T420 + mSata + UEFI ONLY = 20 SEC BOOT

What are current UEFI issues that should be expected for a user not doing anything exotic, eg. RAID?

erik, will be 'bios' updates work the same way as they do now?

Does it matter how the data drive (hdd) is partitioned/formatted (for a msata + hdd setup)? I'm guessing not.

 

vig - the only issue i'm aware of right now is that the FPR doesn't work correctly with UEFI.   afaik, this is being investigated.   the interim workaround is to use UPEK's own software.

BIOS updates work the same as current.

GPT+NTFS is best for all partitions on your boot device.   you can use MPT+NTFS on a second drive if so desired.

 

What's FPR and UPEK?

 

UPEK is the manufacturer of the fingerprint-reader (fpr).

 

Ah. That's what I'm talking about. You just don't know what's not going to work until it's too late. I think I'll stick with the old BIOS system for a few years.

One day you'll install a program and it just won't work or cause blue screens and you won't know what's causing it and think it's the program itself or maybe you got a virus and AV didn't detect it or think a recently updated driver is causing it, etc. Not worth the shaving of 10-30 seconds off the boot time.

 

Just FYI, you don't need UEFI and mSATA to get 20 sec boot. My Intel G2 with normal BIOS in X61s can boot in 10 sec. You just need to know the proper tweaks (reduce boot processes, turn off a few services, etc...)

 

Unfortunately many don't know these things...

Care to enlighten us? Or point us in the right direction? I'm new to 7 so I'm kinda looking for some guide on what services and all that can be turned off safely. Input is appreciated as always.

 

Now, imagine your tweaks plus the UEFI only mode, that supposedly should give you faster pre-OS boot.

 

I started out with something like this:
Black Viper’s Windows 7 Service Pack 1 Service Configurations | Black Viper's Website | www.blackviper.com

then google a few other services to see what I don't need. You are the only one who knows what services you need and what not.

 

Isn't that what Rapidboot does at startup, delay certain services.

 

An out-of-the-box optimization can't work for everyone.

 

I have a hard time believing that you got an X61s down to 10 seconds considering that my T400 (with an X25-M G2 160GB) takes about 8 seconds just to get through the BIOS (boot time is about 25 seconds total).

 

Ditto.

We really need to start defining what people mean by boot. My definition of boot is from the time I press the power button to the point my web browser is up and running on the network hitting my homepage. It takes longer than 25 seconds for me to do that on a rather tweaked W520.

 

I am thinking of using uefi on my x220 when it comes next week. I will be using an INTEL 320 80GB SSD. I have a few concerns:

1. Possible incompatiblity with a driver etc. that is not currently known.

2. My biggest issue is the GPT versus MBR. Lets say my x220 will not boot. I take the SSD and plug it into a SATA to usb converter. Then this is connected to a different non UEFI computer. Will I be able to get data off the SSD from another non UEFI computer? I would not want to boot the drive on another PC (I know that may not work anyway) just get the data off.

Teddy

 

1. Besides the HD 3000 driver (not actually a problem if you install SP1 first), I've seen people talking about the fingerprint reader driver problems.

2. I am not sure what you are trying to accomplish. If you are concerned whether a GPT drive would be readable as an external drive on a non-UEFI PC, it should as it still uses NTFS as the file system.


Re: "We really need to start defining what people mean by boot. My definition of boot is from the time I press the power button to the point my web browser is up and running on the network hitting my homepage. It takes longer than 25 seconds for me to do that on a rather tweaked W520."

I get 16-19 secs from the moment I press the power button to the state when I can actually use the browser. That's with the Intel 320 80Gb SSD and UEFI Only. Btw, I ended up returning the mSata as the WD HDD I ordered as the storage drive turned out to be quite loud (not mSata's fault). So returned both the mSata and HDD to get an SSD.

 

Yea, well mine is domain joined so there's quite a bit of overhead associated with that. 16-19 seconds is fantastic to be at a desktop and have a working browser. What anti virus product are you using?

 

I use MSE. Can't justify anything else considering how little of the resources MSE uses. Oh, and I don't have any of the ThinkVantage tools on my machine and did some tweakings to Windows (e.g. disabled unnecessary Windows features). This kept the startup programs to the minimum.

 

If we're talking technical, then it's 10 sec to get to login screen, and without a password, it's 15 to 16 sec to get to usable desktop. BIOS only appears for 5 to 6 sec for me.

 

For me and most others, boot up begins from the power button to the desktop, not to the browser. Thats an extra step. On my T420 (sent back for the X220) it took about 52 seconds up to 1 min 5 seconds from the start button to the desktop with a 7200 rpm Hdd. No fancy uninstall of services or programs.

 

Awesome, I appreciate the info. It is definitely a personal thing, just hoping to find something like the link you posted. Awesome. I used one of those for xp to get down to about 12 services at boot. Ha, was hoping to do the same with 7.

 

OK, I installed RapidBoot just to test whether it would decrease the bootup time. The boot time was 19 (+-2) seconds before I installed RB and it remained the same 19 (+-2) seconds with RB. The only thing that I noticed is that it switched the power scheme from "Balanced" to "Max Performance". So if you have a system with not so many startup programs, you will probably see only marginal, if any, improvement in startup times.

 

I just tried installing from the Recovery Disk I made, but if UEFI-only is selected it goes straight to the existing msata Win installation. I think if you want the factory image with UEFI, one has to use something like Acronis and clone.

 

I exchanged my intel 320 for a 510 and did a clean install using the UEFI only option. In my opinion, if you are just looking for system that works without troubleshooting, skip the UEFI only option. There are incompatibility issues, especially with some of Lenovo specific drivers and software. Here are some of the issues that I encountered:

- FPR works with just the driver but not with Lenovo's version of the driver so if you want the cold boot fp scan to bypass password, it won't let you boot up your system

- thinkvantage update is not compatible and won't install any updates. It will go as far as finding them and downloading them but it will come back as unable to update and require manually updating them one by one.

- As I implemented updates in a batch and restarted the system, I would get the blue screen and give me bootloops. I don't know and didn't care to find out what exactly was causing the incompatibility issues as I was clear that Lenovo specific drivers weren't playing nice with this setup.

- Once I got the system all updated with the drivers, I ran a benchmark on the ssd just to make sure its working properly and the reads were as expected but there was a significant drop in writes. At this point I just decided that I didn't want to spend any more time dealing with a fix for this and reinstalled the OS using the default setting with legacy.

Each time that I got bsod, what worked in getting the system to boot again was going back into Bios and changing UEFI only to Legacy and going back to a previous restore point.

All this trouble to shave a few seconds on my ssd's performance is not worth it at this time. Legacy works just fine and ssd is just as fast.

I apologize if I don't have any more detailed explanations of the issues and troubleshooting but it was just late and wanted to get this done with.

 

Re: "- As I implemented updates in a batch and restarted the system, I would get the blue screen and give me bootloops. I don't know and didn't care to find out what exactly was causing the incompatibility issues as I was clear that Lenovo specific drivers weren't playing nice with this setup."

The BSOD happened probably because you had installed the HD driver before SP1.

One more thing to add to your list is that after some device drivers are installed (e.g. USB thumb drive), Windows will ask whether you want to reboot. However, I am not 100% positive it's because of the UEFI Only.

Other than that, I haven't had problems with UEFI Only. Although I have to admit that I don't have the FPR.

 

Dear all, I am new to the forum so apologies if I missed out on some of the posts.

I have recently purchased a T420 with SSD and am interested in loading it under UEFI boot. I have been reading through the posts and it seems the process is pretty startaight forward, with the exception of the HD driver load before SP1.

The issue is my Win 7 x64 CD is not booting under UEFI. Have I missed something here? It does boot under Legacy though so not sure where is the issue here.

Appreciate the help. Just need to get past the booting stage off the CD.

Many thanks,

 

Im going back to legacy for 3 reasons.
SSD write performance dropped from 220 to 130mb/s
FPR
wubi ubuntu doesnt work *at all*.


oh. and weird glitches like the touchpad and trackpoint not being recognized out of standby, really weird optimus behavior on DP++->dvi, the fact that UEFI offers no benefit outside of boot-up, etc.

 

mtechbil, I may have a solution for you. I, too, had a Win7 x64 DVD that would not boot on UEFI-only mode. Try using the ISO (if you can find it online somewhere) recommended in my "solution" reply in this thread: UEFI-only Won't Boot Windows Installation DVD - Page 2 - Lenovo Community. Please link to it if you find an ISO that works! I'd do it myself, but I got the physical disk from someone else, instead of an ISO online.

 

I am trying to install an Intel 320 on my T420s...I am finding that Rescue and Recovery disks do not work. I need a real Windows disk I guess?

Edit: OK I actually read the thread and people are apparently using the recovery disks successfully. On mine, it gets to the end of the disks ("Final C" then "Final Q" etc.) and then says nothing. No custom install options or "You're Done" message. I reboot and it nothing happens, like the SSD is still blank. Am I missing something?

 

MacBook Pro 13" vs ThinkPad T420s boot speed:
YouTube - ‪Rychlost startu MacBook Pro 13" vs ThinkPad T420s‬‏

Both notebooks are exactly the same price, both have SandyBridge platform, both are running on battery (fully charged), but MBP has HDD only, as compared to SSD+HDD in ThinkPad. Apple does not offer SSD+HDD combo anyway.

ThinkPad is about 10 seconds faster.

--

Btw, Fingerprint reader pre-boot authentization works well with this small hack:
http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/T400-T5...t-compatible-with-UEFI-Lenovo-Tech/m-p/423135

 

I'm lost. What does this video prove? SSD is faster than HDD? Ok, got it. Duh.

 

You might want to start a new thread for your problem. Then all responses would be directed and helping you out.

There might be an error in the recovery disks. Try creating the recovery disks again. If you can't create the recovery disks again, I think Lenovo only lets you do it once ( I can't remember for sure) you can try doing it using the features built into windows7.

Create a system repair disc

If you still have no luck do you know anyone with a windows7 disk you could borrow? It can be either a win7 full install disk, win7 upgrade, or win7 oem. If you can borrow an upgrade disks here's a guide on how to do a clean install using upgrade media by windows expert Paul Thurott. I used the "double install" method, but I was upgrading from vista. You might not have to do that as you'll probably just be using the windows serial number that came with your computer.

Clean Install Windows 7 with Upgrade Media

EDIT:
Make sure to install the latest intel SSD firmware before you install windows. Make sure to read through the instructions they provide, print them out if you have to. When you install the firmware I believe you have to go into UEFI settings (or BIOS as it used to be) and change the SATA port controller to Legacy or IDE compatibility (can't remember exactly what it's called) then before you install windows change it back to AHCI mode.

 

Same purchase price, different speed. For Mac lovers such a comparison will not make sense, for me it does... Of course, the video itself is bit of a flame. But T420s is a much better notebook for gettting the work done. Even if you file the edge off http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NnGAlf1hjs4

 

Thanks-I actually was pointed somewhere (I already forget where) where I got a clean Windows disk, which I guess I prefer anyway. Thanks!

Edit: I saw on installing windows that there was a 1.2 gig Recovery partition. I guess I need to find out how to get rid of it.

I'll create a new thread for this if you think I should, but when I tried to get rid of the recovery partition in disk manager it said the (empty) partition was the System and Boot partition. I made the other one the boot partition, still couldn't delete the recovery partition, and now it won't boot. I guess I'll try again, but the short question is how do I just format the whole drive from this position, so that this doesn't happen again?

Edit edit: Oh duh I can do that from the Windows install disk. All is well for now. So I haven't had a proper boot yet but damn did it shut down fast!

 

I can understand that many people see value it going to UEFI, but that has not been my experience. I have gone back to legacy BIOS. UEFI / clean Win 7 booted 2 seconds faster than legacy BIOS / Lenovo's pre-pack. IMHO, UEFI required too many work-arounds to achive something close to full functionality; the dealbreaker for me was needing to spend more $$$ for software to backup my boot image: Win 7 Backup & Acronis with UEFI did not work for me. I didn't try it, but I also suspect that Lenovo's pre-pack will produce UEFI / GPT compatible recovery disk: the repair disk the my UEFI / GPT Win 7 system produced would'nt work.

There are probably work-arounds for all of these problems, which might be worth spending time searching for and implementing, but for me, it's not worth it for the benefit of slightly faster boot-times (and being able to use 2TB SSD boot drives, when they become available).

I wish I had read this beforehand:

What is UEFI and when was it introduced on Lenovo ... - Lenovo Community

(to go from UEFI / GPT to legacy requires removal of the GPT partiion. I used a Parted Magic bootable CD to clean the drive)

System: ThinkPad X220, QM67 chipset, Core i7 2620M, Corsair Force 3 120GB SSD

 

Acronis Backup&Restore Workstation 11 works very well with UEFI and GPT.

 

Basically skip steps 8 & 9 and you should be golden?

 

Thank you for this guide! I'm using an X220, but this is definitely applicable for clean installs. I was pulling my hair out with BSODs until I read this thread about installing SP1 first. Thanks!

 

hi, i just installed a 120 gb OCZ Nocti mSata on my t420.

the 500 GB seagate hard drive is noisy, and use battery....
if i ask to stop disk rotation after 1m in Lenovo Power Control,
do you think there would be some mechanical problem to my hard drive?

 

Question: I use mstat and harddisk on my T420 and boot disk set to boot from my msata. However, in the storage management, msata (c drive) is disk 1 instead of disk 0. How can I change it around?

 

I think the better question is why do you care?

 

Ha, I have that same OCD desire. I was trying to figure out why my SSD (primary drive) was disk 1 and how to switch it to disk 0 (HDD). After a while I just decided to scrap the idea and live with it.

I agree with you 100%. I only saw a boot of 20 sec in UEFI vs 22-24 sec in legacy with the intel 310. If people are doing this just because of faster boot, I don't really see the point of a few seconds. I had a lot of stuff that didn't work in UEFI, in the end it wasn't worth it.

 

I did a few testing and has 2 problem by letting SSD stay as Disk 1 (ie non primary disk). Certain program run much faster if it is disk 0. I do not know why. Here is my finding.
(1)
For notebook using PGP and required to encrypt primary boot drive. MSATA solution does not work. PGP take disk 0 as primary drive. As I boot from mSATA. My primary disk is disk 1 and my traditional harddisk is still disk 0 although it is logical drive D.
(2)
Running Windows performance test via control panel->system. The disk performance number is from disk 0 and not my mSATA which is disk 1 (although it is logical drive c, boot drive).

and some other program.

I took away my tradition disk and mSATA become drive 0, the performance is clearly much better.