Testing bare X2xx mobos - minimum level of reassembling?

[Tim82]

Hello!

I had an X200, which had a faulty CCFL LCD cable and then a faulty (bended) sim card slot.

The sim card slot was recently repaired, a new one was soldered on the MB.

Anyway, I made the transition to an X201 (which acquired as a stripped unit, so I built in the most important parts from the X200 - a new LCD cable, keyboard, AFFS display, battery, SSD, inverter board, palmrest, RAM door...).

How can I test the fixed X200 board, without reassembling the X200 as whole? I have some Linux live distros on pendrive for this.

I have the MB, the power jack, the MB base, the WLAN and WWAN cards, the I/O cards in place. I can attach a LED LCD cable with it's board, but I wouldn't like to attach the display (I don't have spare X2xx display, only external monitors) - the AFFS-modded X201 I have is my daily driver, so if not needed, I would not take it apart. I have also an X200 Ultrabase.

Can I do this without an internal display and maybe with an USB keyboard? What's the best course of action?

The same questions can apply to the X220 too, because I have an opportunity to get a stripped X220 (MB, MB base, power jack, WLAN module, lid assembly, antennaes - no keyboard, no display, no LCD cable, no palmrest, no HDD and HDD rails), the difference here is I don't have compatible Ultrabase unit. (Then I would have the challenge to build it from scratch. )

Thank You in advance!

(PS.: as usual, forgive my English, I'm Hungarian, possibly some grammar errors should be here, but I hope I was clear with that I was intended to ask.)

[theterminator93]

I'm not familiar with the X2xx series as a whole, but in general the ThinkPad's power button is a part of the keyboard. While it should be possible to run the unit mostly disassembled as long as the RAM/CPU and heat sink is in place along with some kind of a display, I don't know how you'd be able to turn the unit on without an OEM keyboard attached.

[Tim82]

I'm not familiar with the X2xx series as a whole, but in general the ThinkPad's power button is a part of the keyboard. While it should be possible to run the unit mostly disassembled as long as the RAM/CPU and heat sink is in place along with some kind of a display, I don't know how you'd be able to turn the unit on without an OEM keyboard attached.

On the Ultrabase there is a button for that.

I suppose I'll get a keyboard error message, but otherwise the MB will boot. I don't know if I get visual on an external display though.

For the X220, I need to get a non-external keyboard or a compatible Ultrabase, so that's right.