appear, try another reboot.

7. When switching from "Energy Saving" to "High Performance", the screen should go through the usual conniptions.

8. Navigate to Control Panel-->System-->Device Manager-->Display Adapters. It should now display FireGL 5700.

If it shows this, you've succeeded. Otherwise, we have more work to do.

[Speez]

In my device manager I have "Lenovo PM Device" not "Thinkpad PM Device" not sure if this is just a name difference or not. As per your instructions about installing the actual driver through compatibility mode I have followed that several times already, that's how I got it to recognize the video card in the first place. Only things I'm missing is when I right click the green battery "Lenovo Power Manager" button, I don't get a switch graphics option. I know it is set to switchable and OS detect in the bios. Going to try a restart as well as recheck the bios. Boss just left so I have half an hour to kill working on this. I'll update you in a few

[precip9]

What shows under Device Manager-->Display Adapters?

[Speez]

ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3650 (Microsoft Corporation - WDDM v1.1 (with the error message from earlier)
and the Intel chipset which is currently active

[precip9]

We need to get 3650 out of there, and V5700 in there.
Try this. Navigate to Device Manager-->Display adapters.
Right-click on "ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3650". This invokes a menu. Choose "Update Driver Software."
In the hope of preventing it from going to Microsoft for a driver, pull the ethernet and turn off the wireless before you do this.
See if it finds the 5700 driver. If so, install it, do the reboot, see if it stays, and check for functionality.

Another thing you could try is to uninstall the driver. There may appear an option to delete the driver files. This might force it to use the 5700 driver. Although I think the worst that could happen would be that you end up with a generic VGA driver, the usual disclaimers apply.

I pass through Trenton frequently on my way to NY. I'm downloading the W8 Enterprise trial, which I'll run from the Ultrabay, to see if something has changed.

[Speez]

SUCCESS!!!

Ok so I might even though I'm nervous, try to retrace my steps but I tried the last steps you said with no success.
Only thing I did different this time was install Intel Chipset that was compatable with Windows 8 from the Lenovo website, and what I wonder if what really did it was
I installed the ATI driver again as usual but instead of picking xp/sp3 I chose Windows 7. It was doing the usual install when the screen flickered black several times (which I knew was a good sign) and the install said some things had failed, but when I checked device manager V5700 showed right up as well as the switchable graphics work now. I will try to retrace and figure out what actually fixed it and will post the final solution.

[precip9]

Excellent!

I now remember that I installed the chipset software, but not from the Lenovo website. Where did you find a download labeled compatible with Windows 8?

Anyway, here is a note regarding the Intel chipset. If you have an advanced format drive, at least the one I use, the Western Digital 1TB Scorpio Blue, the Lenovo download will destroy the system. This has been my experience with both the X61 and the W500.

If you have a large drive, your system is now in danger, because certain facilities use the Microsoft Extensible Storage Engine, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extensible_Storage_Engine , which performs raw file access. Try Windows Update. If it refuses to run, that's the reason. If you uninstall the chipset driver quick enough, you may be able to save the system.

The solution is to download "infinst_autol.exe" from the Intel website. This is a collection, not of drivers, but .inf files. When executed, it goes through a system and replaces any generic infs with the Intel specific. Then Microsoft automatically applies the correct driver.

Let's make the guide right, and perhaps the admin will make it sticky.

[Speez]

In order to get the proper drivers for the AMD Mobility FireGL V5700 in your Thinkpad W500 follow these directions.

On Lenovo's website navagate to support>drivers and enter in your exact model and select "Windows 7 64bit" as an OS
Download the following drivers:
CHIPSET
-Intel Chipset Support for Windows 8
POWER MANAGEMENT
-Lenovo Power Management Driver for Windows
-Power Manager for Windows 7
VIDEO
-ThinkPad Switchable Graphics Driver for Windows 7

1. Install the power manager driver Lenovo Power Management Drive FIRST
2. Reboot.
3. Install Intel Chipset Support for Windows 8
4. Open the Thinkpad Switchable Graphics Driver
5. Allow the Switchable Graphics driver package to unpack to C:\DRIVERS\VIDEO as usual, BUT DO NOT RUN THE ATI Setup.exe.
6. Open Control Panel>Device Manager>Display Adapters
7. Right click on Radeon HD 3650 and click "Update Driver Software"
8. Click Browse My Computer...>Let Me Pick From A List...>Have Disk
9. On the pop-up click browse and navigate to where you unpacked the driver earlier
10. C:\DRIVERS\WIN\VIDEO\PACKAGES\DRIVERS\DISPLAY\ "W7_INF" for 32bit and "W76A_INF" for 64 bit
11. Select "C7138564.inf" and OK and driver should install. You may see the screen flash black temporary, this is normal.
12. REBOOT and you should not have a fully functional FireGL V5700 video card

Special thanks to precip9 for the original fix on beta and working together to solve this.

[Speez]

precip9 if you want to try out my slightly different work around, it seems to work well. Let me know if you succeed as well and feel free to recopy and post my solution in its on thread. I only signed up here originally to get help when I saw your post. Glad to have better performance in CS6 suite. Thanks again man!

[emeraldgirl08]

I was not able to get my ATI HD3470/Intel switchable graphics to work correctly until last night. I decided to go to 'Device Manager' and uninstall both display drivers(?) for each of the graphics drivers listed. Initially after my W8 installation I had downloaded and run the exe in W7 compatibility mode and let the exe continue to install immediately upon unpacking. After reading a couple of posts I noticed how people were having success by letting the exe unpack and not letting it continue to immediate installation. I decided to approach this the same way. I already had the latest power manager and chipset driver so I was okay there.

After uninstalling both display drivers that show up in device manager I made sure I had the latest W7 (64 bit for me) exe ready for unpacking. Unpacking simply means double-clicking on the exe file and letting it extract to the "Drivers" folder. At the end of the unpacking there will be a box you can untick asking if you wish to install now. DO NOT INSTALL IMMEDIATELY AFTER EXTRACTING! I also turned my wifi switch off so windows will not search for an automatically install anything.

Also when you uninstall the drivers you will not see the cards anymore in the device manager so I right-clicked and selected 'scan hardware changes.' At this point W8 will load its own generic drivers and that will be reflected by the return of your LCD's native resolution (mine is 1440X900). Now the ATI 3400 will appear in the device manager. This is fine. Proceed to your DRIVERS folder in the C drive.

At this point I went to my Local Drive C:>> DRIVERS>> WIN>> VIDEO>> right-clicked on 'setup' and changed compatibility to W7. I then double clicked after applying the compatibility change. My screen flashed (good sign in this case) and began installing and applying the ATI/Intel switchable graphics drivers.

I then rebooted and when I returned to the desktop I was greeted with a DOS-like screen which was running some graphics tests. After it was done and my Start (tiled interface screen) appeared I noticed immediately that there were several ATI tiles. I didn't want those there so I right-clicked and selected to unpin them from the Start screen. I then went to desktop and right-clicked on my Battery icon and noticed the switchable graphics option was now there!!!

Hooray

Lil ol' me did it!

Some of the advice here I believe is series and graphics card specific. Like the gentlemen with the ATI V5700 graphics card. I tried right-clicking on ATI in device manager and navigating to the 'W76A_INF' but my T400 informed me that the latest driver was up to date. This is when I remembered seeing another thread (forget where) that mentioned something about not letting the extracted contents of the exe proceed to immediate install. Going through the procedure described in paragraphs 2 and 4 were the pivotal applications that worked for my T400 with ATI/Intel switchable graphics. My WEI (not an accurate benchmark I know) is now at 4.5. IIRC it was a bit higher in W7 but as long as my switchable graphics are working then it is fine.

EDIT: forgot to add that when you get your switchable options back make sure you go into Intel Graphics Control Panel and proceed to Power>> Power Features>> choose 'on battery' >> and uncheck the 'Display Power Saving Technology.' The problem with that setting is it will cause undesirable color and contrast oddities at various times when using your T400. There are multiple threads asking about the same symptoms with undesirable video effects and almost all of them were solved by unchecking the 'Display Power Saving Technology' option in the Intel Graphics Control Panel.

Good luck to T400 owners I hope my explanation might help

p.s. Congrats to the T500 peeps above who had success with their graphics installation!

[Speez]

Awesome job emeraldgirl08! Glad you got yours up and working too! It would be great if Lenovo just replaced a driver for Windows 8 since we already know the win7 drivers WILL work.

[precip9]

Speez, I've just performed this on a freshly genned W8 Enteprise Evaluation copy. My notes appear as annotations:

In order to get the proper drivers for the AMD Mobility FireGL V5700 in your Thinkpad W500 follow these directions.

On Lenovo's website navagate to support>drivers and enter in your exact model and select "Windows 7 64bit" as an OS
Download the following drivers:
CHIPSET
-Intel Chipset Support for Windows 8
POWER MANAGEMENT
-Lenovo Power Management Driver for Windows
-Power Manager for Windows 7
VIDEO
-ThinkPad Switchable Graphics Driver for Windows 7

1. Install the power manager driver Lenovo Power Management Drive FIRST
Clarification: Both the power manager drive and the power manager app must be installed, and they are separate packages. Install the driver first, then the app. It is not necessary to reboot between the two installs, but step 2 below is required.
2. Reboot.
3. Install Intel Chipset Support for Windows 8
Reiterate: if you have a large hard disk, this may be extremely dangerous. The W7 version of this package does not correctly support Advanced Format hard disks, which are typically anything larger than 320GB. If you have a smaller disk, it's OK, but beware if you decide to upgrade! We cannot assume this has been fixed in the W8 version of the package until someone tests it. A safe alternative is infinst_autol.exe, downloadable from the Intel website:
http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_ ... ldID=19596
Run it, and it will cause Microsoft to install a safe, working driver, instead of the defective Lenovo W7 package.

4. Open the Thinkpad Switchable Graphics Driver
5. Allow the Switchable Graphics driver package to unpack to C:\DRIVERS\VIDEO as usual, BUT DO NOT RUN THE ATI Setup.exe.
6. Open Control Panel>Device Manager>Display Adapters
7. Right click on Radeon HD 3650 and click "Update Driver Software"
8. Click Browse My Computer...>Let Me Pick From A List...>Have Disk
9. On the pop-up click browse and navigate to where you unpacked the driver earlier
10. C:\DRIVERS\WIN\VIDEO\PACKAGES\DRIVERS\DISPLAY\ "W7_INF" for 32bit and "W76A_INF" for 64 bit
11. Select "C7138564.inf" and OK and driver should install. You may see the screen flash black temporary, this is normal.
I didn't drill down as deep. Selecting "W76A_INF" worked here.

12. REBOOT and you should not have a fully functional FireGL V5700 video card
At this point, my system was missing the ATI Catalyst Control Center, which is normally accessible with a right click on the desktop. The system displayed that an application needed DotNet 3.5, which was not present on the system. This apparently caused a silent failure of the install of the Catalyst Control Center. After the system installed DotNet 3.5, I re-ran the Switchable Graphics .exe, in XPSP3 mode, selected "custom", and unchecked every white box except the Catalyst Control Center. CCC immediately became active.

More notes:
1. The Bluetooth package does not install, and is not needed.
2. Fingerprint software works if installed with W7 compatibility.
3. Ricoh card reader installs, eliminating two unidentified "base system devices."
4. "Hotkey features" installs fine.
5. One unidentified device remains, "PCI Simple Communications Controller", possibly the Intel AMT (Active Management Technology) interface. This package refuses to install at all, even with compatibility settings.

For those, who like me, dislike the GUI, but see it as a way to get cheap copies of a Windows with more efficient internals, I highly recommend http://classicshell.sourceforge.net/ . It gives the seamless functionality of earlier versions of Windows, with no apparent downside.

W8 appears buggy in many basic ways, such as file copies that refuse to start, and occasional "automatic" positioning of windows so that the title bar is off screen. When this happens, the window cannot be moved, though I have managed to get rid of the window through apparently random invocations of the menu bar. If you have Windows 7, I suggest installing W8 on a separate drive, watch the progress, and enjoy the show -- but avoid mission critical uses.

You may also notice that the fan is running louder and faster. See
http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... 66#p693166
for a solution.


Special thanks to precip9 for the original fix on beta and working together to solve this.

This has been an excellent collaboration.