EngineersCake X41 Tablet build

[EngineersCake]

A week or so ago the Apple iPad was released, so in a fit of possibly financially irresponsible anti-Apple disappointment/rage I scoured ebay to find a real tablet computer. I love my ThinkPad R61, so my natural inclination was to look in to ThinkPad tablets. I would love to have had the money for an X200T or even an X61T, alas they were just too expensive. A couple of days later I found a "for parts or repair" listing for an X41T that looked like a project that I could undertake. Seemed like a screaming deal at $127 shipped.

Needless to say, I hadn't done my homework. The ThinkPad that I bid on was missing a LOT of components. Components that are proprietary and expensive.

At the point of purchase it was missing the following:
- 1.8" ATA hard drive
- AC adaptor
- Tablet pen
- Keyboard

Looked like this:
http://img.inkfrog.com/click_enlarge1.p ... =085864211

The computer was delivered yesterday, and on initial inspection the unit looked like it had been "well loved", but was in relatively good shape. Now after doing some research I found some options as far as the hard drive, thanks to this forum and ebay.

I've ordered the following parts thus far:
- New OEM Keyboard (ebay $40)
- Universal AC adapter (from Radio Shack robbed from my sister's retired Dell Latitude 1100)
- ZIF to ATA 100 adapter (ebay $18)
- Tablet stylus (ebay $35)

Now I get to wait for all the stuff to arrive. I hate this game.

[Brian10161]

Definitely looks like it was well used. These computers seem be pretty reliable though in that they keep together. The only problem you might have with that, is the keyboard light (If it has it, not sure). Mine didn't work when I got it. I don't know how to fix that.

I am sort of doing the same thing with my X40. I ordered a new keyboard, battery, trackpoint tips and CF adapter. Much like you, I hate waiting

Good luck!

[bobcardone]

Wow,
I went through the same thought process about tablets and did the same thing...
You did pretty good on your purchase, with the help of this forum you should end up with a really nice machine for not much $$$.
I just got an X41 on ebay for $105 shipped... advertised with a cracked screen, bad HDD and no stylus.

1866-1GU 1.2G ULV, 1.25G ram, 40G HDD, b/g WIFI no fingerprint or bluetooth.

Received it two days ago and here's where I'm at now.
Out of the box it looked great! no cracks, nicks or wear visible anywhere and almost no shine on the keyboard.
Faint evidence of cracked lcd when looked at in the right light (spiderwebbing left side) but the digitizer was fine, not even any scratches!
Came with an extended battery and 72w power brick also.

Figured might as well fire it up... hooked up power, external monitor, network and USB drive with Win 7 disk in it and hit the "flame on" button. Powered up fine!
Booted to BIOS, went thru setup to boot from external USB and started install.
Fail! no hard drive detected... shut down and pulled it out, bent pin! Carefully straightened it and put it back in.
Reboot, Win 7 install went fine. Alternated between windows update and thinkvantage system update a few times until they quit finding any new ones. Very painless!
Everything works but the modem, I don't care about that anyway. Battery reported 58WH out of 64WH available, 30 cycles, and manuf. date of 4-2008 (yay! good battery!)

I'm pleased with the shape this machine is in, looks like it had the screen broken very early in it's life and then was tossed in a closet until now. With a new stylus and LCD installed, I'll still be under $200.

I also ordered a CF to 1.8 HD adapter from eBay. I have some CF cards to play with already. I'm also looking at a few different cases/ sleeves/ portfolios.

Sounds like we're embarking on similar projects. I'll follow your progress and post mine also.
Good Luck!

[Tasurinchi]

- ZIF to ATA 100 adapter (ebay $18)

Which HD model are you using? You did not mentioned it in your post, but I see in your sig that's and 80GB Hitachi. Would you mind posting the HD model? I'm surprised to see an Hitachi drive with 80GB...

Yours it's a good project I wish you luck and lots of fun reviving that little lady...

Cheers

[RDR]

Great job! I have rescued many a *lady* from the junk heap. Purchased a *missing part* marvel myself. Going to use an SSD (IBM), pen, power supply, and memory from eBay. Total cost: $225. Windows 7 all poised to install and I will have a sweet little ride!

Best of luck to you!

[EngineersCake]

Thanks people for all the support. Still waiting for some parts deliveries.

In response to the question about the hard drive. It's not necessarily going to be a Hitachi. I was just using that as an example of what might drive go in.

If anybody has a tablet stylus for cheap around here, I'd certainly take one off your hands.

I love this thing already and it doesn't even work yet... well not how it should. I had it running Ubuntu Studio off an external USB hard drive last night. I'm not sure how interested people are but it's a fun story to tell. So as I mentioned before I robbed the AC adapter from my sisters retired Dell laptop. I stole the 40 GB hard drive out of it too. Popped it into a borrowed external USB case. Next was formatting it with my R61, then installing Ubuntu Studio, which I downloaded at the Ubuntu site and burned to a DVD. The installation went very well and operated in the X41 very well. No wireless support yet, but this was essentially just an alpha test run to see if the [censored] thing would run. Yay X41.

Anyhow, thanks again for the support, and I'll update again as soon as the packaged start coming.

[sjthinkpader]

...
If anybody has a tablet stylus for cheap around here, I'd certainly take one off your hands.
...

BobA has some styli that works but not specifically designed for the X40/X41/X41t. Send him a PM.

[EngineersCake]

Thanks sjthinkpadder, sent him a pm.

[Tasurinchi]

I had it running Ubuntu Studio off an external USB hard drive

Just to add few cents from my side... You can also run a persistent installation of several linux distros using a pendrive. Normally I use an Ubuntu stick when testing new TPs or in case any TP as a bad or no HD at all. It's really ease to create such a stick, any 4GB stick will do the job quite well and it can be also used in case a HD strikes.

[EngineersCake]

Thanks Tasurinchi. I didn't have a memory stick at the time, but I do have a couple of "night owl" techie friends that were willing to let me borrow a HD case and a doner Dell for some parts. So what I had in the wee hours of the morning worked just fine. I'll keep the pendrive Linux in mind for the future though.

Sorry to all for the expletive I used before. I'll keep it squeaky clean from now on.

[EngineersCake]

I finally got the new x41 keyboard in the mail. USPS=slow, shipping was free so I can't complain too much.

It rally blows my mind at how simple doing the keyboard swap was. IBM did a good job at that. I'll have pictures up soon.

I'm also picking up a new tablet pen as well, thanks to BobA.

Now to looking into overclocking... who here knows how bad of an idea that is?

[bazola]

Not sure why you would want to overlock an X series unit. As far as I know this is not a possibility. One thing to keep in mind is that many people go the other way and underclock/undervolt the cpus on these units, because increased heat shortens lifespan in such an enclosed space.

[EngineersCake]

Thanks for the input Bazola. Overclocking was just a thought. Since this is my first build, I'm sure I'll be full of ignorant if not bad ideas.

Thanks to all you people here for keeping me on track.

[bobcardone]

I am trying what bazola suggested and undervolting.
The reason I got a 1.2G ULV processor was to get maximum battery runtime.
I installed NHC and knocked down all the multiplier voltages about 50mv, so far it seems stable with CPU clock set on "adaptive".
With max ram and an SSD hard drive, power consumption should be very low. I'll take data as I test and post it.

My X41 came with 256M ram on board and 1G in the expansion slot. If I replace the 1G stick with a 2G one, will Windows 7 see 2G total?
Can the SD slot be used for readyboost?

[Tasurinchi]

will Windows 7 see 2G total?

Not sure with Win7, it may even see 2.25GB, but the X41 chipset cannot address more then 2GB.

[sjthinkpader]

...
Can the SD slot be used for readyboost?

If you already has a SSD, Win7 will inform you that Readyboost is not needed. This is a feature for HDD.

All of my X40/X41 running Windows7 are on SSD or CF cards.

I tried Readyboost on Class 6 SD card (SD to USB adapter) and Windows7 reported that it is not fast enough. The only device worked for me is a SSD board on USB (ZIF SSD+ZIF to USB adapter). This is on a T43p.

[EngineersCake]

Still waiting for parts. I hate this game.

I have Ubuntu running pretty stably via an external hard drive. Does anybody know weather or not this steup will have an effect on the wireless working? Ubuntu doesn't seem to find the wireless card. If this becomes more complicated I may just go back to WinXP... that is if I can find some OEM tablet recovery CDs.

I can't wait to post pictures of other mods to the X.

As far as the over/under clocking/volting, I think I'll leave it alone for the time being.

[EngineersCake]

People can follow the X41t build at "http://engineerscake.tumblr.com/" too.

I'll keep updating here of course.

[EngineersCake]

I know most people here probably already know, but the IBM tech support sucks. Just awful.

I called up last night to see about purchasing a set of recovery CD's. After the awful automated menu suffered through, the person I eventually taled to put me on hold for 5 minutes before I was hung up on. And to think, I was going to pay for the CD's. Eff that.

[Tasurinchi]

Ubuntu doesn't seem to find the wireless card

That's weird, I never had any problems with Ubuntu recognizing my wireless card in my X40 or X41. It was allways working ootb, even using the USB Sticks...

I don't think the card in your X41T should be that different. Do you know which model is built inside?

[Temetka]

Congrats on your build. I really love my X41T also.

I do have one question for you regarding the wireless card. Have you opened up the machine to verify that you do in fact have a wireless card installed in it?

[EngineersCake]

I did open up the access plate on the bottom of the x41 and sure enough there there's a mini PCI wireless card. Good idea to check though. You never know what's been stripped out of these used computers.

[EngineersCake]

Well I've done it this time. I was moving the X41 from the from the couch to my lap and brushed the external hard drive it was running Ubuntu on, onto the floor. Now it wont fire up. I tried to format it and reload Ubuntu again but the R61 won't even recognize it anymore. Now I'm out the X41 until I get the internal hard drive. I hate me sometimes.

[Tasurinchi]

Now I'm out the X41 until I get the internal hard drive

Buy a 4GB USB Stick (in case you don't have one yet) and install on it a Linux distro you like using these instructions. Takes 10 minutes to do a bootable stick. Keep it around in case some of your TPs or Desktops crash.

My 0,02 cents

[EngineersCake]

Buy a 4GB USB Stick (in case you don't have one yet) and install on it a Linux distro you like using these instructions. Takes 10 minutes to do a bootable stick. Keep it around in case some of your TPs or Desktops crash.

Thanks, I really aught to get on that. Does anybody have Ubuntu with all of the tablet functionality and hardware button scripts in place?

[EngineersCake]

Good news!
The hard drive isn't dead. I plugged it back into the X41 this evening and voila! it worked. No sputtering or clanking. I have no idea what happened in the 10 hours when I was gone.

Any how, still no luck with the wireless in UbuntuStudio. I'm downloading the latest version regular style Ubuntu so we'll see if the later built in drivers work.

Cheers.

[EngineersCake]

So lastnight when I should have been sleeping, I was researching how to take the hard drive out of my 80GB iPod video. The idea was to cannibalize it for the X41. I reasoned the I rarely ever use it, and if I ever wanted to restore it, I could spend the $60 to replace the hard drive.

Life Hacker told me what tools I need and how to disassemble it... but being me, I had a problem "pulling the trigger". I took another look on eBay and found a Hitachi 40GB ZIF drive for the X41 for $48 shipped. I suppose that's all the pace I need. It's gonna be a traveler so the "cloud" always has space for what I need to store. (the OS, and some drawing programs)

[sjthinkpader]

This Hitachi 40GB drive is pretty slow. Best is a Samsung HS082HB or a HS081HB. You will need an OEM style IDE-ZIF adapter also.

[EngineersCake]

This Hitachi 40GB drive is pretty slow. Best is a Samsung HS082HB.

I thought all of the 1.8" hard drives were around 4200 RPM. please correct me if I'm wrong.

[sjthinkpader]

A few 5400rpm drives such as Samsung HS122JC. RPM being equal, 4200rpm, the HS082HB and Toshiba MK8025GAL are single platter designs with really high areal density. That's what made them fast.
Look at the Jan 10th table in this thread:
http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... 1&start=60