T61/X61 SATA II 1.5 Gb/s cap - willing to pay for a solution

[middleton]

I'm not planning to remove the links to stable versions right now. Want to do it at the end of this month to exclude for sure any possible issues with dual-IDA BIOS.

[ThinkLover]

I've just flashed (by CD) this new revision on my R61i (8918) and everything seems to be working perfect! Thermal hack works, SATA II hack works and I'm in process of testing dual-IDA (trying to figure out how to force Linux to run @ 2.3Ghz - any ideas?).

Thanks middleton, another time you did great job for us!

[middleton]

Originally Posted by ThinkLover

Thanks middleton, another time you did great job for us!

Actually my contribution to the patch is not so big, see acknowledgments here. I simply combined my own mods and ThinkPad BIOS patches made by other people into one so-called "Ultimate" BIOS.

And you don't even suspect what a great role nando4 played in this story. if not for him, I wouldn't even know about the existence of T61/X61/R61/X300 SATA II cap. Also it was his idea to add dual-IDA support.

[nando4]

Originally Posted by middleton

Also it was his idea to add dual-IDA support.

. The balance has been shifted. These Lenovo users are now getting more than you paid for courtesty of middleton's ingeniusity.

T61 users could go one step further. Consider then a T8100@3.06Ghz, T8300@3.4, T9300@3.6 and T9500@3.7Gz by running a dual-IDA 200->266Mhz FSLx PLL pinmod below.

Lenovo/IBM T61 FSLx PLL pinmod


Left: ICS954309 datasheet details
Right: T61 schematic PLL pinout details

The ICS954309 PLL's datasheet does not show any software programmable configuration registers. Though the T61 circuit does label PIN59 as TME. So conflicting info on whether the PLL is software programmable or not. If technically clued up could TME-unlock the PLL and experiment with PLL registers to program it. Could be a bit of mucking around.

Might be simpler to just do a 200->266Mhz FSLx PLL pinmod instead by:

1. Flash RAM to to 6-6-6-18 400Mhz spec as a 266Mhz BCLK would mean RAM would be overclocked from 333->444Mhz as shown here

2. Do a CPU overvolt such as Vss+VID4 shown here OR do a 10-20% voltage increase by modding the volt regulator circuit in a similar way to that described here.

3. Ensure the PLL samples a GND(0) on the FSB pin 7 to get 200->266Mhz on bootup. That may mean cutting the track leading from the PLL pin7 from the rest of the circuit and routing PIN7 to GND signal via a 10k resistor OR using a strong pull down of 100-1k to GND.

Worth trying since a T9300 has been successfully overclocked to 3.6Ghz in PLL Pinmod Overclocking Methods and Examples . Such an overclock would get you i5 performance levels. Not bad for 2-gens older tech.

[ThinkLover]

Originally Posted by middleton

Actually my contribution to the patch is not so big, see acknowledgments here. I simply combined my own mods and ThinkPad BIOS patches made by other people into one so-called "Ultimate" BIOS.

Don't be so modest
Even putting everything into one cost some effort.

Originally Posted by middleton

And you don't even suspect what a great role nando4 played in this story. if not for him, I wouldn't even know about the existence of T61/X61/R61/X300 SATA II cap. Also it was his idea to add dual-IDA support.

Big thanks for nando4 too

Originally Posted by nando4

1. Flash RAM to to 6-6-6-18 400Mhz spec as a 266Mhz BCLK would mean RAM would be overclocked from 333->444Mhz as shown here

2. Do a CPU overvolt such as Vss+VID4 shown here OR do a 10-20% voltage increase by modding the volt regulator circuit in a similar way to that described here.

Seems to be too hardcore for me - I don't have soldering skills/hardware...
Anyway, thanks for looking for more and more ways to improve our machines!


Now, 1 question remains unanswered - is there any way to run dual-IDA under Linux?

[middleton]

Originally Posted by ThinkLover

Now, 1 question remains unanswered - is there any way to run dual-IDA under Linux?

It seems nando4 knows how to do it under Linux -Appendix 1: Overclocking in Linux.

[poplin]

Thanks for this great post. I'm willing to flash my x61s bios. While downloading the files

SATA-II_Whitelist_SLIC21_ThinkPad_X61_X61s_BIOS_%282.21-1.03%29.rar

and

Dual-IDA_SATA-II_Whitelist_SLIC21_ThinkPad_X61_X61s_BIOS_%282.21-1.03%29.rar

junkie-1 virus was detected in both files . Anyone else detected this?. It would be posible to have these files signed or at least the md5 sum?.

Thanks.

[middleton]

Use VirusTotal - Free Online Virus, Malware and URL Scanner to check the patches. For example, Dual-IDA_SATA-II_Whitelist_SLIC21_ThinkPad_X61_X61s_BIOS_(2.21-1.03).rar:

Antivirus results:

AhnLab-V3 - 2011.04.07.01 - 2011.04.07 - -
AntiVir - 7.11.5.254 - 2011.04.07 - -
Antiy-AVL - 2.0.3.7 - 2011.04.06 - -
Avast - 4.8.1351.0 - 2011.04.06 - -
Avast5 - 5.0.677.0 - 2011.04.01 - -
AVG - 10.0.0.1190 - 2011.04.06 - -
BitDefender - 7.2 - 2011.04.07 - -
CAT-QuickHeal - 11.00 - 2011.04.07 - -
ClamAV - 0.97.0.0 - 2011.04.07 - DOS.Junkie-1
Commtouch - 5.2.11.5 - 2011.04.06 - -
Comodo - 8254 - 2011.04.07 - -
DrWeb - 5.0.2.03300 - 2011.04.07 - -
eSafe - 7.0.17.0 - 2011.04.04 - -
eTrust-Vet - 36.1.8258 - 2011.04.07 - -
F-Prot - 4.6.2.117 - 2011.04.07 - -
F-Secure - 9.0.16440.0 - 2011.04.07 - -
Fortinet - 4.2.254.0 - 2011.04.07 - -
GData - 22 - 2011.04.07 - -
Ikarus - T3.1.1.103.0 - 2011.04.07 - -
Jiangmin - 13.0.900 - 2011.04.07 - -
K7AntiVirus - 9.96.4320 - 2011.04.07 - -
Kaspersky - 7.0.0.125 - 2011.04.07 - -
McAfee - 5.400.0.1158 - 2011.04.07 - -
McAfee-GW-Edition - 2010.1C - 2011.04.07 - -
Microsoft - 1.6702 - 2011.04.07 - -
NOD32 - 6022 - 2011.04.07 - -
Norman - 6.07.07 - 2011.04.06 - -
Panda - 10.0.3.5 - 2011.04.06 - -
PCTools - 7.0.3.5 - 2011.04.07 - -
Prevx - 3.0 - 2011.04.07 - -
Rising - 23.52.03.06 - 2011.04.07 - -
Sophos - 4.64.0 - 2011.04.07 - -
SUPERAntiSpyware - 4.40.0.1006 - 2011.04.06 - -
Symantec - 20101.3.2.89 - 2011.04.07 - -
TheHacker - 6.7.0.1.168 - 2011.04.07 - -
TrendMicro - 9.200.0.1012 - 2011.04.07 - -
TrendMicro-HouseCall - 9.200.0.1012 - 2011.04.07 - -
VBA32 - 3.12.14.3 - 2011.04.06 - -
VIPRE - 8946 - 2011.04.07 - -
ViRobot - 2011.4.7.4398 - 2011.04.07 - -
VirusBuster - 13.6.291.0 - 2011.04.06 - -

File info:
MD5: b3728370eb3953d545d9191bfc2be459
SHA1: 1ebe122f7719b0387c2247becb63a59bab8b0a98
SHA256: be4c4d44f56e587bcccd66d32486dd9ba9b2d5da91edca3bbf5271521462053a
File size: 11238938 bytes
Scan date: 2011-04-07 12:13:16 (UTC)


I think it's a false alarm from ClamAV. This antivirus suspects ISO CD Images.
Download the official ISO BIOS update from lenovo and ClamAV will find "DOS.Junkie-1" in it .

[poplin]

I did not know that ClamAV was so picky.

Thanks again for your great work middleton!.

[phst]

Hello,
I was attracted to this forum by this thread about SATA2 for T61/X61.
My laptop is a T61p 6460 with Win7 x64 and I tried the modified BIOS "2.27-1.08" from page 8. After burning the CD and rebooting it showed "Check failed. Return code = 1"
I tried two different burning softwares (Nero 8 & the recommended ImgBurn).
Then I tried an official Lenovo.iso, which booted correctly and succesfully upgraded my BIOS to 2.26. (I know this isn't the newest one.)
I would appreciate it if anyone could help me.
Furthermore, could anyone tell me, how to donate money to middleton, when this works?

Thanks for your help!