X41 1866-9GU ... upgrade opts: bigger HD/more mem/new OS?

[Magreve]

I've had my X41 for about 3 years now, bot from reseller via ebay ... wanted to try handwriting on tablet, but discovered I could type faster ... but my daughter, the artist _luvs_ the tablet, and I bot Autodesk full version for her to draw with, and she has produced brilliant art ... but I digress.

I have reset to spec this PC ... about 4 times in those 3 years, each time w/increasing frustration, mostly from the bloatware ... last reset, finally figured out how to use the backup software (vs copy to external drive), and then the darn stuff filled up the HD w/backups ... and just today I figured out how to move them to the external drive.

(Am not an ID-10-T, have been literally setting up PCs since 1980 ... but slow speed, Win XP, software that did not work as I expect (and I write database programs!!!) ... drove me mad with this leetle deevil.)

It has 1.5GB RAM ... can I give it more? I stumbled onto this site, and registered (wish I'd found it an age ago!!!), and found other stuff that suggests more RAM could work...

Can I give it a bigger HD? 32GB is just puny these days. And it's a mini-IDE, yes? I saw dispute over this too. I know it's not SATA.

Finally, on the new HD, can I put Vista or Win7 and will it be happy? I'll keep old drive as external, and replace it when I decide to give this PC away.

I'd like to keep this PC working for another 2 years, before child goes to college, and then I get her something bigger / better / faster / stronger (she wants a Mac, alas, for the artistic world ... not my bailiwick).

Any thots? Thanks all. This is a nice site.

Suzanne (aka Magreve, in my SCAdian life ...)

[sjthinkpader]

The biggest HDD for these machines is 120GB. The largest RAM is 2.5GB. It will run Windows7. My daughter is in art too and the X41t stylus is similar to Wacom pads she uses on desktops.

[Magreve]

Thanks for that answer.

I poked around a bit more, found SSD drive / adapter. So now just waiting ...
(and hopefully current drive will not go south during interim ... it seems to have a bad spot where it won't write, and of course keeps trying ... even tho' I told it to check disk (and it has ... it's not marking that spot as bad ... I long for old days sometimes ... where you could tell the bios what was good / bad)

But am not sure what to do about mem since Win7 is such a hog.

Spec says ...

Expandable with SODIMM module to a maximum of 1.28MB or 1.536MB

... you / others say 2.5GB ... so what am I looking for? Do I need to do anything to the BIOS? It's been a while since I personally needed to flash anything ...

Also ... the SD port ... can it access any size SD ... or only upto 32GB or 64GB or only a certain class, e.g., 4 or 10? I figure that could be a useful / portable / easy backup device ... never really used it, did not need to.

I very much appreciate your time and help.

[sjthinkpader]

...
Also ... the SD port ... can it access any size SD ... or only upto 32GB or 64GB or only a certain class, e.g., 4 or 10? I figure that could be a useful / portable / easy backup device ... never really used it, did not need to.

I very much appreciate your time and help.

You may need an updated driver.

[Magreve]

I tried hunting for SD card drivers and everything seems to imply "it will just work" (I hate answers like that) ... ... but there is _nothing_ I can find on the Lenovo site ... all the links are for _other_ things (both parts/details and drivers/support).

http://support.lenovo.com/en_US/product ... fault.page?

Does anyone have experience with x41 "large memory" cards?

I know an 8GB Class 4 will work, cuz' that's in my camera now, and I just stuck it in there and it blinked and read it. So I bot a 32B Class 10 ... and hopefully ... it will see that too ...

Thanks, sjtp, for your help / ideas.

[Magreve]

Ok, so ... I got all my parts, new OS, all seem good ... BUT ... the Zif-to-IDE "cage" ... does not screw on to SSD drive anywhere, and the cage for the old drive is a hair too small to go on all this, and of course I don't want to force it ... SSD plus new adapter seem to fit in drive space ... but ribbon connect on side seems ... awkward. Also, no way to attach stylus holder piece to new drive sandwich.

Do I need a different ZIF adapter? Please advise. Thanks.

[Tasurinchi]

Could you post a picture of both your adapter and drive?

[Magreve]

I will try ... have to hunt up an actual camera, phone not good for close up ...

Thanks for responding.

[Tasurinchi]

I also have an old SSD model in my X41T and I had a similar problem with space, resulting in the HDD cover not getting right in position, which created also a problem for the stylus pen. The solution was to remove the hard disk housing assembly. I would recommend first to download the HMM manual from here and pay special attention to page 94

So far I always use an adapter like this one Is yours the same?

Cheers!

[sjthinkpader]

I think the HDD slot cover will stay in place with the single screw. The stylus latch is on the cover and will hold the stylus properly. Once the IDE/ZIF caddy is in place, it will not interfere with the stylus.

The ribbon cable on the side occasionally will hangup in the slot. So I recommend removing the palmrest to insert the caddy properly.

[Magreve]

Tasurinchi - greetings.
Yes, I have manual and I have that Zif-IDE converter, but ... there's nothing that hold's that to the hard drive, and no way to push the IDE pins into the internal IDE connector.

SJT - I know about the external screw. I was talking about how to attach that cover piece to the internal piece (the HD / Zif-ID adapter sandwich), when internal piece has no screw holes, no way to be held in place once inside (I am not a whiz at dissassembly / assembly, but am not a complete ID-10-T (I did work on original Apple II, so I go back a ways).

IAC ... I bot yet another SSD, a 64GB Kingston, and it fits just fine, but now I have to figure out how to update the bios, to get rid of dreaded 2010 error (I tried with, then without the leetle disk jumper, original drive had no jumper). I have found posts about the 2010 err, but that too is a little scary.

The Win7 disk I bot, which looks official, but I guess is not ... will not boot via external CD-rom drive (nor on this current PC from whence I am typing), so something is wrong there and seller will get bad eval from me. I have a Win2k orig config disk, and it attempts to boot the X41T, but then gives a blue screen ... (and error codes) ... but I expect this is from the 2010 error?

0x0000007B, 0xF6863848, 0xC0000034, 0x00000000, 0x00000000

As Gilda Radnor would say, it's always something.
(and, in my case, Sunday nights around midnight ... oh, I do want this fixed, back in use, gone away ... sigh)

Thanks all for listening, clues.

BTW, the 2GB memory chip did not give an error.

[Tasurinchi]

Yes, I have manual and I have that Zif-IDE converter, but ... there's nothing that hold's that to the hard drive

That's right, but you don't need a screw or tape or anything else. I have three ZIF drives in my X4 models and they just sit "right" with a little bit of tweaking

and no way to push the IDE pins into the internal IDE connector.

You'll need to disassemble the bezel for this. I don't know another way. I've read users claiming that they got their adapters inserted without removing the bezel, but I couldn't and since removing it it's not difficult, I prefer to spend 5 more minutes doing so instead of having something like this (my first attempt ever):

[Magreve]

Aha, Tasurunchi!

I looked more carefully at that manual and page 94 ...

I did not know there was an _internal_ spot for a 2nd hard drive.

I have been talking all this time about the first hard drive (remove stylus, screw, yank-out drawer-like assembly) ... the zif-ide drive could not go there ... I will try it again in the internal drive spot and see.

Whole reason here was to give daughter more room for drawings, and faster OS ...
(all the bloatware on the original, kindof are way annoying, taking up lots of room.
Was also afraid to try to update that OS to Win7, because then if I had to reformat it _again_ (seems to happen 1/year), it would be a double-hop (original XP OS w/bloatware, then kill dumb stuff, then upgrade OS again) ...

I should just buy a new box. Sigh.
It's just the Lenovo was so light and cute and ... perfect.
(the software ... was the annoying part).

OK, will try again. Now, off to my day job.

Thanks for help / inspiration.

[Tasurinchi]

I did not know there was an _internal_ spot for a 2nd hard drive

I'm slightly confused... What do you mean with "2nd hard drive"? That's actually the one and only internal connector for a drive. You also mentioned in an earlier post that you bought a 64GB Kingston SSD, are you sure it's a 1.8" model? I'm not aware of any Kingston SSDs in that format (or do you mean "Kingspec"?)

A short wrap up of what you need to do:

1- Remove battery
2- Remove keyboard
3- Remove bezel
4- Place and connect the ZIF drive to the ZIF adapter (check this link out for details)
5- Connect drive+adapter into the IDE connector
6- Install bezel, keyboard and try out if it works

Was also afraid to try to update that OS to Win7

With 2GB of RAM Win7 should work fine in your X41T, I had it for a while in mine's and was quite pleased

I should just buy a new box. Sigh

Nope! Keep on trying and don't give up. That's a fine TP you have!

Cheers!

[Magreve]

Now I _AM_ confused ...
The _1st_ hard drive is ... remove stylus, screw, then slide out drawer with drive, disconnect stylus holder, pop off heat sink.
replace drive, re-assemble. THAT slot is where I thot the zif-drive-connector sandwich would go, but it will not ... there is no way to push the zif-to-ide connector into the IDE connector there, no screws to hold the sandwich together, it would all flop around, ZIF cable would get dislodged. THAT slot is where I put the KingSpec drive (yes, KingSpec ... I confused that with the Kingston thumbdrive doohickey ... it can't boot from Kingspec (no OS), can't boot from Win7 disk in external CD (dunno why, but my HP laptop won't boot from it either, so no surprise there), CAN boot from Win2k disk, but _it_ cannot see the SSD because of (I think) the 2010 Error.

No chance to fix 2010 err now, must sleep (horrendous lot of stuff at work, coming to end crunch of 2 years of work, final deploy, too many things to test / tweak, too small a team ... great coup if we pull it off, but today, my test deploy box got its admin rights removed (it was alphabetically next ... could mngment figure out how to take / assign rights to _teams_ ??? no, they cannot, that's too hard ... I need a padded cell).

Anyway ... when I look at diagram on Pg 94 (adobe pg 98), I see what you mean.
I am referring to ... pgs 77 / 78 (adobe pgs 81 / 82). In my haste, I thot they were 2 diff spots in laptop.
Have never taken a laptop apart to that level (desktops, yes, laptops no)
Will try again tomorrow eve after supper.

thanks fer listenin' ... as eeyore would say.

[Tasurinchi]

Nice to hear the confusion is away

I hope you could get some sleep and come back to this mini-project more relax and without stress.

Now I would REALLY REALLY recommend you to check the link from my post above to see how to insert the ZIF drive in the adapter. It SHOULD NOT come off so easily when properly inserted! Without the bezel, inserting the adapter into the IDE connector should be no big issue, unless the adapter is broken or its pins are bent.

A 2010 error should be no reason not to be able to boot from a CD or Thumbdrive, I could always install any OS it in m X41, X41T and T43p before the BIOS mod was out, so please check that the media you are using is ok and that the process you are using to burn an ISO image is the right one. I think your X41T has sucessfully recognized the SSD, otherwise there would be no 2010 error, right?

Hope this helps! I wish you good luck and keep us with posted with the progress!

Edit: I think there were older BIOS that used to stop the booting process if the drive was not on the white-list, but I'm not 100% sure... You what what BIOS version you have?