IBM Thinkpad 600E bios mod for processor update

Don't ask how to hack password. (BIOS Passwords)
Sharedoc
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Measured over period of 60hours power consumption of TP600 based home server is 50Wh, so avarage consumption is 0.83W. Most of the time server is idling and this explains why consumption in much less than 3W under heavy traffic.

For the next measurement period I disabled all non-used devices such as infrared, PCMCIA, COM-port, game port, audio system, standard display adapter.

Also for the next measurement period I will include Devolo network adapter module (USB-connected) in the measurement. Previously I used Devolo network adapter (Ethernet-type) but I discovered that Ethernet-type heats (consumes more power in standby) much more than USB-type adapter. I will switch to using only USB-type network adapters in my house.
Sharedoc
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I have detected instability problems with my second TP600E PIII 700@756Mhz (108MHz FSB) when there is a card in the PCMCIA slot. I suspect that BX system chip on the processor MMC2-module gets overheated if there is a card in the PCMCIA slot. Propably BX chip is driving directly PCMCIA slot without bus buffers. BX chip is already 40% oveclocked @ 108MHz. It runs really hot and burns fingers.

As a quick remedy I don't use PCMCIA cards at the moment. I plan to test if instability gets reduced if I reduce Vio voltage on the mainboard. BX chip main logic runs powered by Vio. Reduction from 3.3 to 3.0V would reduce heating by 20%.

I have unused 750MHz PIII MMC2-module that has not been 100% stabile at 810MHz. Maybe its BX chip may also suffer from overheating?
Last edited by Sharedoc on Sun Sep 05, 2010 9:32 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Sharedoc
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Lowered Vio -> 3.03V by motherboard regulator (Maxim voltage regulator pin 3 resistors 10kohm / 39kohm)

Testing stability with PIII 750@650MHz, Vcore = 1.56V.

Once I get XP installed with VMware Player 3, I hope I can set SpeedStep with W Marcus Miller's SpeedStep utility and run @810MHz.
Sharedoc
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Getting SpeedStep mod to work with Ubuntu 10.04LTS has turned out very difficult to do.

Grub method does not install because Ubuntu has turned to Grub2. W. Marcus Millers DeepSleep utility Linux code points to wrong kernel place. I don't have sufficent Linux knowhow and time to fix either of these. Can anyone with Linux help with these?

For me only approach seems to be to go back to dual boot arrangement with WindowsME, which is kind of silly but XP does not install on CF and running it via VMware is too slow and running Miller's DeepSleep utility in XP VMware Player jammed the whole virtual machine for 15 minutes.
Ripa Rapa
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I don't use deepsleep on my Ubuntu 600E. It has 850MhzPIII running at 700Mhz and for L2 cache activation I use pIIIcache2.6.tar.gz.
But looking this deepsleep utility it seems that you have to edit the KSOURCE at MAKEFILE file? Set the address so that it points to your newest kernel version. On my T60 it would be "KSOURCE=/usr/src/linux-headers-2.6.32-24". If this is not helpful I can try to install it into my 600E and look what errors I get... (next weekend)
Thinkpadder
Ripa Rapa
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My 600E is running ubuntu 9.10 and I was able to run "make" command for the deepsleep 1.5 with following KSOURCE on Makefile:

# Makefile for 2.6 based Linux Kernel
# You will need to change KSOURCE to point to your kernel
# source tree.

MODULE_NAME = l2cache
PWD = $(shell pwd)
#KSOURCE = /usr/src/linux-2.6.9
KSOURCE = /usr/src/linux-headers-2.6.31-13-generic

I did not install it but I do think there should not be other problems. There was a few warnings but that is quite common, I believe. You can check your correct release numbers for KSOURCE with command "uname -r". (My previous post was incorrect because I did not know that line needs to end with "-generic".)
Thinkpadder
Sharedoc
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Home server avarage power consumption is 4W over period of 8 days. It includes TP600E, Huawei E220 3G modem and Devolo USB Powerline network adapter.

I am studying now to include alternative Internet connection to the home server via USB WLAN network adapter.
Sharedoc
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With help from Ripa Rapa I managed to get DeepSleep utility to get installed in Ubuntu 10.04LTS.

sharedoc@sharedoc-CF:~$ x86info -mhz
x86info v1.17. Dave Jones 2001-2005
Feedback to <davej@redhat.com>.

Found 1 CPU
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Found unknown cache descriptors: 1 2 3 4 8 12 130
Family: 6 Model: 8 Stepping: 3 Type: 0 Brand: 2
CPU Model: Pentium III-M (Coppermine) [cB0] Original OEM
Feature flags:
fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 mmx fxsr sse

L1 Instruction cache:
Size: 16KB 4-way associative.
line size=32 bytes.
L1 Data cache:
Size: 16KB 4-way associative.
line size=32 bytes.
L2 unified cache:
Size: 256KB 8-way associative.
line size=32 bytes.
Instruction TLB: 4KB pages, 4-way associative, 32 entries
Instruction TLB: 4MB pages, fully associative, 2 entries
Found unknown cache descriptors: 1 2 3 4 8 12 130
Data TLB: 4KB pages, 4-way associative, 64 entries
Data TLB: 4MB pages, 4-way associative, 8 entries
800MHz processor (estimate).

sharedoc@sharedoc-CF:~$
Sharedoc
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Ordered superfast (600x) 16GB CompactFlash module from China.
http://cgi.ebay.de/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vie ... 0458547217

Will be interesting to see how fast TP600E CF-disk write/read access is and whether it allows XP to install or not.
Sharedoc
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Location: Finland

Received KingSpec 16GB 600X CF card.
Does not allow XP install (which is a big disappointment)
Allows Ubuntu 10.04LTS install

Feels a bit quicker than running Ubuntu from Kingston 8GB CF.

sharedoc@sharedoc-600E:~$ sudo hdparm -tT /dev/sda
/dev/sda:
Timing cached reads: 284 MB in 2.01 seconds = 141.57 MB/sec
Timing buffered disk reads: 78 MB in 3.02 seconds = 25.79 MB/sec
sharedoc@sharedoc-600E:~$
Sharedoc
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KingSpec 600x 16GB CF lost master boot record propably because of switching off power too quick when shutting down from Ubuntu.
Ubuntu does not close down properly in 600E, you have to close it from power-switch.

Have to follow does this happen again.

Had to resintall Ubuntu.
Sharedoc
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KingSpec CF lost MBR again after switching power off. Had to reinstall Ubuntu.

Both time MBR loss was when I switched power off from mains 240Vac. From this on I will switch from laptop power slider switch. If MBR loss takes place then there is problem with KingSpec CF...
Ripa Rapa
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Some of you may be interested/amused about this. :o Android x86 (at least version 2.2) live cd boots into Android in Thinkpad 600E. No settings change needed. My wlan card is not supported, I'm unsure about audio, but those are settings that can be fixed by compiling and adding missing parts? Android even shows the battery status which has not worked in the latest ubuntu versions. Download the generic version here if you are interested: http://www.android-x86.org/download
Thinkpadder
deshraya
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How do you update your bios without having an operating system? I need to update my bios, but the only operating system I have access to is a usb version of ubuntu. I want to update my bios, how do I do it with a usb key? I dont yet have a working dvd drive, so it has to be usb, thanks for your help!
Ripa Rapa
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this: http://forum.notebookreview.com/sager-c ... stick.html
describes how to flash from usb stick. Find the ibm bios and follow instructions.

You can't update bios from linux but I think you knew that already.
Thinkpadder
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