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

Hi everybody,
in last 2 days I've been trying to find any possible information on this topic. Quite a few I found on this web and also on the lenovo forums. However, it seems to me that this problem hasn't yet been solved.

And I think there are quite many T61/X61 which where the original HDDs are being swaped for SSDs. And therefore quite many of us unhappy T61/X61 customers who would even be willing to pay few $$ to someone being able to hack the BIOS to enable the SATA 300.

I'm sure I'm not the only one. If someone spends ~$800 on a fast SSD drive and cannot actually use it at full speed, I think everybody will bi willing to spend a bit more fore someone who will be able to unleash the full SSD potential on the T61/X61

If Lenovo is not willing to do this for us, we should find our own solution. And the one who makes it I'm sure he can make profit on that.

dubak

 

7-22-2010 PROBLEM SOLVED!! Patched R61/T61/X61 sata-II bios available here.

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Just today I've posted a request on thinkpads.com for a hacked bios fix solution. All that is necessary is decompressing the bios, disassembly, altering the offending byte(s), repack and distribute to the enjoyment of users. T61p worthy of the time investment.

T61p bios hack for ICH8M SATA-II 3Gbps (+history), quoted below:

 

This is the way it's going to be. Despite my misgivings, I'm going to allow this thread to move forward, but as soon as this thread devolves into the merits of doing this or a discussion of Lenovo's decision to cap the T61 era machines, this will be closed. If you have anything to contribute to the subject, please feel to post. I would also add you're doing this at your own risk. If you brick your machine or void your warranty, you're on your own.

 

I think it can be done! Come on people!

 

There is a guy who made a BIOS modification that swaps the FN and CTRL button functions in the lenovo forums. Perhaps one of you could contact him to see if he can tackle your SATA2 cap problem.

http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/T400-T5...hinkPad-T400-T500-keyboard-SOLVED/td-p/199662

 

Mark's explanation sounds a lot more believable than what I thought was the "company line." I mean Lenovo capped it in order to save power.

That's a new wrinkle for all Thinkpad users, not just 61 generation users So my Thinkpad's original hard drive had the same (barely noticeable) cap. Oh well, at least I don't want to worry about that. The 7K200 has been relegated to my UltraBay.

Did Lenovo ever offer the T or X61 with a SSD as default? If so I guess they would have to have a firmware flash. I just doubt a 2007-08 era SSD (besides the original X-25M and Lenovo only used Samsungs back then) would saturate the SATA 1 speeds. Ok, the people who need this are also bringing their own SSDs to the party anyway

 

only as a CTO option (and a very expensive one at that )

 

Nando4,

The Mydigitallife forum has a quite active BIOS modding community. If I am not mistaken, there is a guy called Yen that is a skilled Thinkpad BIOS modder.

 

Would it be possible to ask him for us

 

Can't say I'm surprised. It would have had to have been the SLC Samsung