T420 ultrabay sizing and a ram question :)

[chamberxm]

I've had my T420 for a couple of weeks now and have been looking into the next step of swapping out the 500gb Seagate Momentus drive for a yet to be purchased SSD.

Now, I've just won an auction for a ultrabay caddy to place the momentus into, but I think I may have purchased the wrong size (Silly me getting caught upin the excitement of winning)

So, I have bought a 9.5mm caddy, yet have now realised that I maybe should have bought the 12.7mm. Will the 9mm work and fit nicely, or should I right off the £2.58 price and get the 12.7mm?

Also, I plan on using the laptop for digital art and some photo editing, would people suggest 8, 12 or 16gb ram? I have 4gb at the moment and am swaying toward putting another 8gb stick in, but just wanted to hear people's thoughts on wha might be the best

[theterminator93]

The 9.5mm caddy should fit and operate, but it won't be snug. As far as photo editing... the more RAM, the better. 8 at minimum, 16 will suit you much better though.

[chamberxm]

Why thank you for confirming that:-) I'll see how I get on with the 9mm, and maybe I'll update it to the 12.7mm in the future (or earlier if I don't like the aesthetics).

And thank you for the ram answer, seems I'll be looking for an 8gb for now and upgrade the 4gb in the new year:-)

[rkawakami]

T420 Ultrabay is 12.7mm high. It also has a SATA connection inside the bay, which you'll need the matching version on the Ultrabay HDD caddy. You should be able to use the slimmer 9.5mm height adapters but there will be a gap and you have to be a little careful when inserting it. I just ran across this:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads ... it.568716/

Kind of a quick-and-dirty hack which could cause more problems (foam breaking down and getting inside the bay). If it were me, I'd opt for the proper-fitting 12.7mm adapter but in an emergency I could use the thinner one.

As far as memory goes, I'd say "bigger is best". The T420 should support a total of 16GB. Buy an 8GB module. If you are patient on eBay you can find one for around $35. Stick to the major brands and make sure the seller offers return privileges. If you have a single 4GB module, leave it in and put the 8GB in the empty slot. Don't worry about having mis-matched modules for dual-channel mode; I doubt you'd see any significant performance difference. If you have two 2GB modules, pull both and sell them to slightly offset the cost of the 8GB module. Once you have the new memory installed, run memtest86+ on the system for several hours; let it complete at least three full passes. Hopefully 12GB or 8GB will be enough for you to do what you want. In another year or two, 8GB modules should have come down in price and you can decide if it makes sense to bump the system up to 16GB.

If the cost of an 8GB module seems too high right now and you have an empty memory slot, get another 4GB for around $15. I think you'll lose money in the long run when you decide to upgrade to one or two 8GB modules later on but you'll at least have 8GB now.

[chamberxm]

Thank you for the reply. Money isn't an issue right now, but going with just the 8gb seems more practical for me at the moment, and then I'll swap out the 4gb ram at a later date if I feel I could use it I think I'll get on the case for this 12.7mm caddy though, I don't think that other guys solution of the rubber foam would really cut it for me I'm in no hurry, so a non-rushed Chinese bought one at £2.96 will do the job I think

Thanks again for the advice guys

[chamberxm]

Hi again people
Just took receipt of a Samsung Evo 850 and popped it into the caddy and into my T420. The thing isn't recognised at all. Can't see it in the device manager, not the bios. I've tried the SSD in the hard drive bay and the bios sees it there, so I know it's not a dodgy drive. Am I doing something wrong, or is it probably just a non-working caddy?

[theterminator93]

I'd suspect that caddy unless you can verify it works in either another machine or in your machine with a different HDD.

[RealBlackStuff]

My guess is you need to initialize it first (in DiskManagement) and then format it.
To do so, hook it up via USB to a working PC or laptop.

[chamberxm]

Okeydoke. Well, I've tried the original drive in the caddy and it's the same story. Not in bios or showing up in my computer. So I imagine it's the caddy. Hmm......I may have to get in touch with the ebay seller then. Thank you for the replies, may give it another go, just in case though

[jaspen-meyer]

Okeydoke. Well, I've tried the original drive in the caddy and it's the same story. Not in bios or showing up in my computer. So I imagine it's the caddy. Hmm......I may have to get in touch with the ebay seller then. Thank you for the replies, may give it another go, just in case though

I had a similar problem last week, an EVO 840 in a bay caddy in a T420 wouldn't boot and wasn't recognized by the OS, and I couldn't figure out a fix.
The same bay/drive worked in an R400.

The electronics of the caddy were very basic, just remapping the hard drive's sata interface to the bay drive's smaller sata interface.

[chamberxm]

Okeydoke. Well, I've tried the original drive in the caddy and it's the same story. Not in bios or showing up in my computer. So I imagine it's the caddy. Hmm......I may have to get in touch with the ebay seller then. Thank you for the replies, may give it another go, just in case though

I had a similar problem last week, an EVO 840 in a bay caddy in a T420 wouldn't boot and wasn't recognized by the OS, and I couldn't figure out a fix.
The same bay/drive worked in an R400.

The electronics of the caddy were very basic, just remapping the hard drive's sata interface to the bay drive's smaller sata interface.

Must be a bad caddy. I have no other way to test it for the moment. I am now waiting on a USB to SATA cable to clone my HDD over to the SSD. Fingers crossed the next caddy I buy will work

Thanks for the replies guys

[lembang]

@chamberxm
Find a seller name nimitz i've been using his caddy and working really well.

[chamberxm]

@chamberxm
Find a seller name nimitz i've been using his caddy and working really well.

Just had a search and looked for that seller. Seems to have not had any items listed for 6 months or so I have a USB to SATA hopefully dropping tomorrow, so fingers crossed I can find some time to give that a god for cloning purposes and hopefully get it into my machine as the main drive Thanks for the help (Y)

[lembang]

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/221096920823?_tr ... EBIDX%3AIT
this one

[chamberxm]

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/221096920823?_tr ... EBIDX%3AIT
this one

Thank you for that Just what I think I need, and fits so well too
I shall get one ordered and wait for the slow boat to bring it to me

Thank you again.

[chamberxm]

Well, I have finally took receipt of this bay form ebay

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/371385257948? ... EBIDX%3AIT

I know the Nimitz bay came recommended, but I thought I would give this a punt for now, as I was in no dire need of having it ASAP

I can say it fits very well, and the HDD works just lovely

Thank yo uall for giving me replies to my queries. Very much appreciated

[terry_mccann]

I am using that 9mm (original Lenvovo) caddy as well, 4 years now, in both T500 and T520 without any issues. Also tried that foam strip thing but this is way too fumbly once you try to swap drives for dvd drives and stuff.

And, as far as I can tell, there is no dust or dirt problem on the contacts...and you have to clean the device regularly anyway....