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    Lenovo T430 with i7 3720qm

    Discussion in 'Lenovo' started by SJLPHI, Aug 17, 2017.

  1. SJLPHI

    SJLPHI Notebook Evangelist

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    I will first start with that this is the Lenovo side of this thread:
    http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/lenovo-thinkpad-panasonic-toughbook.806220/

    While I was overseas, my Lenovo T430 failed on me. I was able to troubleshoot it after I got home, and it turned out to be a nice crack on the motherboard, with 3+ capacitors burnt out.

    In the midst of it I purchased Lenovo T430 with i7-3720QM without HDD/SSD for a decent price(negotiated with the seller, after telling them my situation, they were very helpful).
    http://www.ebay.ca/itm/253006327247?ul_noapp=true

    After I received it, I moved over my 16:9 screen, keyboard, palmrest, SSD(240GB Optical Bay for Data, 256GB Main for Linux and 128GB mSATA for Windows).

    First thing I noticed was that the CPU was running at around 80 degrees Celsius! There was no crash, but I decided to move over the cooling system over also, considering that after a bit of research the one with the broken T430 was superior.

    After new thermal paste with the cooling system exchange, now it's running at 45 degrees Celsius, and on the Linux side, with careful coding, also(thinkfan modified to run fan at 5033RPM starting at 60 degrees Celsius).

    After a fair amount of reading, I realize T430 isn't by default supposed to come with 3720QM. I am having hiccups on my computer that may be hardware issue. Although this T430 is under 1 year warranty, I MUCH rather fix/prevent failures than to have it professionally fixed because I want it to be working at all times(I do have a pure backup purpose Toughbook CF-19Mk6 with i5 3rd gen and 16gb ram with 500gb ssd).

    The hiccups are:
    1. Nomatter the power settings on(both) OS, if laptop is untouched for 3 minutes, the monitor powers off until I touch the touchpad, or press a key.
    -Is this a BIOS feature that I was never aware of?
    -This is more prominent when the T430 is docked.
    -Broken T430 started doing this before being full blown-out freezing/crashing problem.
    2. some sort of whiney-oscillating noise is coming out from the back of the motherboard. This is not from the fan or the cooling system.
    3. The mSATA SSD in the back is running at 60deg Celsius, even with DIPM enabled on Windows.

    I would appreciate it if someone with the similar setup could comment.
    Ultimately, it would be ideal to have this laptop running as it is until 2020+. Eventually, I will upgrade, but not on my student budget anytime soon.