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Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

Older ThinkPads from the 300, 500, 600, 700 Series, iSeries, Transnote etc.
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Gold007
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Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#1 Post by Gold007 » Tue Dec 04, 2012 12:53 pm

I couldn't find any topics about these cool little machines, so I thought I would start one. For first, they are far the coolest portables ever, I think. For second, they are very rare so you should really appreciate these tiny wonders :D I have one too, but unfortunately it's an s30, so it doesn't have that cool, shiny, piano black cover. Apart from that it's a great machine, I can use it for browsing or text editing, or even watching a film :thumbs-UP:
But I have a question: What kind of external display connector does it have? I couldn't find out it. Even the HMM says "External monitor (mini-plug)" Before you reply, no, it's not HDMI, nor mini VGA.
Thanks in advance.

Gold007
-A31p: P4-M 2,4Ghz, 1gb RAM, 2x60gb HDD, 15" 1600x1200 + docking station --> The best thinkpad ever!
-s30: P3 600Mhz, 256mb RAM, 10,4" 1024x768, WiFi --> The coolest thinkpad ever!
-T42: Pentium M735, 1gb RAM, 14" 1024x768, Mobility Radeon 7500 +Win7

ajkula66
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Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#2 Post by ajkula66 » Tue Dec 04, 2012 5:52 pm

Welcome to the forum!

If you browse deeper through the forum - especially this "classic" sub-forum - you'll see that there are actually quite a few posts regarding S30 and S31 models. A lot of folks around here owned them at one point - myself included - and some still do, including forum's owner...

You can post the pictures of your rare bird in this thread:

http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewforum.php?f=21
...Knowledge is a deadly friend when no one sets the rules...(King Crimson)

Cheers,

George (your grouchy retired FlexView farmer)

One FlexView to rule them all: A31p

Abused daily: T520, X200s


PMs requesting personal tech support will be ignored.

Gold007
Posts: 14
Joined: Tue Dec 04, 2012 12:22 pm
Location: Budapest, Hungary

Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#3 Post by Gold007 » Sun Dec 23, 2012 10:39 am

I still don't know what type of connector is it. I would really appreciate if someone could help me. I've seen a picture of a converter or cable plugged into this laptop, it had a D-sub on the other end and wasn't so big, so I guess it should be just a simple cable without any active components.
-A31p: P4-M 2,4Ghz, 1gb RAM, 2x60gb HDD, 15" 1600x1200 + docking station --> The best thinkpad ever!
-s30: P3 600Mhz, 256mb RAM, 10,4" 1024x768, WiFi --> The coolest thinkpad ever!
-T42: Pentium M735, 1gb RAM, 14" 1024x768, Mobility Radeon 7500 +Win7

Gold007
Posts: 14
Joined: Tue Dec 04, 2012 12:22 pm
Location: Budapest, Hungary

Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#4 Post by Gold007 » Sat Jan 12, 2013 1:53 pm

It would also be great if someone could tell me how to get the Easy Launch buttons working. Thanks!
-A31p: P4-M 2,4Ghz, 1gb RAM, 2x60gb HDD, 15" 1600x1200 + docking station --> The best thinkpad ever!
-s30: P3 600Mhz, 256mb RAM, 10,4" 1024x768, WiFi --> The coolest thinkpad ever!
-T42: Pentium M735, 1gb RAM, 14" 1024x768, Mobility Radeon 7500 +Win7

DDinghoya
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Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#5 Post by DDinghoya » Mon Jan 28, 2013 5:14 am

I'll check my FRU of external monitor cable for s30 after my business.

Also, Please see as below fuction buttons util and etc.

http://nothing.sh/thinkpad/s30.html
.ThinkPad 220 / 235 / 330C / 550BJ / 560 / 701c / R50P / S30 / W510
.Thinkcentre M57 USFF / M58 USFF
.Workpad c500 / z50
.IBM 2435-A01 / 7344-TW0 / 9103-A12 / PalmTop PC110

DDinghoya
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Contact:

Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#6 Post by DDinghoya » Tue Jan 29, 2013 12:35 am

IBM ThinkPad s30 CRT Conversion adapter : 27L0659
.ThinkPad 220 / 235 / 330C / 550BJ / 560 / 701c / R50P / S30 / W510
.Thinkcentre M57 USFF / M58 USFF
.Workpad c500 / z50
.IBM 2435-A01 / 7344-TW0 / 9103-A12 / PalmTop PC110

Gold007
Posts: 14
Joined: Tue Dec 04, 2012 12:22 pm
Location: Budapest, Hungary

Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#7 Post by Gold007 » Thu Feb 07, 2013 5:11 pm

Thanks a lot man! You almost saved my life with this FRU number :) I hope I will find one somewhere. Also, I have checked that page already, but the links are dead, IBM is now focusing on servers and has deleted all their old sites :evil:
-A31p: P4-M 2,4Ghz, 1gb RAM, 2x60gb HDD, 15" 1600x1200 + docking station --> The best thinkpad ever!
-s30: P3 600Mhz, 256mb RAM, 10,4" 1024x768, WiFi --> The coolest thinkpad ever!
-T42: Pentium M735, 1gb RAM, 14" 1024x768, Mobility Radeon 7500 +Win7

DDinghoya
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Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#8 Post by DDinghoya » Thu Feb 07, 2013 10:01 pm

Sorry I could not check link. So, I uploaded new link as below;

https://docs.google.com/folder/d/0B0jSd ... sp=sharing
.ThinkPad 220 / 235 / 330C / 550BJ / 560 / 701c / R50P / S30 / W510
.Thinkcentre M57 USFF / M58 USFF
.Workpad c500 / z50
.IBM 2435-A01 / 7344-TW0 / 9103-A12 / PalmTop PC110

Gold007
Posts: 14
Joined: Tue Dec 04, 2012 12:22 pm
Location: Budapest, Hungary

Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#9 Post by Gold007 » Sat Feb 09, 2013 10:50 am

Ooh my god, thanks a million!! :bow: I cant express my gratitude for you.
-A31p: P4-M 2,4Ghz, 1gb RAM, 2x60gb HDD, 15" 1600x1200 + docking station --> The best thinkpad ever!
-s30: P3 600Mhz, 256mb RAM, 10,4" 1024x768, WiFi --> The coolest thinkpad ever!
-T42: Pentium M735, 1gb RAM, 14" 1024x768, Mobility Radeon 7500 +Win7

michelle13
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Location: Moriya, Ibaraki, Japan

Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#10 Post by michelle13 » Tue Mar 12, 2013 2:32 pm

Gold007 wrote:Ooh my god, thanks a million!! :bow: I cant express my gratitude for you.
Hi Gold007,
I also have the s30 and looking for the recovery cd for it. do you by any chance still keep them?

Gold007
Posts: 14
Joined: Tue Dec 04, 2012 12:22 pm
Location: Budapest, Hungary

Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#11 Post by Gold007 » Fri Mar 15, 2013 7:47 am

Unfortunately I don't have that CD, nor any other accessories, just the laptop :( But why do you need it? You can just save your stuff to somewhere and install a new XP on it. Your computer will be much faster. And also I guess the recovery CD is Japanese, becasue the s30 was sold in AsiaPacific only.
-A31p: P4-M 2,4Ghz, 1gb RAM, 2x60gb HDD, 15" 1600x1200 + docking station --> The best thinkpad ever!
-s30: P3 600Mhz, 256mb RAM, 10,4" 1024x768, WiFi --> The coolest thinkpad ever!
-T42: Pentium M735, 1gb RAM, 14" 1024x768, Mobility Radeon 7500 +Win7

michelle13
Posts: 23
Joined: Tue Mar 05, 2013 8:20 am
Location: Moriya, Ibaraki, Japan

Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#12 Post by michelle13 » Fri Mar 29, 2013 3:34 am

Gold007 wrote:Unfortunately I don't have that CD, nor any other accessories, just the laptop :( But why do you need it? You can just save your stuff to somewhere and install a new XP on it. Your computer will be much faster. And also I guess the recovery CD is Japanese, becasue the s30 was sold in AsiaPacific only.

You basically right,
But the thing is, I hardly use those laptops those days, so the joyful part (at list for me) is to see them working with their old OC and the third party software that came with the preinstalled configuration.
I had tried fresh install more then a few times, on my 240x but it was never like the original install. Those days Lenovo don’t really provide ALL the software that came in the preinstall.
So basically, I can get to what I want ONLY with the recovery cd's.

Hopefully, someone out there still have them….

Gold007
Posts: 14
Joined: Tue Dec 04, 2012 12:22 pm
Location: Budapest, Hungary

Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#13 Post by Gold007 » Sat Mar 30, 2013 6:27 am

I think you mean OS not OC :D Anyway, you could try to contact the Lenovo suppport, they may could help you.
-A31p: P4-M 2,4Ghz, 1gb RAM, 2x60gb HDD, 15" 1600x1200 + docking station --> The best thinkpad ever!
-s30: P3 600Mhz, 256mb RAM, 10,4" 1024x768, WiFi --> The coolest thinkpad ever!
-T42: Pentium M735, 1gb RAM, 14" 1024x768, Mobility Radeon 7500 +Win7

DDinghoya
Posts: 21
Joined: Sat Apr 02, 2005 11:50 pm
Contact:

Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#14 Post by DDinghoya » Sun Mar 02, 2014 6:10 pm

Gold007 wrote:I think you mean OS not OC :D Anyway, you could try to contact the Lenovo suppport, they may could help you.
Recovery CD FRU list - ThinkPad s30/s31 as belows;

http://support.lenovo.com/en_US/detail. ... MIGR-41550

*****************************************
Language, Microsoft Windows XP Home

Chinese, Traditional (Hong Kong) : 46P6366
Chinese, Traditional (Taiwan) : 46P6364
English (Asean, Hong Kong) : 32P6298
Japan : 46P6979
*****************************************
.ThinkPad 220 / 235 / 330C / 550BJ / 560 / 701c / R50P / S30 / W510
.Thinkcentre M57 USFF / M58 USFF
.Workpad c500 / z50
.IBM 2435-A01 / 7344-TW0 / 9103-A12 / PalmTop PC110

michelle13
Posts: 23
Joined: Tue Mar 05, 2013 8:20 am
Location: Moriya, Ibaraki, Japan

Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#15 Post by michelle13 » Sun Mar 12, 2017 12:55 pm

Well, to revive an old thread,
It's been a while and i STILL haven't manage to find anyone that have the recovery cd's for the Ibm ThinkPad s30 /31 (2639).
Does anyone here have by any chance the ThinkPad s30/s31 recovery cd?
Or even the hidden recovery partition, and willing to share it?
I will be more than happy to pay for it… :thumbs-UP:
I've been looking for them it seems like no one bothered to keep them.
So many ThinkPad's lovers and no-love for me...( :bow:
Those ThinkPad's were hard to find, but trying to find the recovery cd's is really taking its toll... :help:
Help, anyone?

jonas-fr
Posts: 16
Joined: Mon Mar 16, 2009 7:38 am
Location: Nantes, France

Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#16 Post by jonas-fr » Mon May 14, 2018 6:21 am

Hi,

Long time no post ! I'm currently selling off my Thinkpad collection and I'm preparing my mint complete in box S30. In this end I preciously ripped the new recovery CDs in order to make them available to everyone. Here they are: https://archive.org/details/SLCJP10.

I hope it helps!

Jonas
Last edited by jonas-fr on Mon May 14, 2018 10:41 am, edited 1 time in total.
---
My Thinkpad evolution : T22 > X31 > X41T + S30 piano black > X60s > X201 > X220T + left-handed Transnote

madicetea
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Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#17 Post by madicetea » Mon May 14, 2018 8:31 am

I have a box-complete piano black s30, but with no recovery partition, so I will try to make use of your gift of the recovery discs.

(If perchance, my seller made a mistake, and I do end up finding a Windows XP recovery partition, I will share it.)
MadIceTea, Thinkpad Enthusiast

Daily: X250 FHD
Museum: PC110 20MB, X61 T9300 SXGA+ LED
Donated: x2001 AFFS i5-530 (to my alma matter)
Past: 701Cs German, 535/X, 760E/XL, i-series 12/14xx, piano s30, R60e, X60, X61, T60, T61, X200 P8700, X121e

That chicken sure looks funny.

jonas-fr
Posts: 16
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Location: Nantes, France

Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#18 Post by jonas-fr » Mon May 14, 2018 10:43 am

Let me know about your recovery technique.
Last edited by jonas-fr on Tue Jan 21, 2020 10:23 am, edited 1 time in total.
---
My Thinkpad evolution : T22 > X31 > X41T + S30 piano black > X60s > X201 > X220T + left-handed Transnote

Saucey
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Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#19 Post by Saucey » Tue May 15, 2018 8:17 pm

I am trying to revive my machine, how did you go about installing the OS? I have an S31 and I am not sure what PCMCIA CD drive works on that, and it doesn't boot from USB sadly.
I have a PCMCIA CD Drive from a Vaio but my S31 refuses to boot from it, I confirmed it working by testing it with my X61T.
I am probably going to install Win2000, unless I could find a clean XP disk/ISO.
Coffee, ThinkPads & Nikon Fan.

Current: PixelBook & Precision 7730
Old Favorites: A31p, T43p, T430s

jonas-fr
Posts: 16
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Location: Nantes, France

Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#20 Post by jonas-fr » Wed May 16, 2018 1:56 pm

I don't know yet but I guess installing msdos with ramdisk and cdrom support will be a (the) way to go without any recovery partition
---
My Thinkpad evolution : T22 > X31 > X41T + S30 piano black > X60s > X201 > X220T + left-handed Transnote

tdot
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Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#21 Post by tdot » Wed Mar 27, 2019 8:38 pm

ajkula66 wrote:
Tue Dec 04, 2012 5:52 pm
Welcome to the forum!

If you browse deeper through the forum - especially this "classic" sub-forum - you'll see that there are actually quite a few posts regarding S30 and S31 models. A lot of folks around here owned them at one point - myself included - and some still do, including forum's owner...

You can post the pictures of your rare bird in this thread:

http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewforum.php?f=21
I'm curious - would you happen to know if the S30 has DOS Sound Blaster compatibility? According to the manual, I'd say no, unless they just didn't include it ...

ajkula66
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Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#22 Post by ajkula66 » Wed Mar 27, 2019 8:48 pm

tdot wrote:
Wed Mar 27, 2019 8:38 pm

I'm curious - would you happen to know if the S30 has DOS Sound Blaster compatibility? According to the manual, I'd say no, unless they just didn't include it ...
Absolutely no clue. Apologies.
...Knowledge is a deadly friend when no one sets the rules...(King Crimson)

Cheers,

George (your grouchy retired FlexView farmer)

One FlexView to rule them all: A31p

Abused daily: T520, X200s


PMs requesting personal tech support will be ignored.

Screamer
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Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#23 Post by Screamer » Thu Mar 28, 2019 4:41 am

tdot wrote:
Wed Mar 27, 2019 8:38 pm
I'm curious - would you happen to know if the S30 has DOS Sound Blaster compatibility?
If I am not wrong, the S30 and the S31 has an Analog Devices SoundMAX AD1981A codec.

The AD1981A appears to be exactly the same as the AD1981B, specifications-wise. If this is actually the case, that means the AD1981A is capable of being identified as a Sound Blaster in most DOS games, just like the AD1981B.

tdot
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Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#24 Post by tdot » Thu May 02, 2019 12:27 pm

Screamer wrote:
Thu Mar 28, 2019 4:41 am
tdot wrote:
Wed Mar 27, 2019 8:38 pm
I'm curious - would you happen to know if the S30 has DOS Sound Blaster compatibility?
If I am not wrong, the S30 and the S31 has an Analog Devices SoundMAX AD1981A codec.

The AD1981A appears to be exactly the same as the AD1981B, specifications-wise. If this is actually the case, that means the AD1981A is capable of being identified as a Sound Blaster in most DOS games, just like the AD1981B.
Not quite ... while it's possible the S30 has a AD1981A, the AD1981A is simply a CODEC. It contains no interface to a PCI or ISA bus, which would have to be implemented on another chip. The majority of ThinkPads of that generation (like A20) have a CS4*** with built in PCI interface (some having two chips, one for soundblaster compatibility). If it is being interfaced over PCI, it would require DOS drivers to play sound in DOS ... which may not be available, since I can't seem to find a collection of S30 drivers anywhere

I'm more or less just curious if it would make a great vintage gaming laptop - the A2x series is GREAT but hardly portable - the S30 is from the same generation, but given the size, they may have dropped the DOS compatibility sound chip

Screamer
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Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#25 Post by Screamer » Fri May 03, 2019 1:02 am

I see, but isn't the AC'97 codec connected to the AC'97 audio controller, which is then connected to the southbridge? On such a platform that has an 440MX, I am sure that the southbridge would be connected directly to the PCI bus. In this case, wouldn't the AC'97 codec be connected indirectly to the PCI bus?

DOS drivers? Have you thought of using Windows 98 Second Edition to run your DOS games instead? If I can recall, it has a built-in Sound Blaster emulation layer to emulate a real Sound Blaster. The only thing that I can't confirm, is the emulation layer's ability to run under a .VxD audio driver.

Nobody has archived the S30's drivers yet? Christ... I guess that I'll just have to list it for you.
Audio: [98SE, Me, 2000, XP]
Graphics: [Me, 2000, XP] [Me] [2000]
Modem: [Me] [2000] [XP]
Ethernet: [Me, 2000] [XP]
Wireless: [Me] [2000] [XP]
Power Management: [2000, XP]
SpeedStep: [NT4, 2000]
BIOS: [Floppy Disk] [eFlash]

Let me know if any of these links happen to be broken.

madicetea
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Re: Thinkpad s30 and s31 - The asian miracles!

#26 Post by madicetea » Fri Jun 18, 2021 6:00 am

Years later, someone managed to contact me and let me know that I was being paged (seems some people have decided to ask about me and arise old ghost from the land of the dead).
This post is for that person, for Jonas, for his kind contributions to the community, and, for michelle13, for her sheer sense of curiosity and inquisition.
jonas-fr wrote:
Mon May 14, 2018 10:43 am
Let me know about your recovery technique.
In the end, I did not manage to make use of the recovery image CDs he provided -- the forum member who bought the s30 piano from me decided he had no use for it.

However, in the process of wanting to have an archive, I did recently image the entire 80GB drive of a (likely within the year to fail :( ) drive which was originally within a T61 machine (I Think).

(As an aside that T61, like a number of others I have owned, that particular one now has now a small Intel SSD [likely] in it and it should have found itself a home to someone in Japan who uses Mercari. It also has 8GB of DDR2 RAM. (A feat made well easier by the fact that this was all in 2018 and not in 2021 -- if you all still have 4GB DDR2 sticks I may seek a backup stick someday.))
michelle13 wrote:
Sun Mar 12, 2017 12:55 pm
Well, to revive an old thread,
It's been a while and i STILL haven't manage to find anyone that have the recovery cd's for the Ibm ThinkPad s30 /31 (2639).
Does anyone here have by any chance the ThinkPad s30/s31 recovery cd?
Or even the hidden recovery partition, and willing to share it?
I will be more than happy to pay for it… :thumbs-UP:
I've been looking for them it seems like no one bothered to keep them.
So many ThinkPad's lovers and no-love for me...( :bow:
Those ThinkPad's were hard to find, but trying to find the recovery cd's is really taking its toll... :help:
Help, anyone?
But back to the topic at hand. I have an 80GB file, but unfortunately am not living in Japan anymore, and my region of the state of California (USA) is not blessed with a quick 'fibre' connection or similar, as I used to have in Japan. Conversely, it is dangerous for me to file backup this 80GB ISO created in linux (using pv -- a utility similar to dd), though as I did an md5 checksum verification prior to wiping the disk, I am sure it is byte-faithful and can be restored to any disk assuming a large enough storage drive for the ISO [on/and] a linux live USB, and a hard disk in your SATA port.

As this HD is from a computer I had during my time living in Japan, so too, is the edition and language of Windows XP and the IBM Recovery Tools built into it.
However, if all you kind forum members do not mind, I'll make a point next time I'm in a place with better internet access to backup that entire ISO somewhere to my cloud, and then will share that.

[As for payment, etc. I have no need for it -- partially why I am as such inactive these days is because I am now a working professional, graduated from the world of academia and always finding something new at work to keep myself occupied with. Perhaps, if you wish to support me, I will provide you with some suggestion to support a reputable charitable organisation instead. Personally, my favorite event from my childhood onwards, is 'Trick or Treat for UNICEF' (and there are many others).]

-- madicetea, 12:00 UTC; 18 June 2021
MadIceTea, Thinkpad Enthusiast

Daily: X250 FHD
Museum: PC110 20MB, X61 T9300 SXGA+ LED
Donated: x2001 AFFS i5-530 (to my alma matter)
Past: 701Cs German, 535/X, 760E/XL, i-series 12/14xx, piano s30, R60e, X60, X61, T60, T61, X200 P8700, X121e

That chicken sure looks funny.

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