Experiences upgrading the memory and getting Windows 11 and Windows 10 on a W510

[IrishMASMS]

Thanks to the folks who chimed in on my previous post regarding the W510 on my workbench: viewtopic.php?f=48&t=137009&p=881585#p881585

A nice surprise was that this W510 has four (4) #DIMM slots, two underneath the keyboard and two accessible underneath. Looking at https://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Category:W510 it noted that a W510 4391-BB6 and 4x8GB Corsair Vengenance 1600MHz = 2x CMSX16GX3M2A1600C10 was all detected and usable by Windows 7 64-bit; I assumed that my W510 and Windows 11 would work great.

I was wrong.

I upgraded the memory to four 8GB DIMMS totaling 32GB. Grabbed MEMTest86+ ver 7 and tested them all, all passed with no issues.

Getting Windows OS installed was problematic. I started with the Win11 LTSP: Booted up fine, initial install was fine – and the initial boot want to a black screen with a blinking cursor.
Ok, let me try Win10 64-bit LTSP with the same results: Booted up fine, initial install was fine – and the initial boot want to a black screen with a blinking cursor.
Though this has a 64-bit processor, let me try the Win10 x86 32-bit LTSP installer from 2019: and it worked! The install went fine, but it ran dog slow. I used the native browser to download and then upgraded the BIOS to the latest for the W510 and updated all the patches for Windows 10. The end user experience was painful, everything was noticeably slow. Unfortunately, most of the tools I want to use are 64-bit so this version of Win10 was not an option.

To test & try to troubleshoot, I installed the latest version of Debian Linux. The install went fine, and the user experience was much better than the 32-bit Win10 – no real noticeable slowness. Ok, Linux is an option – but not what I had planned for this laptop.
Let me wipe the drive (getting rid of GRUB) and retry installing Win11 or Win10 LTSP. A new experience now: when booting with either Win11 or Win10 LTSP install USBs the windows logo flashes and the dreaded black screen with blinking cursor appears. We don’t even get the option to install…. (Ugh!)

Ok, I booted into ShredOS and wiped the drive as a load test. This worked fine.

I pinged my local vintage computing group and one fellow member clued me in that e820 BIOS routines were not tested against 32 GB of physical memory. If wonky, then that could confuse the bootloader – the issues I was running into. So even though that 32GB tested out fine with #MEMTest86+ v7, that does not mean the BIOS and other circuitry in a W510 can handle 32GB! On their suggestion, I replaced the DIMMs with four (4) 4GB DIMMs totaling 16GB. As a precaution, I ran MEMTest86+ and they passed.

I reinitiated the Win11 install, and the install worked! But like the Win10 x86 install I had on this W510 previously; Windows is dog slow on this laptop. It was usable, I was able to update the latest patches and such, but painful and not the end user experience I wanted. With only a i7 1.6Ghz processor, I am thinking that this may be the cutoff for usability. Any of the i5 or i7 ThinkPads I have with 2Ghz or faster processors running Win11 have minimal issues and certainly not with this slowness I experienced.

So, in short:
- Thinkwiki.org is wrong, and sadly (as I understand) they are not creating accounts for folks to update the site. YMMV regarding the information on the site.
- Just because the device can boot with the memory does not mean it will run with that memory.
- Just because the memory passes MemTest86+ testing does not mean it will run with that memory.

So, I have re-thought my plans for this laptop. I am leaving Debian latest on the W510 with a possible project in mind. Also, I am thinking about what to do next for my workbench needs and will do some research on which other Lenovo ThinkPads have eSATA ports with a faster processor than this W510.

Thanks all, hope my sharing of pain helps someone.

[RealBlackStuff]

Try it with only 2x8GB, using this RAM slot info

[IrishMASMS]

Noted @RealBlackStuff though I have plenty of 4GB DIMMs and limited 8GB DIMMs that I am hoarding for other ThinkPads which do not have more than 2 DIMM slots.


Some research last night has me down the path of adding a spare eSATA card, connecting three spare eSATA drive arrays, and installing OpenMediaVault (OMV) on this W510 as a home NAS. If at least I get to learn about installing OMV, I have a home NAS which is better than the old & crusty Netgear we have running.

[TPFanatic]

It reads to me like the machine actually works fine with Windows 7 or Debian, which you tried, and it is 10/11 that causes problems.

Microsoft doesn’t want people using 10/11 on old hardware anymore, they want you to go to walmart or staples or the OEM and purchase a brand new machine with the $100-200 windows license baked in.

Even Windows XP with or without PAE will be a better user experience than 10/11 on a machine they want you to throw in the trash. And if you cant conform to their demands for human capital, theyll try to throw you out too through raised rents or unnecessary institutionalization.

I’ve been writing powerful words on a Core 2 to this day, no 10/11 necessary.

[IrishMASMS]

Agreed @TPFanatic, agreed. But why should I do that when I can pick up a T430s at the local ewaste for $20, max out the memory and throw Win11 on it, and have a daily driver (that is currently burning an OpenMediaVault DVD)? My assumption & experiences so far is with processors over 2Ghz getting Win10 and Win11 to run satisfactory can be done; anything slower is painful and are better candidates for BSD, Linux, or Haiku.

Seems you, I, and most in this forum are not the targeted demographic for going to wallywold/staples purchasing the consumer trash laptop.

[TPFanatic]

I believe on paper 10/11 should legally work, I even got 11 installed on a R61 last year.

The problem is 10/11 grants no new functionality to the old machines and actually makes things worse on purpose. It’s like going to Sentinel Island.

I am daily driving a T60 with 7 x64, it browses facebook, instagram, linkedin, youtube, reddit, imgur, wikipedia, pacer, turbocourt, this forum, the social security administration… these are important things today. 10/11 would not add anything to this machine, and 7 does not remove anything, neither would vista/XP.

10/11 are deliberately confusing and broken on purpose. They are bland and boring, soulless on purpose.

I do have a machine running 10 and this is conducive to using my Printer and Scanner released in the 10/11 era. I remote into that machine from the T60 as needed. The T60 is certainly usable without running 10/11 or Linux natively.

Ive been down the road of trying to make 10/11 Just Work and it is impossible, as 10/11 is in a state of flux as they try new ways to sell stuff to you. You can try it, you may succeed, I have no judgement and I wish you all the best.

My only tip is use the Firewall to block inbound and outbound connections, and hunt down the drivers yourself, and be prepared to use ADK to remove the arbitrary and capricious limits on the installation of software such as Power Manager.

[IrishMASMS]

@TPFanatic - I would not be comfortable running EoL 7 x64 on the open internet due to the security risks that have not been patched/addressed, and recommend considering Linux, BSD, or Haiku as an alternative. Your firewall will not mitigate many security vulnerabilities exposed in Win7 that are propitiated on Farcebook and the other web sites you listed (as well as the ad networks being abused to spread malware).

10 & 11 address those issues (perhaps not functionality, but addresses vulnerabilities); but were poor end user experience with a 1Ghz processor. The T430s that has a 2.5Ghz processor and Win11 is working fine to post this, and for much of my other daily driver activities. So it depends on the true specifications not what Microsoft has artificially limited.

[dr_st]

The usual "as soon as an operating system is EOL it immediately becomes vulnerable to 10 million different security vulnerabilities which will compromise your computer and turn it into a Chinese child labor bot network as soon as you search for the weather in Google" FUD.

[IrishMASMS]

Nice dismissive post @dr_st

For the record, Win7 was (and still is) vulnerable before it went EoL. There are vulnerabilities that have been discovered since, that are actively being exploited, which have been patched/addressed in 10 and 11 but not in any of the versions of Windows that are EoL. Not sure what about that is FUD. Get your information and bank account stolen, your laptop encrypted with ransomware, I don't care - as long as I'm not the incident responder called to clean up the mess.

And yes, the ad networks on Google are leveraged for spreading malware.

[TPFanatic]

The hardware itself is vulnerable, see Plundervolt and Spectre / Meltdown.

The OS itself is only one attack vector. 10/11 being in a constant state of being updated are inherently also vulnerable just for being what they are.

There is little money anymore in attacking Windows 7 since Windows 7 at this point is no longer being used by banks, hospitals, et al. If someone really wanted to attack you they’d just steal your computer and it doesn’t matter if the Bitlocker is enabled by 7 or 11, they just read the code out of the TPM and it’s over.

As for ads, I don’t see ads, I have an adblocker.

[RealBlackStuff]

My daily driver T440p runs M$ W7 Pro 64-bit, as well as M$ Office 2010 Pro Plus (only Word and Excel).
Both were fresh installs in 2018, when I bought the T440p.
They have run like that without ANY updates since 2018.
The only exception is Windows Defender, which updates itself every few days.
It's currently on Version 1.421.1209.0 from 5/01/25 (5 January 2025) at 20:19.
It also runs Firefox ESR and Malwarebytes, both of which auto-update, but that's it.

My wife's X250 runs W10 LTSC-2021 without ANY updates since 2022, so she can use some programs which require W10.
Any bloatware and other useless programs have been removed.

All my other machines run either W7 or Linux.
I'll become an octogenarian in a few months and I can honestly say that any more W10, let alone W11, might only enter this house over my dead body!

FYI: we are retirees, our computers are here for fun, nothing more.

[dr_st]

Nice dismissive post @dr_st

Thank you.

For the record, Win7 was (and still is) vulnerable before it went EoL. There are vulnerabilities that have been discovered since, that are actively being exploited, which have been patched/addressed in 10 and 11 but not in any of the versions of Windows that are EoL.

That's exactly what one always sees from the FUD doom-and-gloomers. There is some huge list of actively exploited vulnerabilities somewhere, and all PCs are compromised as soon as your OS is EoL, and yet they can never name a single one.

You know why they can never name it? Because if there had been an actually serious practical exploit, and not some theoretical mumbo-jumbo, Microsoft would patch in ASAP even in EoL OSes, as they have done in the past.

Not sure what about that is FUD.

All of it. That's the very definition of Fear-Uncertainty-Doubt: you are unable to identify any threat, but you are convinced that it must be out there, and it's out to get you, and the only defense against it is to blindly apply more and more layers of "security".

Get your information and bank account stolen, your laptop encrypted with ransomware, I don't care - as long as I'm not the incident responder called to clean up the mess.

OK, I promise I won't call you to clean up any messes.

And yes, the ad networks on Google are leveraged for spreading malware.

*Gasp* Are you seriously telling me that you run your browsers without ad-blockers? And that you don't mandate ad-blockers for the users who you support? And with this attitude you lecture about security? This would be akin taking pride that the software on your security cameras is always up-to-date, while keeping the front door to your house open at all times.

The OS itself is only one attack vector. 10/11 being in a constant state of being updated are inherently also vulnerable just for being what they are.

That's well-put. In software that's actively updated with new features, introduction of new bugs, including security, is just as likely as elimination of existing ones. Granted, 10 is no longer updated with new features, so its general security trend is probably positive, which cannot be said (yet) about 11. However, as you said, the OS is just one attack vector. And for a reasonable user (you know, the one with an ad-blocker), not a very major one.

With that said, @IrishMASMS, please do forgive my off-putting "welcoming" speech. Security FUD is a pain point of mine, because, IMO it just gives people the wrong advice and teaches them bad habits, while encouraging they spend more and more money unnecessarily. Something which may be a good idea for a big organization where good habits of users cannot be expected, but for a deep technical discussion, we should know better.

[TPFanatic]

If you actually want to secure your OS, you need to

Windows
1. enable TPM-less Bitlocker with boot key
2. create a boot key out of a self-encrypting SSD
3. encrypt that SSD too
4. bury it in a hole somewhere or throw it in the ocean
5. turn off your computer

Linux
1. i have no idea

i'll say it right now Stallman the known Ephebophile and the Epstein club created Libreboot to try and lock the FBI out of their PCs so they can do all their Epstein [censored] on their computers "legally". how bout ya just leave them kids alone