Thinkpad T420 Owner's Thread

Awesome - found it. Wow, that is one tiny switch. Thanks a bunch!!

 

I am performing these steps right. I just wanted to let you know that there is no power option in the BIOS 1.36 called automatic for AC or battery. It is either maximum performance or balance optimized. I searched everywhere and could not find the automatic option you mentioned in any item in the power or CPU headings. I already had BIOS 1.36 so there was no need for update. All what I did is resetting the settings to default by F9 and save. By the way, I am doing the installation of Windows on the Samsung 830. I decided to get it after I observed some sluggishness even on AC with the Crucial M4. Is there any firmware update to do for the Samsung SSD?

After installing all the drivers you stated, there are 2 missing pieces in the device manager (PCI serial port and PCI Simple Communications Controller). Also, do I need to install Intel video driver?

Here is my results after following your steps except for some steps that I told you about above:

With the power plan optimized, I got a maximum of 2.4Ghz on HWINFO64 with AC and battery. After disabling deep sleep since fan is already chosen to be balance, I still get a maximum of 2.4Ghz on battery and the cores never go to the yellow/Turbo. This performance is OK for me but I am not sure if it should actually go to the turbo zone? I tried to even change the cooling to active instead of passive or to choose maximum turbo but the CPU never exceed the 2.4Ghz on battery. I am now on back to the default of the optimized mode.

Please, note that I have not installed Windows updates or any of my software yet. Hope that after installing these, I will still have that decent performance.

I know these are too many questions but Windows updates are asking me to install Lenovo monitor driver, Conexant driver (though I already installed it from Lenovo) and also the Intel AMT or something like that. Should I install any of these?

 

does anyone else have trouble using two or one finger scrolling? for me it's useable in some programs but in firefox especially it just doesn't work most of the time. The pointer turns into the scroll icon so it is registering the gesture, but it doesn't actually scroll 95% of the time, and when it randomly chooses to work it just jumps straight to the top or bottom of the page

 

You can do a check for updates via the Samsung SSD Magician software, if you bought one recently you may find it had already been shipped with the latest firmware.

The gesture scrolling on the T420 can be a bit patchy, try these methods (Method 1 / 2) to see if it improves things.

 

wow, great call, number 2 works perfectly. scrolling is smooth and accurate now, thanks!

 

I honestly still can't figure out the cause of unexpected shutdowns. It doesn't instantly shutdown but it performs a shutdown as if my battery was critical even though the battery is more than 70%

 

It's a strange problem as it seems you had this problem for a while if I remember, is this using Lenovo's factory image or a Clean Installation of Windows? I haven't come across this issue myself after a year's ownership of my T420...

 

I'll try using a different OS to see if it's hardware or software related.

 

Speaking of your T420 shutting off randomly... Mine has done this is the past as well. It has happened 7 times in the past 2 months. I say "shutdown" but it really just puts itself into hibernation. From the Performance Monitor, I have gathered that the battery meter drops to 0% and starts the hibernation process because it thinks the battery is low. When I turn the laptop back on, it displays the battery percentage normally again. I am not sure if it's because the battery is loose or? This usually happens when it's on my desk in my kitchen so I am not moving it in any way while this happens or when I try to turn it back on. I have since uninstalled Lenovo's Power Management Software (but kept the driver) and it has not done it in quite a while. That is all the info i have for now since this is a recent problem, maybe 3 months old. I have tried jiggling the battery to try and recreate the problem but that does not do anything in terms off shutting the laptop off due to a connection being loose... I'll let you know If I find anything else worth mentioning.

FYI, I have Windows 7 Enterprise and the 9Cell battery. The rest of my Specs are in my Sig.

 

Guys, what's the latest news on your mighty Quad upgrades?
Has anybody stress tested an upgraded T420 yet(code compilation/video encoding)? Is it a safe upgrade? Or does the laptop becomes unstable?

I'm asking as I need a bit more power in my T420 and I'm not sure what's best: buy an ivy laptop or upgrade the cpu. I mainly run couple of parallel VMs and compile code (c/c++/java)

Cheers

 

Hi,

It works properly with i7 2720qm. One thin is cooling system - it a little is not enough specially on long term compiling and it can't use Turbo bust fully.
I am using engineering sample.

I made screenshot and you can see the situation.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/22412698/T420/cpu clock.jpg
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/22412698/T420/cpu temp.jpg

This is compiling large GWT application.

 

I have been loving my Quad Core. Unlike everybody who claims battery life lost or overheating I have been having zero problems. Sorry guys

I do a lot of gaming with my eGPU like Skyrim and BF3 and Just Cause 2 so I push it a lot. I have seen temps of 75 but rarely anything higher. Just make sure you apply your thermal paste properly and keep your cooling system free of dust and lint. It idles around 38-43 When on Intel only mode and 40-45 when on Optimus mode.

I run loads of VM's for all the syspreping I do as well as creating images, super fast and I can run an entire Network Eco system right inside Virtualbox.

If you have any specific questions or if anybody wants any detail info like in a video let me know!

 

Thanks for the swift replies!

My only concern would be temperature: I've got 80GB mSata SSD with 2 HDDs (Momentus hybrids): the main one and one in a caddy (swapped DVD), 16GB ram and onboard GPU. Do you guys think the genuine heatsink will still cope? Or shall I swap one of the HDDs for an SSD as well?

Cheerio

 

You can choose whatever you like as far as Hard Drives and SSD's go. Those do not effect the ability for the heat sink to cool down the CPU/GPU. Laptop hard drives do not generate enough heat to warrant the use of a heatsink.

 

hi. thanks for the replies! i've just replaced the cpu so far so good!
the temperature is about 35-38 idling.
i'm actually installing win7 and ubuntu simultaneously in two VBoxes now and the temp hovers around 48-55, which i recon is not bad at all.

will have to compile something to convince myself

somebody said he had to revert back to the genuine CPU due to issues (sorry don't remember who that was). what issues exactly? running what software? i'm asking as i have the same cpu (a retail one) not the ES type.

cheerio

 

Has anyone tried RapidBoot? Does it really increase boot time or makes things slower?

 

If you have a harddrive, which you do, it does help even out the load caused by starting up services and programs sequentially all at once. If you have an SSD, the boot up times hit the fan

 

Few more observations:

- burned all 8 cores with *systester* (cpu+mem) - no throttling observed, temp went up to 92 and hovered around 85-87 (run 3h)
- the battery (9cell extended one) discharged in less than 1h, 65W power adaptor although connected wasn't charging the battery
- once the battery had gone, the test continued on 65W adapter and it got _REALLY_ hot, I mean pipping hot, event the table it was on got hot!
- the laptop was hotter than usual, however, the ram compartment got much hotter than the bottom of the cpu; I recon you wouldn't be able to keep it on your laps for longer periods of time

So it looks like a decent thermal paste and the stock heatsink can do the job unlike the stock 65W power brick.

Do you guys know any decent 90W replacement power adapter for T420? UK location preferable
Are there any mods to cool the interior of the laptop down (ram mainly) ?

PS.
I run linux arch + custom kernel with thinkpad_acpi module with the genuine thinkfan configuration, so the max fan RPMs kick in early at about 70 C.

Cheerio

Sent from my Transformer Prime TF201 using Tapatalk 2

 

Look on eBay for genuine Lenovo 90w 20v adapters, I managed to get an used one for £6.99 and it works perfectly so getting one for less than a tenner is doable. 90w adapters from the T6x era onwards will be compatible with the T420 (my one came from a T60).

 

Another odd observation. Just got a 125W power supply and rerun the benchmark test and observed much lower temperatures !?

I recon it's a pass and I'm happy with the mod so far. Thanks for help.

Cheers

Sent from my Transformer Prime TF201 using Tapatalk 2

 

It's me again Got bored on a rainy bank holiday and decided to mod my laptop

Firstly, I removed the heat sink and gave it a good polish with a very fine sanding paper; then I prime it with a thermal paste.
Secondly, I removed a bit of the plastic CPU ventilator casing on the CPU side (lower right corner) so the air could circulate towards the CPU (I had to remove some of the black foil placed on top of the mobo).

The result: lower temperatures in the systester, 58 on average, peaking 78 , which is about 20 lower than previously!

I'm not sure what did the job: sanding (cleaning) the heat sink contact area or the improved inner ventilation, but I'm happy with it

Have anybody tried modding the t420 heatsink? Would w520's one fit with some minor modifications?

I was also looking for a low profile water block, however, couldn't find anything the closes thing to liquid cooling would be a custom, low profile GPU cooling (?). It's very unfortunate, t420's CPU is in upright position, there's no room for mods

 

wow that is truly amazing. have any pics to show us? I'm glad there is someone else to try and take a risk in improving their cooling conditions!

 

You could try the copper shim mod. I tried it on my thinkpad t400 and it lowered the temp by about 5 degrees Celcius.

 

Cheers, the heatsink on T420 is pure copper though. Would a shim make any difference then?

About the fan mod: it doesn't work I'm afraid. It's fine until the surrounding of the laptop is moderately cool. Once the CPU hits high temps the air around the vents gets pipping hot and the ventilator sucks hot air into the laptop
I'm afraid I'll give up on that one and reinstall the genuine fan.

I sill want to explore liquid cooling though

Cheers

 

Could you explain this a little further? Did you remove the fan or just a piece around it? From your explanation it sounded like you removed your fan? lol

 

On a laptop?!? I wouldn't...

 

I'm interested in a T420 and I'm trying to decide between the i7 and i5. I'll mostly be using this for web browsing and medium duty multitasking. Should I spend the money for a quad or should I stay with the dual core i5?

 

i5 for your usage pattern.

BTW: Upgrade to 1600x900 screen. Later, upgrade to SSD and use the stock HDD for storage (two drives).

 

hjjfffaa, I would go for i5. I have an i7 which I'm really disappointed with it - not very quick and poor battery life. (I have an T60 which for it's age impresses me far more). I've seen lots of Laptops and track their basic Windows 7 benchmarks (they may not be great but it's easy to compare) and you get so little extra for the i7 and reduced battery life I wish I had gone for the the i5. Which is still very good.

 

It would be helpful that if you are going to make a broad statement, that you could provide some supporting detail. What is poor battery life? What are you doing while running on battery?

 

So far my experience with my new T420 has been great! At first glance, I could already tell that it was going to be well built and surely it was. The keyboard needs some time to get used to but its better than my old dell keyboard. I was lucky enough to get the LG display. Amazing battery life! I have no complaints so far. The trackpoint does have a learning curve however. Just takes time to be familiar with it.

Dad: How much was it?
Me: $700
Dad: Why is it so expensive? Does it have core i7?
Me: No, only core i3.
Dad: There is no way!

I could've gotten a core i7 consumer laptop, but I value the T420's 1600x900 display and build quality more. My dad will never understand. He prioritizes processor and disk space although all he does is watch videos and burn discs.

 

In my case, I wanted a more portable version of the W520.

The i7-2640m Optimus T420 with the six cell battery, 16GB RAM, 256GB primary SSD and a 750GB HDD in the Ultrabay is a powerful combination. Add a 34mm USB 3.0 ExpressCard and you have nearly every port on the planet covered. The 1600x900 screen isn't going to get rave reviews but it is usable. All in a nicely sized machine.

 

Okay, stupid question about the Dolby Sound drivers:

I DL'd the 3 rar files + the .inx file from the link in the instructions PDF. However, looking at the content of the rar files, they contain the same DTPC.msi and dtpc_mda.cab files. Am I supposed to extract the three rar files into the same directory and let them be overwritten? When I do that, the WinRAR program messages say that the two files are broken. What's going on?

Thanks!

 

From the link you either get x86 Part 1-3 (32 bit) or x64 Part 1-3 (64 bit). Download whichever is relevant to your OS Version (if unsure just click on the START ORB, move the mouse over COMPUTER, right-click and choose PROPERTIES and look at SYSTEM TYPE) but make sure you download the whole set and not just one part.

So for example if you have Windows 7 64 bit, download the files x64.part1, x64.part2 and x64.part3 and when you extract them (using WinRAR, 7zip or similar) it should all combine the parts together automatically. Afterwards just run the DTPC.msi file to start the installation but make sure you uninstall the old sound driver if you have it on.

 

I was bored last night and followed another contributor's suggestion of removing the textured surface from the trackpad. The textured part peeled right off and the "new" smooth trackpad feels very nice (kind of like apple's trackpads) and works much better for multitouch. However, it does leave fingerprints very visible.

I have been having some weird issues where either the brightness keys (fn+home/end) or the enter key (!) do not work. This problem is solved by shutting down (or hibernating) the machine and then turning it back on, but I'd appreciate advice for a more permanent solution.

Finally, I have an extra CD Optical drive, and I recall someone looking for one. PM doesn't work for me, so if anyone wants it, shoot me an email at btmppr at gmail dot com

 

Okay, so I installed the Dolby drivers (removed the Conexant drivers first) and everything seems to be working okay except that now my external speakers (plugged into the docking station) are no longer being recognized. The sound is only coming out of the laptop's built-in speakers. How do I get the system to recognize the external speakers again? The speaker panel in the Control panel only seems to see the two laptop speakers.

Thanks!

 

Found on the Dolby Home Theater thread
"External Speakers do not work when connected through Dockingstation.
How to fix: Connect Speakers to your ThinkPad directly. "

 

Ah, didn't see the original Dolby thread. I just picked up on the Dolby sound drivers in this thread.

 

I've been thinking about doing that as well, but I don't want to ruin anything just yet. Are you going to put a smooth sticker over it or are you going to leave it like that? I'm really don't like the bumpy surface of it right now.

 

When I try to install the Dolby drivers from Setup.msi, it says the PCEE is required and it stops the installation. Anyone know what's up?

 

The Dolby drivers seem to make latencies spike and the audio is sometimes crackling from the increased latency.

Does anyone experience this?

Sent from my SHW-M250L using Tapatalk 2

 

My audio has been running smoothly without hiccups.

 

Hi, just got my T420 in the mail today.

An issue I've noticed is that the optical drive is quite loose and not snug. Is this defective or are all T420's like this? I never had a laptop where the optical drive was so wobbly. This is my first ThinkPad by the way.

 

Is it wobbly when the tray is extended or while inside the 12.7mm Ultrabay?

 

It is when the optical drive is inside the laptop's body (i.e. not ejected).

I was surprised at how much I could wiggle the optical drive around...

 

Why are you wiggling it around?

 

Mine is snug as a bug in a rug

 

I am not intentionally wiggling it around for the sake of wiggling around of course. I first noticed when I grabbed my T420 to move it around (it is a laptop right?). I realized that there was this abnormal, squeaking, almost a grinding noise when I grabbed the right side of the laptop, near the optical drive. I located the issue of this sound and it was due to the optical drive moving around when I would adjust the position of the laptop.

I'm also hearing a high pitch whine when running programs. I think this may be the infamous intel CPU whine? I noticed there have been some members on this board complaining about the issue but none of them really gave any viable and lasting solution. Anyone have a suggestion to rectify this issue? This whine is really interfering with my work.

Everything else is great. I love the keyboard and the structure of the laptop is phenomenal. The screen is pixalized but I do work only on this laptop and doesn't bother me that much.

 

There is no fix.

You either disable throttling/clock control or you live with the whine (or you avoid Intel CPUs in your laptops...)

 

Actually there is a fix. Return the defective machine. For some people, living with the defect is not an option. Some T420's work as expected, others don't. That is a defect in my book.

Intel should pay for returned machines with this defect.