Author: Vivi The Mage
Categories
Dean Martin and Goldie Hawn
This was a very simple mod, did not require anything, other then 4 new/shorter screws to replace the ones that were longer on the M4, and a bit of electrical tape. Without hte electrical tape, the drive was undetected, it was shorting out by touching the metal top…so there is a reason to the spacer :).
So far battery life has improved over the 320gb 7200rpm drive the x220 came with. I’d say a good 30 minutes over a usage. The battery still needs a bit of burn in though.
[zp src=”m4-mod1.JPG” album=”blog/M4-SSD-Mod/” width=”600″]
EDIT : Thanks to mark for commenting, you can get these screws :
“The screws are M2X3MM part #10124 from laptopscrews.com.”
I recently purchased an awesome little laptop…the Lenovo x220.
Specs :
Intel Core i7-2620M Processor (3.4GHz, 3MB L3, 1333MHz FSB) w/ USB3
Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit
12.5″ Premium (IPS) HD (1366×768) LED Backlit Display, Mobile Broadband Ready, 2×2 Antenna
Intel® HD Graphics 3000
4 GB PC3-10600 DDR3 SDRAM 1333MHz SODIMM Memory (1 DIMM)
250 GB Hard Disk Drive, 5400rpm
ThinkPad Battery 29++ (9 cell)
Intel Centrino Advanced-N 6205 (2×2 AGN)
I decided I wanted to get an SSD, and opted for the Crucial M4 series. It required a little tweaking to get into the x220. I had to unscrew the middle spacer, and it slide right in.
Benchmarks in IDE mode:
[zp src=”m4-crystal.png” album=”blog/CrucialM4/” width=”600″]
Benchmarks in AHCI mode:
[zp src=”m4-crystal-ahci.png” album=”blog/CrucialM4/” width=”600″]
These aren’t bad numbers at all, considering the manufacturer rates them at :
Sequential Access - Read
Up to 415 MB/s (SATA 6Gb/s)
Sequential Access - Write
Up to 175 MB/s (SATA 6Gb/s)
What I really like about this drive is the low power consumption, SATA 6/Gbp/s, as well as the 40,000 IOPS. I still think SSD’s are the number one upgrade for any PC (as long as they are SATA 3+ capable). They just make the system that much faster.
I recently water cooled my XFX 6950 2gb reference cards. The specific model I am testing is (XFX HD-695A-CNFC AMD Radeon HD 6950 2G). I put on some XSPC water blocks, as with air and unlocked bios, they were hitting 95C + on load, which was worrying me.
hardware / test setup :
CPU : i5 2500k (also water cooled with an HK Supreme HF)
Motherboard : Asus P8P67 PRO
Case : Corsair 600T
PSU : Corsair HX1000
Memory : 4x4GB G.Skill DDR3 1600
GPU : 2x Reference 2GB XFX 6950’s shader unlocked and oc’d
Hdd : OCZ Solid 2 120GB
You can view the rest of the rig here :
http://vivithemage.com/2011/04/water-cooling-a-corsair-600t-case-i5-2500k-2×6950/
The load temp will be running OCCT v3.1.0 for about 15 minutes.
Benchmarks – shader unlock bios only – 800/1250
idle – 38C (GPU1) 40C(GPU2)
load – 44C(GPU1) 46C(GPU2)
average fps – 635
Benchmarks – shader unlock bios and OC – 840/1325
load – 45C (GPU1) 47C(GPU2)
average fps – 650
Benchmarks – shader unlock bios and OC – 900/1400
load – 46C (GPU1) 49C(GPU2)
average fps – 675
Benchmarks – shader unlock bios and OC – 1000/1500
BSOD
If you want me to test some games, let me know. I can always switch the BIOS back to stock as well.
We run Landesk, using the HII (Hardware Independent Imaging), which is run within a WinPE environment. I ran into issues where Windows 7 would not auto activate, which was causing issues, as some of the techs were forgetting to activate windows 7. We have a lot of internet restricted users, so once logged in as that use, they would not be able to get activated themselves. What I found was very simple.
The fix :
On your windows 7 image, browse out to : C:\Windows\Setup\Scripts\ and create a file called SetupComplete.cmd. In that file, you want to put in :
cscript C:\Windows\System32\Slmgr.vbs /ipk xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx
cscript C:\Windows\System32\Slmgr.vbs /ato
You will want to put your CD Key in the area where x’s are. Now sysprep, and roll out a new build!
UPDATE POST/BENCHMARKS CAN BE FOUND HERE :
I decided to run a test on the similarly looking USB devices from Corsair. Test rig :
Asus P8P67 PRO
i5 2500k
16gb ddr3
Corsair 600T case
Test devices :
Corsair Flash Voyager 16GB USB 3 (CMFVY3-16GB)
Corsair Flash Voyager 1GB USB 2 (CMFUSB2.0-1GB)
At first glance, you notice the USB 3 is a little bigger, almost 35% larger then the original USB 2.
[zp src=”corsair voyager.JPG” album=”blog/corsair usb3/” width=”600″]
The first test is USB 2 running off the USB 3 front panel, with 1GB USB 2 Flash Voyager.
[zp src=”usb2-front.png” album=”blog/corsair usb3/” width=”600″]
Second is USB 3 running off USB 3 front panel, with 16GB USB 3 Flash Voyager.
[zp src=”usb3-front.png” album=”blog/corsair usb3/” width=”600″]
The third test is USB 2 running off USB 3 rear panel (on the motherboard), with 1GB USB 2 Flash Voyager.
[zp src=”usb2-rear.png” album=”blog/corsair usb3/” width=”600″]
The fourth test is USB 3 running off USB 3 rear panel (on the motherboard)l, with 16GB USB 3 Flash Voyager.
[zp src=”usb3-rear.png” album=”blog/corsair usb3/” width=”600″]
Those are some very solid numbers coming from USB 3. I was expecting to see in the 100MB/s, but solid 68MB/s is pretty good as well. It was good to see zero difference between my rear, onboard USB 3 as the front panel USB 3 though.
*UPDATED with write tests
USB 2 on the front panel USB3 slot :
[zp src=”usb2-atto.png” album=”blog/corsair usb3/” width=”600″]
USB 3 on the front panel USB3 slot :
[zp src=”usb3-atto.png” album=”blog/corsair usb3/” width=”600″]
USB3 on front panel USB2 slot :
[zp src=”usb3 on usb2-read.png” album=”blog/corsair usb3/” width=”600″]
[zp src=”usb3 on usb2-bench32.png” album=”blog/corsair usb3/” width=”600″]
If you want some other tests run, let me know, I am more then happy to accommodate :).