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T60 Motherboard Swap

T60/T61 Series
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EasyMac308
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Posts: 100
Joined: Fri May 11, 2012 5:20 pm
Location: Kent, WA

T60 Motherboard Swap

#1 Post by EasyMac308 » Tue May 15, 2012 6:32 pm

I've been reading a lot about the various Frankenpads out there, and I'm considering throwing my hat into the ring. The motherboard selection is what throws me.

My current personal rig is a 4:3 T60 (1951-43U, give or take). I painstakingly parted this thing together on a shoestring, and it shows (it's pretty rough...). Being broke is the name of the game, though, so it is what it is.

I currently use this machine in a dual boot configuration, Ubuntu Lucid on HDD0 and Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard x64 on HDD1. I use the Windows Server environment for running a VM lab environment with Hyper-V. It runs great until I get more than two VMs going, and by the time I hit four I'm hurting.

My current bottleneck is, of course, the RAM. Therefore, I'm looking at doing the T61 upgrade. Like I said, I'm broke, so everything has to be as cheap as possible.

Can one of the experts tell me which part number (or numbers) I should be searching for? I want to keep everything else, including the CPU; I just need the board. I'm willing to lose the PCMCIA slots if necessary and I don't mind busting out the Dremel or doing some soldering to make it work. For the right price, I'll strongly consider a board that needs work or has a fault I can overlook (broken USB port? Onboard LAN not working? I'd even consider something that won't charge the battery).

tl;dr: Need recommendations for a cheap T61 4:3 board for a T60 swap.
EasyMac308
MCITP: EDA, MCSE NT, MCSE 2000, A+
Work: Thinkpad T410 / i5-650 / 8GB / 500GB / Win7 Ent x64
Personal: T60 (4:3) / T7200 / 4GB / 500GB / Ubuntu 12.04 <scrap built>
Retired: 570E, T20, T21, T23, T30, T40, T42, T43

ajkula66
SuperUserGeorge
SuperUserGeorge
Posts: 17303
Joined: Sun Feb 25, 2007 11:28 am
Location: Belgrade, Serbia

Re: T60 Motherboard Swap

#2 Post by ajkula66 » Tue May 15, 2012 7:09 pm

Good luck with that...

Boards from 4:3 T61s are selling at premium prices, since they are the ones that FrankenPad IPS units are based on...
...Knowledge is a deadly friend when no one sets the rules...(King Crimson)

Cheers,

George (your grouchy retired FlexView farmer)

One FlexView to rule them all: A31p

Abused daily: T520, X200s


PMs requesting personal tech support will be ignored.

EasyMac308
Freshman Member
Posts: 100
Joined: Fri May 11, 2012 5:20 pm
Location: Kent, WA

Re: T60 Motherboard Swap

#3 Post by EasyMac308 » Tue May 15, 2012 11:33 pm

Ugh. I have access to a stripped T61 with a good motherboard, but it's a widescreen... Wish they would have used the same motherboard across the line. I'm not sure how interested I am in finding an LCD and the miscellaneous other parts it's missing. Guess I'll have to put my scrounger hat on.
EasyMac308
MCITP: EDA, MCSE NT, MCSE 2000, A+
Work: Thinkpad T410 / i5-650 / 8GB / 500GB / Win7 Ent x64
Personal: T60 (4:3) / T7200 / 4GB / 500GB / Ubuntu 12.04 <scrap built>
Retired: 570E, T20, T21, T23, T30, T40, T42, T43

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