Fingerprint Sensor

[surgex]

I recently purchased a T42 from an IBM tech, fully upgraded centrino 1.7, 1gb ram, 80gb 5400, the works. It also has the fingerprint scanner that the tech had installed himself, however it's not fuctional. He said the scanner is brand new and should work, but he never could get it to work. At work we use the thinkpad tablet notebooks, x41 I believe, and they have the built in sensor. I can enable and disable this option in their bios, however my bios does not have the fingerprint option. I have installed the most recent bios in hopes that it would pick up the sensor, but no luck. From the basics of being an IT guy, I know that you never flash the firmware with one that is of a different model, however I'm not sure of any other way to enable this. I did download the fingerprint software, but it could not find any fingerprint devices installed on my machine. Thanks!

[GomJabbar]

The motherboard is different on the fingerprint sensor models. Check out the list of System Boards (Item 15) on the following page: System service parts - ThinkPad T40, T40p, T41, T41p, T42, T42p

[surgex]

Sorry, but I'm a little ocnfused on how this info will help me. I believe my model is 2373-4wx, so it corresponds with this number: 93P4156. Do I need to match that number with a version of the fingerprint sensor?

[GomJabbar]

You have this System board assembly:

System board assembly
for ATI M7-32, Gigabit Ethernet with security chip for T42 series

2373-1Ux, 1Wx, 1Yx, 1Zx, 2Tx, 2Ux, 2Wx, 2Xx, 2Yx, 3Wx, 3Zx, 4Tx, 4Ux, 4Vx, 4Wx, 4Yx, 4Zx, 5Wx, 5Xx, 6Ux, 6Vx, 6Wx, 6Yx, 6Zx, 7Tx, 7Vx, 7Wx, 7Yx, 7Zx, 8Tx, 8Ux, 8Vx, 8Tx, ATx, AUx, AVx, AWx, BTx, BVx, JTx, FWx, CTO
2374-1Wx, 4Wx, 6VU, 6Yx, 8Tx
2378-2Xx, DTx, DUx, ETx, EUx, EVx, FUx
2378-2Zx, DVx, DWx, EWx, FTx, FZx

2379-DZx, DWU
93P4156

You need one of these System board assemblies:

System board assembly
for ATI M7-32, Gigabit Ethernet with security chip/fingerprint sensor for T42

2373-F1x, F2x, F5x, H1x, H2x, H3x, H4x, H8x, J4x, J6x, J7x, J8x, J9x, JAx, JBx, JCx, JDx, JEx, JFx, K1x, K2x, K3x, K6x, K7x, K8x, K9x, KAx, KBx, KCx, KDx, KEx, KFx, KGx, KHx, KLx, KMx, KNx, L1x, L2x
2374-J4x, K1x, K2x, L1x
2378-R1x, R5x, R8x, RPx, RQx, RRx, RSx
2379-R1x, R5x, R8x

27K9910
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
System board assembly
for ATI M10-64, Gigabit Ethernet with security chip/fingerprint sensor for T42

2373-F3x, H5x, H6x, H9x, HAx, KJx, KKx, L3x, L4x, L5x, L6x, L7x, M1x, M2x, M3x, M4x, M5x, M6x, N1x, N2x, N3x, N4x, N5x
2374-K5x
2378-R2x, R9x, RTx, RUx
2379-R9x, RUx

27K9911
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
System board assembly
for ATI M10-128, Gigabit Ethernet with security chip/fingerprint sensor for T42 series

2373-F4x, P1x, P2x, P3x, P4x, Q1x, Q2x, Q3x, Q4x, Q5x, Q6x
2374-Q2x
2378-RVx
2379-RVx

27K9912

The difference in the three boards above is the graphics chip and amount of video memory. The first is probably an ATI Radeon 7500 with 32MB VRAM. The second is probably an ATI Radeon 9600 with 64MB VRAM. The third is probably an ATI Radeon 9600 with 128MB VRAM. I believe the M7 is the 7500, the M9 is the 9000, and the M10 is the 9600.

[christopher_wolf]

Sorry, but I'm a little ocnfused on how this info will help me. I believe my model is 2373-4wx, so it corresponds with this number: 93P4156. Do I need to match that number with a version of the fingerprint sensor?

There are some T42 boards that support it, and some that don't. It doesn't affect their physical placement as that is simply a different model of palmrest that has the cutout necessary for it. It might be that the board doesn't support the FPR; although that seems strange installed, as it was, by an IBM Tech.