Upgrading a T901, Results!

It seems undervolting in the manner of that thread does not work for anything newer than a Core 2 CPU. The i7 XM series might be able to do it, but not the regular Sandy Bridge CPUs. It's also kind of a moot point; Intel uses "SpeedStep" to do it automatically, and in CPU-Z you can see it work, stepping down the clock frequency and the voltage when it reaches its thermal tolerance.

 

While I haven't had time for surgery still, I'd like to report another development.

I had ordered a display port to mini display port adapter, after receiving the docking station for this system. Unlike most docking stations, this one is pretty useful because it adds more unique ports that are missing on the core chassis, such as a display port output.

Using the display port to mini display port adapter, and then the Apple mini display port to dual link DVI converter, I am able to get the tablet to power up the notoriously difficult to use 30" 2560x1600 Apple Cinema display - on Windows XP!

On other systems like the Alienware m14x, the display port outputs are soldered to the nVIDIA card, which does not run on Windows XP.

So once again I would like to congratulate and thank Fujitsu for building a system so well designed that everything works out of the box as it should, no complications!

 

I was just wondering if any of you had an inkling whether the mobile Ivy Bridge processors would work in a T902. As far as I've found, the Ivy Bridge processors use a G2 (rPGA988B) socket like the Sandy Bridge ones (which makes sense as Ivy Bridge is a 'tick+').

I wonder if the motherboard might not be compatible though? (I have no knowledge or experience in this area) I also wonder whether the IGP would work. The HD4000 performs better than the NVS4200.

The T902 just doesn't seem to be my cup of tea. A 16:9 display (even if it is 1600x900) is just too much of a compromise and I'm not too keen on island keyboards. It looks like it won't have a dedicated GPU (I'm assuming that the HD4000 is considered 'good enough'), so an Ivy Bridge T901 would be a great alternative (and probably still cheaper).

 

I spent hours trying to find a service manual for this thing. I wanted to upgrade my HDD to an SDD but couldnt find how anywhere?

Does somebody know how or where to find this information? thanks

 

The T730 manual should be very similar, not that you really need it.

Just make sure you get 2.5" SSD. I think they all come with the right connector (SATA).

The main drive bay is on the lower left side. Unscrew the panel there (it should be most of the left side, with the fan filter). Make sure you only unscrew the screws near/on the surface, not the deep-set screws. Use the right type of screwdriver.

 

I think backwards compatibility would be not an issue; but I'd be warier of trying a G3 CPU on a T901. I'm certain a G2 on a T902 would work.

Are you sure the HD4000 can beat the NVS4200? If anything, most games refuse to run on Intel drivers - I don't know if its the game or the driver or the GPU - and there's usually more rendering problems with Intel vs. nVIDIA.

Not that I like nVIDIA either; if you saw a recent video by Linus Torvalds on his feelings on nVIDIA, I feel much the same way in that they completely nuked XP support with their Optimus product line. I don't think I'll be going for the T902 - trying to place a couple orders for the last remaining T901's.

 

In the T902? Unless they soldered in the CPU to the T902, they should be interchangeable just like the T901.

If you mean putting an Ivy Bridge in a T901, that isn't possible. The motherboard chipset for Sandy Bridge CPU's doesn't support Ivy Bridge, and Ivy Bridge CPU's aren't backwards-compatible.

The 16:9 display alone is why I'm glad I got the T901 when I did. Even the T901 feels a bit narrow when using it in portrait mode; going narrower would almost be impractical for portrait mode for me.

 

I'll say from using the t5010 that I do wish I had a few more vertical pixels, even if I dont like the ratio, I'd consider it worth it.

while we are talking about modifying the 901, I'd love to find out the the 902s screens are compatible; maybe they use the same connector, I'd imagine the webcam, mic, touchscreen and wacom would use the connectors so it's just the screen. (that and the physical mounting lining up)

if any of you get a peek at the lcd panel connector can you take a photo for me?

This would be perfect, as to me the 902 seems to have little to no improvement over the 901, and the 901 does have a dedicated graphics card, so it still wins

 

Apparently the 3rd generation Intel CPUs have finally caught up with nVIDIA's performance, at least on the low-end. According to notebookcheck.net, the performance of the Intel 4000 series "GPU" is identical to the NVS 4200 GPU that is on the T901, but as I mentioned earlier, quality and drivers are always a whole other issue.

I personally prefer smaller resolution screens because I find it to be a lot easier on the eyes. For a variety of reasons the T901 still seems superior to me to the T902, but I am intrigued about the XP capabilities of the T902 still. Especially because the nVIDIA GPU is inoperative under XP and just drains battery power...

 

apparently don't cut it for me, I'd just rater have a dedicated graphics card anyway; that's less processing power taken from the CPU and RAM.

there just doesn't seem to be any real improvement over the 901 to me anyway, so cost wise I feel I'm better off, and if the screens are interchangeable I might be able to add that over time after the initial purchase

 

Hello all! First post here, but I've been lurking around these parts for awhile. I just won an auction for a Fujitsu refurbished T901, and I can't wait to make it a quad core! I'm hoping to do a Samsung 830 SSD (I have one in my desktop and it's fantastic), 16GB of 1600MHz RAM with tight timings, and the Intel i7-2760QM.

I'll be doing the teardown either myself or with a friend that owns a computer repair shop. I'll do my best to take a few pictures and post them here. Before the teardown I'll do some benchmarks with the stock i7-2620M as well, which should give everyone an idea of a baseline.

A few questions though...

For RAM I was hoping to get my hands on a pair of these sticks. Comments?

Could someone please recommend a retailer/reseller for the CPU?

Any thoughts on how to further upgrade the cooling system? Maybe the fan? I looked at the dis-assembly manual for the T730 and this doesn't seem like an option if the T901 has a similar "squirrel cage" style fan.

Were there any MOSFETs that could have heat sinks added to them?

@bikerbob10116, I believe I saw in another thread that you run an eGPU. One reason I had to get my hands on a T901 instead of a T902 was the expresscard slot for this purpose. I'm hoping to get it to work with a nVidia Quadro. Any threads you could point me at other than this one?

 

Could anyone confirm that this is the fan part number for the 901?

CA49600-0240

I think the model number, starting off with something like "KDBxxxxxxx" (I'm guessing based on pictures from the T730 manual), could help with finding a replacement fan with similar dimensions and possibly a few more CFMs. The CAxxxxx-xxxx number seems to be Fujitsu's P/N, and isn't as useful for finding parts from the manufacturer, Delta Electronics.

 

Awesome! Aside for the RAM, that's the exact setup I have! I think you're really going to like it.

Pretty much the only option is eBay. The seller I got my 2760qm from doesn't have any for sale, but there are others on eBay right now for under $300.

I'm stumped on this one as well. There's definitely no room for more fans or a bigger fan.

That's the only thread I'm aware of. A non-NVS T901 and a nVidia Quadro eGPU? That should work great. If you mean an NVS T901... much much more difficult. I don't even use my eGPU anymore because it is such a pain to get it to work (because the NVS and its drivers have to be completely deactivated). Though if you use a Quadro card in the eGPU, I would think the driver problem should be a lot better, though really expensive. If you get your eGPU to run reliably, I'd be extremely interested in hearing your process.

 

I'm assuming this is because one install of windows doesn't like having multiple drivers/graphics cards installed. Also the problem must have to do with how you get the eGPU to work using the nVidia Optimus driver. Basically it boils down to the NVS and the eGPU can't both utilize the Optimus drivers, correct?

I would think an easy workaround for this would be having two separate installs of Windows. One with the NVS enabled/drivers installed and the other without.

I believe you mentioned running SolidWorks on your 901. That is my goal as well, as SW is the most demanding application I use. Hence the need for Quadro. Which I was planning on doing as cheaply as possible, probably a used Quadro 2000D. I don't see much sense going up to something like a Quadro 4000 with all that loss in bandwidth via the expresscard slot.

 

Well folks, in case anybody's wondering why I've been silent, here goes...

Last weekend I did finally have a moment to swap the CPUs, but after the first reboot, the tablet pen was not working. It may have been an issue with me not having re-installed Intel GPU drivers (since the CPU went from an Extreme edition to a non-Extreme one), but I assumed it was due to the surgery on the machine so I opened it back up. And from there...it was downhill.

First I removed the TPM chip from the motherboard of the system. When I then tried to boot, the system wouldn't boot at all - the keylock LED would light up, and that'd be it. I then re-inserted the TPM chip (making a total of three surgeries in one day), and this time the system was booting, but the display was dark. I was able to Remote Desktop into the system, but suffice to say I wasn't left in much of a mood to run any CPU benchmarks. Fujitsu picked up the system a couple days later, and declared that the issue had nothing to do with the keylock LED, and that I had damaged the LCD connector pins during one of the surgeries...could well be. Right now my T901 is in repair at a friend's computer shop. Hopefully I'll hear from them this week.

I've never lost a machine in surgery before, so this hurts Part of me still thinks its some TPM lockout, but I do remember cracking the plastic of the LCD connector on the motherboard, so might well be the case. At any rate, if the tablet pen doesn't work, there's really no point to using the system at all. So hopefully I'll have some good news coming my way this week, as I am eager to see what results I get from the benchmarks.

But for now, I'm back on my Alienware m14x...at least it does handle the Extreme CPU much better (doesn't really underclock at all).

 

Hi, all! Im new here with my t901. Any news about it? i want to do some upgrade in the future like quad core. For now just bought Uj 240 for 50$.

 

So I ended up returning my refurbished T901, and instead purchased a T902. I just finished installing the RAM and SSD I mentioned in my previous post. Attached is a screenshot of CPU-Z and WEI.

 

I ran a few more benchmarks today, attempting to keep everything "apples to apples" as possible.

Cinebench: 19.57 fps, 3.41 pts
PCMark7: 5036
3DMark06: 5552
3DMark11: 687
3DMark Vantage: 3214

 

Quick question:

Did you purchase the T902 with an i7 or did you upgrade it?

I took mine apart, and I did not see where I would be able to replace the CPU.

Thanks for any info!

-ddw

 

I bought mine with the i7. When you say you took yours apart, did you take the access panels for ram/hdd/etc off the bottom? Or did you actually take it apart?

 

i mean completely apart. i need to add wwan antennae.

unless the cpu is next to the fan (the only board i didnt disassemble) its soldered.

 

I got WEI of 6.3 on my T901 CPU 2520, 8GB, 120 GB SSB, Intel HD3000 graphics with Win7, x64. I would have to check the CPU #, doing this post from memory.

However, it doesn't appear worth it to me to go up to T902. Does Ivy Bridge really do much more than Sandy Bridge??

I can also put a 2760QM into it according to this thread, has anyone posted photos on this?

 

We really need a baseline comparison of a T901 with a i7 2620 or 2640 with a NVS. But as to HD4000 vs HD3000 there is no comparison. HD4000 competes with lower end discrete cards like the NVS4200. Now how much the benchmarks translate to real world for performance will vary. I think the case that is pertinent to my application may be Solidworks, where a discrete card with nvidia drivers may reign supreme over HD4000. If anybody has SW11 or newer I'd be happy to compare benchmarks with you

 

In my t901 the top left of the screen not fitted to keyboard and it uneven cambered when open = ( but works norm..bikerbob1016 excuse me, can you tell me depending on your experience, what quad core proc from ppga988 line would be best choice for t901 in terms of the compromise between least heat, performance, throttling? How about 2820qm , 2860qm, 2720, 2760? Thank you for the answer in advance

 

I have no idea, those CPU's are all rated at the same 45 W TDP, which is 10 W outside of the thermal design for the T901. If the slower clocked CPU's rise in temperature more slowly than the higher clocked ones even though they have the same rating, the 2630qm or 2670qm is your best bet. But that's a big if, and I don't know how if a 2 GHz processor will heat up as fast as a 2.6 GHz processor when both have the same thermal rating.

But even then, the T902 with a stock i7 beats my modified T901 in almost every benchmark (one of the glaring exceptions being the Cinebench CPU test, where my T901 scored 4.13 vs. 3.41 in the T902), so unless you don't like the changes on the T902, it's the better and much easier way to go. That new HD4000 really clobbers the NVS.

 

Hm, unfortunately, i cant return t901 and my way is upgrade for now..Remember, you say that 2630 or 2670 have not virtualisation unlike 27 or higher,isn"t it? Can you tell me about the average temperature of your proc in office applications and games? my t901 have i5-2520 and i think upgrade worth for me but I care for troubles with installation. How good it would be, if you would text or visual instructions for dummies as I) HD4000 really beat nvs 4200?..wow..Is there any way to upgrade videocard?

 

I've just received my set of new T901's from Fujitsu; and first thing I replaced the CPU with the 2.0GHz quad core (eight including HT cores). After checking that the machine is booting (and no harm done to the tablet pen etc.), I powered off for the night.

I'll be running a full set of benchmarks soon. On my older system that I broke during the previous cycle of CPU upgrades, I did notice that putting in a slower quad core (eight w/HT) did not solve the under-clocking problem. In fact, there was a proportional slow-down (proportional to the ratio of under-clocking in the Extreme CPU that I had tried) which was disappointing.

Unfortunately I cannot go T902 because the screen resolution is too big...I actually prefer smaller resolutions for preserving my eye sight The Intel GPU to be honest does sound quite exciting...and not in the least because Intel, unlike nVIDIA, is still making drivers for XP (which I still fondly use in its more mature Server 2003 incarnation).

The only major issues I've had in the past with Intel GPU's (other than performance of course) had been game compatibility - some games will just not run on Intel, or when they do, the display will be full of artifacts - not sure if the game, or the GPU, or the GPU drivers would be to blame for this. I am eager to report more results as soon as I have them.

I also have a T902 on order coming soon (which I plan to upgrade to the third generation quad (virtual 8) core CPUs), so I may be able to draw deeper comparisons in benchmarks and games - assuming everything goes well with the upgrades of course If the T902 performance is stellar and the screen doesn't look awful when downgraded...that might give me options. I am also considering replacing the T901 screen with the T902 screen outright.

So much to try, so little time

 

Well, the news with the latest processor I installed - the i7-2630QM - is not much different either. It's still under-clocking.

It may just be best to install the fastest quad core CPU after all. I will let you know once I've run through all the benchmarks to see what I find.

Might take a while so thought I'd share this brief news first

 

mimarsinan, glad to hear that experiment continues// Fastest cpu you mean 2960xm or 2860qm? But if there is no difference, why pay much more? And, please, tell me about your cpu temperature..

 

Anybody knows how much point multitouch in our unit? My driver say 2 points, but Internet say five point multitouch. May be i need update the driver, but i dont know which driver for t901 on wacom site. By the way, in my t901 installed 2*8gb crucial pc3-12800 dram

 

I meant the 2960XM.

The most under-clocked this one gets is actually 1.5GHz, which isn't too bad considering!

The 2960XM used to drop to 1.6GHz, with occasional dips to 1GHz, but on the overall it does seem it was the faster processor!

Maybe because RAM access is slower on this one, but the system does feel noticeably slower overall. Which comes as a surprise!

In terms of heat, there's a LOT less heating and fan noise (although I don't have official temperatures).

A real world software build scenario that took 2 hours with the Extreme CPU took 3 hours with this one. So that's certainly a bit of an extreme variance indeed.

I suppose I should reinstall the Extreme after all - it does have better performance across the board.

But in terms of heat and what not, keeping the current one makes more sense.

I'll follow up with more benchmarks, but let me know if you have any thoughts

To go extreme or not to go extreme

 

Here's some initial results with this new CPU on Server 2003.

I find it interesting that the 3D Mark score virtually did not change at all!

wPrime shows less thermal sensitivity than the Extreme CPU, as would be expected.

PC Mark shows a significant drop, as I suppose would also be expected.

More coming from the Windows 7x64 side of things when I get a chance!

 

Well let's not forget about SuperPI and Cinebench on the 2003 side of things

SuperPI took a serious hit - coming in at 36 seconds (no screenshot, since it didn't replace the older higher score with this new lower one).

Cinebench was interesting - the multi processor score actually improved over the Extreme CPU! Now that's interesting...and of course, so did the multi processor speed-up factor. I suppose the Cinebench render is particularly taxing on the CPU and forced a heavy underclock of the Extreme, lower than 1.5GHz on average. The OpenGL score is just a bit higher with the Extreme.

 

Well, looks like I haven't been comparing apples to apples.

The BIOS of the Fujitsu is different than the older T901 I had (its .7, and I'm pretty sure the old one I had was .6 - the last available online BIOS).

I reinstalled the Extreme CPU and it is clocking itself down even further now - all the way down to 1.4GHz. So actually, its performing slower than the non-extreme version when the system is under load.

The system fan is not working near as loud as I remember it used to be, so I am pretty sure the BIOS is doing a bit of an aggressive throttling on the CPU.

No one here has a BIOS for the T901 that exposes control over CPU thermals and/or permits a downgrade of the BIOS, right? When I try to install the .6 BIOS from the Fujitsu website, upon running the installer, it won't let me proceed - saying that I already have a newer version of the BIOS installed.

 

Im also tired to upgrade bios for 1.15 (last availiable on the site) but can not..

 

Oh, excuse me..seems like it is was not bios for my fujitsu(n.america) unit. Im downloaded version 1.06 as said mimarsinan and can upgrade for it, but did not dong that at this moment, because want to see how new proc( i think it will 2820qm) will work with old bios 1.03

 

I think, downgraide must be done in DOS. There are files for DOS upgrade bios on the Europe Fujitsu Tech Solutions site Technical Support pages from Fujitsu but i cant find something like that on N.America site. I tired extract files from bios 1.06 exe file, but without any success

 

I've figured out how to force the BIOS downgrade:

Basically you start the tool. It will give the error. Then go to your temp folder, using the form %TMP% in the Explorer address bar. Inside one of those folders you will find a file named BIOSHeader.ini. That's the folder you want. Copy all files in that folder to another folder, name the target folder "hacked bios" or something similar You can then close the tool that complains; it will delete the source folder when it is closed so don't close it until you've copied the files out somewhere safe.

Then edit the line in that file which reads like so:
BIOS_Version=0x80010800

You basically want to "up" the version shown here to something newer than the current BIOS you have. So for example the line above is BIOS version .8; it is newer than the .7 version I had, etc.

I've so far flashed both the .6 and .5 BIOS'es on my system. No joy though. The underclocking is still happening more aggressively.

I did receive a i7-2860QM CPU today. This is the fastest 45W, non-extreme CPU. I will install it next and see if it performs better. The CPUs with the 6MB cache were just too slow. This one is with an 8MB cache and hopefully it underclocks less than the extreme - thanks to the 45W - while still having a good overall performance envelope.

I'm nervous every time I work on the tablet though now - given how I lost one tablet when the Wacom cable snipped somehow! Wish me luck

 

Thats why i think about 2820qm..its have 45 tdp and first(2,3 Ghz) in 8mb cache line. And of course, wish you good luck or as say in Russia wish you "no down, no feather",and you must answer "dash it")

 

That's a pretty good suggestion. My results with the i7-2860QM are very unsatisfactory, not even worth posting benchmarks for.

 

Results with i7-2860qm even worse than with 2630qm? Oh..

 

Here's the core benchmark set.

Some values are worse, others are better as you can see.

I think its better than the Extreme CPU but still performs very poorly when all CPU cores are engaged.

Single thread performance is better though, as you can see from these results.

All results obtained on Server 2003.

 

Your test in 3dmark 06 with intel HD3000? My unit with i5-2520 and overclocked= )(memory 960 Mhz, gpu clock 875 and 1750 Mhz) ~ 6300

 

I mean nvidia 4200m. May be 2820qm will be better than 2860qm? Throttling must be less, i think

 

The Intel, since it is impossible to make the nVIDIA work on XP.
What software do you use to overclock?

 

I just finished opening up the T902 - bad surprise on this one.

The CPU is actually soldered to the motherboard in this model!

The display on the T902 is nice but there's a lot of empty bezel edges around the monitor.

Overall I find that I am not comfortable with a 13.3" display running all the way at 1600x900.

And the inability to use an 8 core CPU (with virtual cores) is a deal-killer!

 

Hm, sounds daunting..anyway, I glad that bought t901. For overclocking you may use nvidia system tools. It seems that nvs 4200 not mxm in t901 and if it was wrong, last would be the best tablet of all times) I tired to extract bios without any success. After all i used nvidia system tools for over clocking. After long play in Scyrim temp was ~ 85-89 Cels.
Which results shows quad proc in terms of battery life? Im disappointed of short battery life In comparison with lenovo t220-230. My unit is work about 3 hrs in saving mode(with min brightness and wlan) and Im afraid battery life with quad core will be much less.

 

From other side I dont think that i7 3d gen need to upgrade. Videocard need to upgrade but 3d gen core(even 2 core) very fast and should be suitable for any application

 

Seems like now we'll never know what it might have been like.

 

Yes sadly battery is poor. I think it lasts 2 hours on mine. But keep in mind I keep brightness at max at all times.

NVS 4200 is not MXM for sure...

I'll check nVIDIA System Tools. Thanks!