The Complete 6x-series QXGA Thread

[Worzyl]

It's a bit blurred. Even XGA, which should scale perfectly(4:1), is blurred. However, the blur is not as noticeable as any other LCD I've seen because the pixels are smaller. But you would have to judge for yourself.

That's interesting to know. I think I may have to pass on this as I do a lot of artwork, which results in intense, non-blinking stares at the screen. (which usually results in my face being pressed up to the display - bad habit...). Also, not too sure if my 3 decade and a bit years old eyes would be able to handle it for long periods of time either, as I'm already wearing glasses

Still....I just can't help being curious...

Edit: I assume that your running at the highest of 50Hz. Is there any noticeable flickering?

[andykrej]

Troels: It feels just perfect. This is how all screens should be made. Actually I'm already tempted using this one as an external monitor:
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/IDTech-IBM-T221-9 ... 20ada52d0c

I think somebody got it working on a T60, but I can't find the thread. Must have been with an extra graphics card in the advanced dock.

That's interesting to know. I think I may have to pass on this as I do a lot of artwork, which results in intense, non-blinking stares at the screen. (which usually results in my face being pressed up to the display - bad habit...). Also, not too sure if my 3 decade and a bit years old eyes would be able to handle it for long periods of time either, as I'm already wearing glasses

Still....I just can't help being curious...

Edit: I assume that your running at the highest of 50Hz. Is there any noticeable flickering?

50Hz yes. There's no flicker at all. What kind of artwork do you do? If it's artwork for print, you'll have a much more detailed and realistic display of it on this screen.
I would recommend running it in native resolution and turn up the DPI in windows. Mine is at 160%, and everything looks really nice and sharp. I can't say how the colors and contrast compare to the newer Boe-Hydis screens, but the IPS/AFFS screens in general are in a league of their own.

[Worzyl]

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/IDTech-IBM-T221-9 ... 20ada52d0c

50Hz yes. There's no flicker at all. What kind of artwork do you do? If it's artwork for print, you'll have a much more detailed and realistic display of it on this screen.
I would recommend running it in native resolution and turn up the DPI in windows. Mine is at 160%, and everything looks really nice and sharp. I can't say how the colors and contrast compare to the newer Boe-Hydis screens, but the IPS/AFFS screens in general are in a league of their own.

The artwork I'm doing at the moment will be done for print. It's only pixelart for this project, but in the future it will be higher resolution drawings mixed with some photos and 3D sets.
The more I think about it, the more I'm thinking of picking up an LCD for cheap and giving it ago. Another important thing for me is that I need this for my animation jobs as well and I do wonder, if it will be able to handle fast moving objects without blurring or strobing...

That ebay monitor is an absolute BEAUTY! It's not a hulking CRT either which helps with space and power. Admittedly I don't mind using my desktop monitor for animation, but for art pieces it's not very good. This old Toshiba laptop of mine is much better despite the crappy viewing angles
I'm still in Peru, but hopefully an opportunity to purchase a monitor of that quality and price will come up again when I get back to the UK(and when I have the money...).

Spending money on quality built components is always cheaper in the long run. No point of wasting money having to update a display every couple of years!

[Worzyl]

Okay, I've been doing a little more research and response times for fast moving objects.
Judging by the recent poll I did:
http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=29&t=80131

Nobody on that poll used their T60p for animation or 3D graphics, so it's tricky trying to find peoples experiences or examples.
Other forums are suggesting nothing below 25ms - but however these are related to games, which I'm guessing that people would switch to a lower resolution anyway. (I don't game on PC - arcade Streetfighter 4 is where it's at! )

So I'm guessing that using a 50Hz, 30ms response display at a QXGA resolution, could probably cause some stress/problems for animation work on this type of screen. My Toshiba A30 is 24ms at 60Hz at the XGA 1024x768 and is okay for 3DS max animation work (as long as there isn't too many objects on screen).

[bhtooefr]

Yes, the QXGA will work on the i945 - someone in China did it to an R60e, even.

Scaling isn't perfectly smooth, but it isn't bad.

Keep in mind that the 30 ms response, at least on my panel, appears to be overdriven, so it bounces around the target shade for a little bit.

Oh, and as for the T221, buying a DG3 for 1900 GBP... that's not how to do it at all... if you've got connections in Japan, look on Yahoo Japan's auctions. You can get DG5-equivalents (the best version - 9503-DGP and DGM are the models) for much less - last I checked, 20,000 yen. I paid about 36,000 yen each for mine. (I bought one for resale, and ended up shipping it to France. Would've been shorter to just go from Japan straight to France. )

If push comes to shove, IIRC, there's a brand new DGP (identical to the DG5, with the dual-link converter box) for 168,000 yen on there, IIRC. Shipping is the hard part, but...

The trick with a T221 on a T60 or T60p is... 2880x2400 is all you'll get out of it. The ATI card has a very hard 2880x2880 per monitor limit, I believe. You could drive the other half of the monitor off of a second card in the advanced dock or whatever it's called, but that gets to be a bit screwy, running the monitor off of two different cards, and there's only one PCIe lane, which some cards may not like.

I believe the nVidia card on a T61p mobo has no such limit, so that's the obvious fix, although it brings some of its own problems. (And, it'd be about a $500 upgrade to get the mobo, a reasonable CPU, and the different heatsink, IIRC.)

[Worzyl]

Hmmm, looks like the QXGA screens are definitely out of the question for my uses then.

I think the DG5 got rebranded as a viewsonic too I think.

[tgun603]

For those interested I can confirm that the QXGA LCD works just fine with the integrated Intel's GM965 graphics (T61p 14.1" motherboard: 42W7872).
Here is my system:
- T60p 15" body (everything less modem board, LCD, HDD, RAM, CPU and T6x parts mentioned below)
- T61 motherboard (42W7872)
- T61 heatsink (42W2821)
- T61 PC-card/ExpressCard slot (42W3436)
- IAQX10N 15" QXGA LCD
- Intel T9500 CPU (SLAZA)
- 2x4G DDR2-667 RAM
- Intel X25-M G2 160G SSD

For parts, manuals, BIOS, and drivers search I used the 8897-03U Lenovo model numbers on their web-site:
http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... ry=889703U.
I upgraded BIOS to the latest official version, which is v.2.26-1.08 (2009-05-26).

The T60p's hardware maintenance manual helped a lot during disassembling/assembling:
http://download.lenovo.com/ibmdl/pub/pc ... 844_04.pdf.

I tried to reprogram the LCD with registered version of the PowerStrip using 2 different systems (T60p and T61) but it did not work (could not even detect EDID).
So I bought the LCD cable on eBay ($7) and built simple I2C programmer (http://www.lancos.com/e2p/easyI2Cbus.gif).
You don't need the part to the right of the I2CBus box (http://d00m.net/projects/t61-qxga/easyI2Cbus_qxga.gif). I used +5V from USB port.
Here is the LCD connector pin-out: http://users.cybercity.dk/~dsl35822/edidconnection.jpg.
Then I was able to reprogram the LCD with PonyProg v2.07c BETA (http://www.lancos.com/ppwin95.html).
Here is the binary version of the EDID (the PonyProg does not accept the PowerStrip formatted files): http://d00m.net/projects/t61-qxga/qxga.bin.
Most of the LCD programming related info I found in these threads:
- http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=29&t=66257;
- http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=29&t=76519.

In order to make the T61 motherboard fit in the T60p body perfectly I had to get rid of the modem board and file 2 holders it was screwed to (I used Dremel for this).
DO NOT TRY TO DRILL HOLES IN THE T61 MOTHERBOARD TO MAKE IT FIT!

The system is very cool and quiet, most of the time the fan is not even spinning.

[gordan]

I have just performed this upgrade myself (T60 + IDTech IAQX10N), and thought I'd share some of the pitfalls and observations that I haven't seen mentioned anywhere else.

1) If your EDID isn't suitable, you are likely to find that POST and low-res screens only show vertical stripes. That's what mine did. But despite this, you may find that once Windows boots, it actually queries the EDID, gets the 2048x1536 mode information, and works fine.

2) The EDID data floating around for this screen is not entirely sound. I have found that it works OK for POST and Windows, but some other operating systems including some versions of Linux (specifically, RHEL6b, but there may be others) seem to make different assumptions (possibly rounding of timing information to a pixel multiple greater than 1) and fail to work properly (once the high-res text mode kicks in everything will crash with a blank screen).

Eventually I pinned it down to either vsync timings or sync polarity. Either way, the EDID that works for me for POST, BIOS, Windows and all Linux distros I have tried is here:

EDID BYTES:
0x 00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 0A 0B 0C 0D 0E 0F
------------------------------------------------
00 | 00 FF FF FF FF FF FF 00 30 AE 49 40 00 00 00 00
10 | 00 13 01 03 80 1E 17 78 EA CD 71 91 55 4F 8B 26
20 | 21 54 56 21 08 00 81 80 A9 40 01 01 01 01 01 01
30 | 01 01 01 01 01 01 29 40 00 60 80 00 10 60 10 10
40 | 88 00 30 E4 10 00 00 1E 00 00 00 FD 00 30 32 4C
50 | 4D 11 00 0A 20 20 20 20 20 20 00 00 00 FE 00 49
60 | 44 54 65 63 68 0A 20 20 20 20 20 20 00 00 00 FE
70 | 00 49 41 51 58 31 30 4E 20 51 58 47 41 0A 00 D9


If anyone is contemplating doing this, I highly recommend it.
If your eyes can handle the pixel density, it is absolutely awesome. I use this thing for work all day every day, and my productivity has increased considerably with the extra xterms I can have on the screen at the same time.

Word of warning, though - BEWARE of suppliers claiming to have these IDTech panels available for about $120 (if you Google around for a best deal, you'll no doubt find who I'm talking about) - they will just take your money, and you'll have to chase disputes via PayPal when they never ship the part and don't respond to refund requests. Save yourself the trouble, pay double that amount (what the screens cost anywhere else) and just be done with it. I got one from a Chinese supplier on Alibaba, for example.

I hope this is useful to someone.

[iwishiwasinwhistler]

Thanks gordan it has been useful.

I completed this a few weeks ago on my t60p and use linux so was very grateful for your updated work on the EDID.

I used a copy of windows 7 while doing the mod and, as you found, while booting I had the vertical stripes but once windows was up and running it worked fine. This meant there was no need to connect an external monitor as I could reflash the EDID using Powerstrip and on the next reboot the QXGA res worked fine all the way from the BIOS onwards.

It's a great screen and having this much space is fantastic. I did the AFFS mod to my x200s a while ago which I wrote up a little bit about in the 200/300 forum and going back to the x200s now makes me laugh. The boeHydis in the x200s is definitely brighter and the colours have a richer feel to them but the resolution makes it feel like looking through a porthole! The IDtech Qxga is not as bright but at home, as opposed to being on the road, I can control the ambient light and prefer working on the T60p. The UXGA had also faded and yellowed a fair bit so it's great having proper whites back. Photos now look incredible. I'm considering buying a Spyder for calibration to finish it all off properly.

A year ago I didn't have a clue what colour management for internet browsers meant, or icc profiles, let alone the difference a decent screen could make. The last year has been a steep learning curve and the results have been well worth it.

I love it! Thank you to everyone for posting so much great info as always.

(on a different note - I only picked this T60p up within the last month looking to do this mod and I can't believe how different the keyboard is compared to my x200s - I thought it was good on the x200s but the keyboard on the T60p has blown me away!)

[crashnburn]

I might want to do this with a T61. Which T61p model should I be looking at..? in terms of Video Card / Display: XGA, SXGA, UXGA?

[Worzyl]

Does the QXGA LCD also get the yellowish tint and fade over time?

[spacejunk]

I had one for over 4 years (transferred from R50P->T43P->T60P->modded T61P) and no hint of the yellowish tint. I think the yellowish tint only occurred with the LG SXGA+ IPS panels. Don't know what fade means but all LCD will get less bright over time because the backlight is getting weaker.

[crashnburn]

I had one for over 4 years (transferred from R50P->T43P->T60P->modded T61P) and no hint of the yellowish tint. I think the yellowish tint only occurred with the LG SXGA+ IPS panels. Don't know what fade means but all LCD will get less bright over time because the backlight is getting weaker.

Wow! The screen survived through all that frankenization? Maybe I should just come visit you and work with you on this over a weekend I gotta visit LA/SD anyways

[Worzyl]

I had one for over 4 years (transferred from R50P->T43P->T60P->modded T61P) and no hint of the yellowish tint. I think the yellowish tint only occurred with the LG SXGA+ IPS panels. Don't know what fade means but all LCD will get less bright over time because the backlight is getting weaker.

Whoops, sorry! I meant dim - not fade. I thought that the yellowish tint also occurred on the Hydis. Good to know that it doesn't.

[geohsia]

This looks like a very interesting mod. I am considering this panel because I am a photographer and would love the pixel density. For those with experience with this panel:

a) How does the slow refresh rate affect videos? I might be doing some video editing. Specifically any issues playing back full 1080p videos?
b) How is color accuracy in comparison to the standard UXGA panel? The resolution is great but if the colors are off then I might as well stick with UXGA
c) This panel seems rather old. I think someone said this panel's from 2003. Any other gotchas that I should know about? Besides the text being entirely waay too small?

Thanks.

[goofyGAguy]

Any other gotchas that I should know about?

These panels are very dim, even when new.

[geohsia]

These panels are very dim, even when new.

That's exactly what I needed to know. UXGA it is. Thanks.

[Kira]

I'm thinking about getting one of these displays, and have a few newbie questions. First off, how's the quality of the IAQX10S? The 60ms response time seems VERY high, and I just want to know if it actually interferes with usability. I'd also like to know how the color quality compares to the UXGA, since it's supposedly 262k colors instead of 16M, and whether there's any substantial impact on battery life.

Thanks

[bhtooefr]

I might want to do this with a T61. Which T61p model should I be looking at..? in terms of Video Card / Display: XGA, SXGA, UXGA?

If you want to do it to a T61p, you actually need to start with a 15" T60 or T60p, SXGA or UXGA. Graphics card doesn't matter, for all I care it could be integrated graphics, because step 1 is to throw out the T60/p motherboard, heatsink, and CPU.

Then, you'll need a 14.1" 4:3 T61p motherboard (there's only one graphics card choice if it's a T61p,) the heatsink for that motherboard, and a Socket P CPU. If you get a 14.1" 4:3 T61p that's been dropped and the LCD shattered, that wouldn't be a bad donor.

Install them as if you were replacing the T60/p stuff, and voila, you have a 15.0" 4:3 T61p. (This is why you have to start with a T60 or T60p - Lenovo never made a 15.0" 4:3 T61p, but the 14.1" 4:3 and 15.0" 4:3 motherboards are identical, and the 14.1" 4:3 T61p is the same chassis as the 14.1" T60 and T60p, so you can build a 15.0" 4:3 T61p in this way.)

Then you can do the conversion just like it were a T60p.

[eatbuckshot]

I'm thinking about getting one of these displays, and have a few newbie questions. First off, how's the quality of the IAQX10S? The 60ms response time seems VERY high, and I just want to know if it actually interferes with usability. I'd also like to know how the color quality compares to the UXGA, since it's supposedly 262k colors instead of 16M, and whether there's any substantial impact on battery life.

Thanks

I would think that all the IDtech QXGA's were manufactured with the same quality and spec. I have one and I'd have to say it's superb. You must remember that the typical reported response times for lcd monitors are usually best case (ones that say 1-5 ms) and in actuality there are hundreds of possible response times based on what gray to gray transition is happening. With that said, the qxga IPS is slower than normal, but it is by no means unusable and that much slower, You may notice a tiny bit of ghosting, that i only noticed playing fps's at 89 hz or so(with t61p mobo)

Now that you mention that it's only 262k it may not give as nice color gradients as the UXGA (i have both) also, the qxga is a little dark i think it was 190 cd, and it's slow to warm up the ccfl(well all do)

I would think that the impact on battery life would be minimal, of course unless you have an intensive graphics application that is rendering qxga resolution.

[Troels]

The IDTech IPS LCDs (desktop or laptop alike) are based on the first edition of the IPS technology developed by Hitachi in 1996-1997. That means that the display transmittance is a bit low compared to today's improved IPS panels (also Hydis AFFS panels) and that you need a relatively bright CCFL to get a bright image. On top of the liquid crystals layer one applies a RGB color filter (using the process called photolithography). The gamut of the monitor depends on how pigmented the color filters are. For laptops, the colors are typically less pigmented, so that a lot of light aren't just absorbed - since the objective is to get a TFT-LCD that is bright enough.

The color gamuts of the IPS QXGA and UXGA panels and most other laptop panels are roughly the same and they're all 262k colors (6 bit per color) in order to save a bit of power.

[tom121]

does anyone has a close-up picture of the lvds connector of the QXGA screen?

are these connectors normed? their dimensions together with their electrical specification?

[Troels]

does anyone has a close-up picture of the lvds connector of the QXGA screen?

Sure... let me know if you need further pictures.
http://users.telenor.dk/~dsl35822/P1010269.JPG (500 KB!)

are these connectors normed? their dimensions together with their electrical specification?

Well, some years ago 20 pin connectors were also popular, but with the introduction of resolutions requing dual link LVDS, 20 pins weren't enough, whereby the 30 pin interface was introduced. Today, 20 pin connectors are rarely used, even if only a single link LVDS is used - maybe due to price and availability of connectors.
The connectors are normed after Japan Aviation Electronics (JAE) standards. The connector you see on the image is a FI-XB30S-HF10 connector, while the connector (male) on the LCD cable is called FI-X30M.

Not all LCDs have the same pinouts - for example, Dell has/had the habit of swapping around one of the Vcc connections with a ground connection, so for some monitors there are more than one designation. LG for example has many suffixes on their panels to indicate customer (Dell, HP etc.).

LCD screens with LED backlights typically has a 40 pin connector, which has further signalling (power supply) to the LED backlight...

[locafoca]

I'm set on swapping out the 15" SXGA+ panel in my T60 for a 15" QXGA panel, but I'm not sure about a few things. I've searched the forum over for any thread that could possibly mention this, but are the differences between the IAQX10N and IAQX10S displays noticeable? Specifically, would I notice a difference between the 30ms and 60ms response rates? I understand 60ms is quite useable, but is 30ms much of an improvement?

I'm also curious about where to find IAQX10N panels. The suppliers mentioned in this thread do not carry the panels right now. Alibaba seems to have a few suppliers of the panels, but they have all been unresponsive... IAQX10S panels seem cheaper and easier to find, but I'd like to know that if I go this route I'm not missing anything.

Additionally, I don't own a copy of windows, which seems to be necessary to run PowerStrip. Does anyone know if PowerStrip plays nice with Wine? If not, I'll have to find out for myself, I guess.

Thanks!

EDIT: It's not hard to find what I should put in xorg.conf (found here: http://translate.google.com/translate?h ... 6prmd%3Div):

Code: Select all

# Thinkpad R51 / NEC VersaPro QXGA (2048x1536) LCD Panel
Section "Monitor"

    Identifier "CustomConfiguration"
    VendorName "IDTech"
    ModelName "IAQX10"
    HorizSync 76.0-77.0
    VertRefresh 48.7-49.7
    Modeline "2048x1536" 164.25 2048 2064 2080 2144 1536 1553 1554 1555 +hsync +vsync
    Option "dpms"

EndSection

It seems like this doesn't take care of the EEID problem... would I need something like l2CTools? http://www.lm-sensors.org/wiki/I2CTools

[xcoldricex]

where can you get these panels at a reasonable price these days? haven't been having luck turning anything up

[AbsoluteRaleigh]

xcoldricex: they were all over the place- 6mos ago I was looking around and someone on ebay was practically throwing them away.

[bgalakazam]

Just to make sure, if I have T61 14.1 SXGA+ board, I don't need to buy an inverter cable, right?

EDIT: Where can I get this baby? Everyone doing single orders (for a reasonable price) is sold out. Only one guy had them for single orders and he wanted ~ $440.

[tpclover]

Just to make sure, if I have T61 14.1 SXGA+ board, I don't need to buy an inverter cable, right?

EDIT: Where can I get this baby? Everyone doing single orders (for a reasonable price) is sold out. Only one guy had them for single orders and he wanted ~ $440.

Hi bgalakazam,

I would be happy to liaise with you on this.

I also want the QXGA screens.


Please let me know if anyone is selling those screens.

I shall be grateful

Thanks,

[bgalakazam]

There is 1 more here http://cgi.ebay.com/15-QXGA-LCD-IBM-IAQ ... cff7#payId

I bought 1 of the 2.

Cheers.

[Mr. Coffee]

Looks like I really missed the boat on this one. The only screen I can find will cost me more than my T60p.

I know some of you have spares just waiting to be shipped free to anyone who asks.

Edit: scratch that, I can't find a single one at any price. The UXGA screens under the same IBM part numbers aren't helping.