Thinkpads Forum

Hey everyone, first of all Merry Christmas! I've been reading for the past month for any help I needed for the Lenovo x60 I just got, and you guys are extremely helpful, and I appreciate your support! I just got the Broadcom Crystal HD card (the newest model) for Christmas, and placed in what i believe is my WWAN slot (I took out a Sierra wireless card when I put the Crystal HD card). I downloaded the drivers, but unfortunately, the setup says that it can't find the card. I really wanted to use the card to help with game emulator performance, is there anything I need to do to make the setup see the card? Oh and my model number is 6363AE9. Thanks guys!

Not sure but maybe you need a whitelisted BIOS, as there is a list of devices that the BIOS will allow to run in the Mini PCI slot...

Sorry don't have a link on hand, but think you should be able to google it.

Cheers.

Thank you loyukfai! I have researched modded bioses for a while and found out that Zender's bios is unavailable, and it seems that it is the only bios that can be whitelisted. So I can't use it until I hopefully find some link to Zender's bios.

Try one of these (matching your TYPE): http://forums.mydigitallife.info/thread ... #post90337

Thank you for the Link! Unfortunately, the whitelist is not removed on the bios they had for my x60 tablet

Are you sure? Because I flashed the same BIOS and there is no whitelist anymore.

I doubt that this is a BIOS problem, the whitelists have definitely been removed.
However, your card is rather exotic, and may not have the proper drivers installed.
Check this out: http://www.broadcom.com/support/crystal_hd/

Thanks guys for letting me know that the whitelist is removed, saved me a lot of aggravation of stupidly searching for another one I did download those drivers and once setup starts the, it says it was not able to detect the card. I think its because under device manager it has the card currently listed as "Ricoh R/RL/5C476(II) or Compatible Cardbus Controller". Don't know how to go about this but I will keep you posted!

Switched the slot it was in, and its detected and working! The wifi card does not work now, but I am purchasing a mini usb adapter for wireless. Thanks so much guys! Now I'm off to figure out how hard it would be to get game emulators to support it.

Game emulators work great I used a program called GameGain to optimize my X60T tablet, it runs really smooth I found mini wirless N cards on sale for eBay for really cheap I am thinking of getting one of those and taking out the wireless card off mine.

Has anyone tried this card in the X61/X61T ? Does it help?
Also, I guess you have to get rid of the WiFi card to put it in? right?

Yes, the broadcom card needs to be placed in the first slot to work. unfortunately, my x60 gets a terrible connection with many usb wifi adapters, so i may have to remove my broadcom to put back my wifi card. I there anyway possible that i can use my wifi card in the second slot?

Read this: http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=30&t=103458

Try a PCMCIA card rather than a miniUSB card - specifically a 3Com XJack a/g PCMCIA card.

I had an X61 and X60 tablet and found that this worked really well. The card slides into the laptop when not in use and the in/out slide action also turns it off.

They are really cheap on eBay right now.

RealBlackStuff wrote:Read this: http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=30&t=103458

Just saw your link where you posted him to the same thread I was thinking of...

crashnburn wrote:Has anyone tried this card in the X61/X61T ? Does it help?
Also, I guess you have to get rid of the WiFi card to put it in? right?

As per a thread already mentioned, the x60 doesn't actually have two true mini pcie ports (the second slot is only usb), so it loses the wireless card. The x61/t SHOULD work with both cards, where its second port really is a mini pcie port. I'm now thinking about adding one of these cards, just to see if they're all they're hyped up to be.

crashnburn wrote:Has anyone tried this card in the X61/X61T ? Does it help?
Also, I guess you have to get rid of the WiFi card to put it in? right?

truk wrote:As per a thread already mentioned, the x60 doesn't actually have two true mini pcie ports (the second slot is only usb), so it loses the wireless card. The x61/t SHOULD work with both cards, where its second port really is a mini pcie port. I'm now thinking about adding one of these cards, just to see if they're all they're hyped up to be.

Both are interesting threads.

I am wondering if these x61 PCIe's can be "soldered" or "hardware connected" to the following:
- Some kind of SSDs? PCI-e SSD Maybe? (Which as mentioned by someone are hard to find.. and probably expensive)
- Exposing USB 3.0 & eSATA connections to outside storage?

Thanks again guys, ill try a pcmia card. The cards you listed above are much more expensive in the US, so I was gonna look for a wireless n pcmia card, but i stumbled upon some forums that stated that some thinkpads did not like newer pcmia cards (32-bit) can anyone varify this?

crashnburn wrote: I am wondering if these x61 PCIe's can be "soldered" or "hardware connected" to the following:
- Some kind of SSDs? PCI-e SSD Maybe? (Which as mentioned by someone are hard to find.. and probably expensive)
- Exposing USB 3.0 & eSATA connections to outside storage?

I believe the only true mini PCIe SSD (i.e. not mSATA, or other arrangements of SATA/PATA signal) is the Super Talent CoreStore MV, and people have reported less-than-steller compatibility with laptops.
However, there are SATA controllers and USB3 cards in mini PCIe form factor. It might be possible to use them for internal/external connections provided you can make room/find place for external connectors.

crashnburn wrote: I am wondering if these x61 PCIe's can be "soldered" or "hardware connected" to the following:
- Some kind of SSDs? PCI-e SSD Maybe? (Which as mentioned by someone are hard to find.. and probably expensive)
- Exposing USB 3.0 & eSATA connections to outside storage?

twistero wrote:I believe the only true mini PCIe SSD (i.e. not mSATA, or other arrangements of SATA/PATA signal) is the Super Talent CoreStore MV, and people have reported less-than-steller compatibility with laptops.
However, there are SATA controllers and USB3 cards in mini PCIe form factor. It might be possible to use them for internal/external connections provided you can make room/find place for external connectors.

What kind of soldering/balling i.e. basically CONNECTING & JOINING .. equipment, bonding agent (solder) and skill would this kind of job need?

crashnburn wrote: What kind of soldering/balling i.e. basically CONNECTING & JOINING .. equipment, bonding agent (solder) and skill would this kind of job need?

The way I see it, it's less about specific skills and more about the hacking spirit, so to say.
These cards are not designed to be used in a laptop, and certainly not for an external connection. You're using them in a way not intended. As far as I can see you'll have to follow roughly these steps:

1. Make sure the card fits under the palm rest. This may involve removing / moving / replacing parts that are too tall;
2. Route cables inside the chassis so it does not obstruct anything;
3. Make a new opening on the chassis, or reuse an old opening, to bring the connection outside.