[Bense]

Figured I'd post this up here for your viewing pleasure
This past June I purchased a lenovo r61e with a celeron M 540 (1.86ghz single core)

I installed a modified BIOS and then upgraded to a T9300 CPU as well as 4GB of RAM

Both CPUs have the same 35w thermal design power, so there is no need to worry about dissipating excessive heat.

The pics tell the rest of the story



From left to right: T9400, T9300, Celeron M 540. Confirming what others have said the T9400 (1066MHz FSB) is not compatible. (excuse the thermal grease mess)


Swapping out the wlan card for one of my favorite / cheapest 802.11g cards. No issues with BIOS whitelist with this modified BIOS






See Note in bottom right.


I have $230 invested in it

[Bense]

The interesting thing about this lenovo r61e is that it was one of the lowest models with the socket P platform. So I was able to go from one end of the socket P spectrum to the other.

I am also running OSX Lion on it now.

[Belmont]

Why did you swap out the wlan card?

Great work btw! I just bought a used Dell D830 2.2 Duo. I have 4G of soDimm DDR2, a bluetooth module, and a new touchpad coming in the mail. I can't wait to start the upgrades!

[Bense]

Originally Posted by Belmont

Why did you swap out the wlan card?

Great work btw! I just bought a used Dell D830 2.2 Duo. I have 4G of soDimm DDR2, a bluetooth module, and a new touchpad coming in the mail. I can't wait to start the upgrades!

I got a couple of these things, a few years ago I chose it as my legacy wifi card because:
* chipset is the same as apple airport cards, so instant hackintosh support
* supports packet injection
* works in any OS that I've tried it with
* goes for $4 shipped on ebay.

I'm not familiar with dell models, is that one of the older lower end models? How much did that d830 set you back?

[Belmont]

Originally Posted by Bense

I got a couple of these things, a few years ago I chose it as my legacy wifi card because:
* chipset is the same as apple airport cards, so instant hackintosh support
* supports packet injection
* works in any OS that I've tried it with
* goes for $4 shipped on ebay.

I'm not familiar with dell models, is that one of the older lower end models? How much did that d830 set you back?

Dell made thousands of D830 for businesses. Kinda like the Thinkpad T series.

I bought this model because of the abundance of second hand parts, starting with the D820 in 2005.

I got mine for $200 on CL.

I'd like to know more about that wifi card you have. I'm interested in creating my own dual boot hackintosh.

[DaveSi677]

Nice job Bense... I was looking at upgrading my i7 cpu to a higher end one but the price was just to crazy!

I know it's and i7 but i do a lot of virtualization and run many programs at the same time... my current i7 cpu is not having any problems running it but I like having more power lol... Network Admins we like to have the latest specs in everything lol

Glad to have you back with us to Bense!!!

[Bense]

Okay so I have been wanting a notebook that I could designate as my 'study' notebook. That is, a notebook that doesn't have any of the BS distractions.

No Movies.
No Games.
No Pictures.
No Instant Messaging.
No Email.
No Web Forums.
No Social Networks.
No Internet.
No Wifi Module.

Nothing but MATLAB, MS Office, Maple, and a PDF viewer.

So after exploring options and taking many things into consideration, I concluded that at this point, because I am now so familiar with the Lenovo R61/T61/X61 platform, that the simplest route would be to find a x61 tablet.

I got one for $152 shipped.

I cloned my R61e OSX86 partition onto a spare hard drive and plugged it into this X61. Then I deleted all the pictures, movies, games, etc. Leaving nothing but the essential, 'get your work done' applications.

I have tried this previously with linux, but ended up just getting all ADHD and started writing shell scripts instead of working on what I should have been working on lol.

Then I took the thing apart and physically removed the wifi card! :D It's like I'm on vacation from the internet. No notifications, or anything. It's so relaxing and bliss.

So what I now do is leave this tablet in my locker, but pull out the harddrive whenever I go home. Once I have physically transported the x61 drive home, use rsync to merge the changes that I have made to my $HOME/Schoolwork and $HOME/Music (I listen to instrumental music when I study). This updates my iTunes library with playcounts, ratings, and minor changes that I made while away.

When I leave in the morning, I sync the changes (if any) that I've made to my Schoolwork and Music directories back to the x61 harddrive, eject it, then take it with me. Rinse and repeat.

If I do not feel like taking the drive home, or if the changes to my directories are minor.. I can carry the x61 tablet to any computer lab, plug the ethernet cable in. Then run a script that connects to my machine at home, then tunnels rsync through ssh to do the sync.

Next consideration "But Andrew, what about those times when you actually do need wifi on your laptop, I bet that you're going to have a blast taking it apart and reinstalling the MiniPCIE wifi card!!! I just think that it's so stupid that you crippled your AMAZING, AWESOME TABLET by removing the wifi card!"
HAHAHAHAHAHAHHA!!!! Here's my $10 solution with packet injection and linux/osx/windows drivers!!!!!!

HERES SOME PICS OF THE BEAST!




http://forums.thinkpads.com/~thinkpa...p?f=32&t=98102

osx86 details:
WORKING - 10.7.1 Lion (I don't feel like dealing with the platform next changes that they made in the 10.7.2 update)
WORKING - Intel x3100 graphics
WORKING - Sound, Including headphones port
WORKING - Intel Speedstep (CPU clock speed scaling to save power, increase battery life)
WORKING - Bluetooth
WORKING - keyboard, trackpoint, tablet buttons, volume keys, etc.
WORKING - gigabit ethernet
WORKING - screen brightness
WORKING - sleep/wake, restart, shutdown
WORKING - battery stats
WORKING - Apple App Store
NEED TO GET WORKING - Wacom Tablet Input (I'm not really interested in this)
NOT WORKING - Wireless Internet

Hacked BIOS for the x61 tablet can be found in my first post of this thread. After the hacked BIOS has been installed, it removes the wifi module whitelist in the BIOS. AFTER you have installed the hacked BIOS, you can then install a Dell DW 1390 in the MiniPCIE slot. There are tons of these wifi cards on ebay, going for as little as $2.72 with free shipping!!!!!!11111ONEONE111

[Bense]

The rosewill miniN1 wifi adapter works with driver downloaded from the rosewill website!