Lenovo M700/M900 BIOS mod to Coffee Lake CPUs

[mobilenvidia]

The BIOS mods are pretty well for any Computer/laptop with 8pin EEPROM in the end I suppose, be they small or large
I just happened to do it on a M700/M900 tiny at the time

Give the non T CPU a go and report back with how you get on
WIll be good to know for others doing the mod is it worth going to the dark (but noisy) side

But don't forget the 9500 will need the CPU Pads masked as well for mod to work

 

[kino0924]

The BIOS mods are pretty well for any Computer/laptop with 8pin EEPROM in the end I suppose, be they small or large
I just happened to do it on a M700/M900 tiny at the time

Give the non T CPU a go and report back with how you get on
WIll be good to know for others doing the mod is it worth going to the dark (but noisy) side

But don't forget the 9500 will need the CPU Pads masked as well for mod to work

I got this image from M710q/M910q thread in china forum
I believe this masking will work on M900

Will give an update once all the parts are arrive.

 

[EasyRhino]

So I have recently come into a M900 tower computer with a 6700 cpu.

Is it correct from all this complicated discussion that it WILL NOT support a 7700 kaby lake cpu out of the box, and I'd have to mod the bios?

(The person I will be gifting it to will not be willing to put up with that)

 

[mobilenvidia]

You are correct, and that persons loss

Got a 9100T in my M900 in the bedroom so Mrs can watch TV and watch her movies, been running flawlessly

 

[custom90gt]

(The person I will be gifting it to will not be willing to put up with that)

Really sounds like first world problems to me.

 

[EasyRhino]

Really sounds like first world problems to me.

lol, well realistically, I don't think I will be able to follow the instructions well enough to execute the bios mod without some programs, the person I am gifting it to will definitely not be able to do it herself, and she'll be just fine with the i7-6700 that's in there already.

 

[AnUrbanPenguin]

Good evening everyone.

I have been following this thread with some interest. I have an M910Q that I am considering modding to get an 8th or 9th gen CPU in, but the CPUs I am looking at are laptop ones from AliExpress which come with an adapter to LGA 1151. I believe someone else touched on this somewhere else in the thread.

The 2 specific CPUs I am looking at are:
- Coffe Lake 6c12t QNCT CPU
or
- Coffe Lake Refresh Xeon E-2276M 6c12t

The seller states that a couple of pins need to be shorted if using PCIE Bifurcation which shouldnt be nesscessary on the M910Q so I believe the adapter is setup to be plug and play with an LGA1151 socket despite it being more than 4 cores which usually needs pin mods.

Am I right in thinking that I would need to do the following to get this working?:
1. Read the BIOS from the EEPROM reader
2. Save a copy incase of reflash being needed
3. Run Coffee Time to add in the appropriate microcodes
4. Write the new bios back to the M910Q chip
5. Enjoy

If I were to go down this path, would it be possible to keep support for my current 6500T in the BIOS too or does that disappear? I know there is limited space in the BIOS for different microcodes and this machine will already have 6th and 7th gen being a 10 series board.

Thanks.

 

[neggles]

Am I right in thinking that I would need to do the following to get this working?:
1. Read the BIOS from the EEPROM reader
2. Save a copy incase of reflash being needed
3. Run Coffee Time to add in the appropriate microcodes
4. Write the new bios back to the M910Q chip
5. Enjoy

If I were to go down this path, would it be possible to keep support for my current 6500T in the BIOS too or does that disappear? I know there is limited space in the BIOS for different microcodes and this machine will already have 6th and 7th gen being a 10 series board.

Thanks.

I did almost exactly this today, but with an E-2286M rather than the E-2276M. Worked great - take M910Q, dump BIOS with SPI flash clip, feed into Coffee Time, push all the buttons, upgrade the UEFI GOP, add various microcode, end up with something like this:



Those microcodes will boot any Coffee Lake chip, as well as production Skylake and Kaby Lake chips - the i5-6500T booted just fine, and the E-2286M does too:



Long story short, yep, should work fine

I need to do the bios advanced menu unlock still, but, details.

 

[AnUrbanPenguin]

I did almost exactly this today, but with an E-2286M rather than the E-2276M. Worked great - take M910Q, dump BIOS with SPI flash clip, feed into Coffee Time, push all the buttons, upgrade the UEFI GOP, add various microcode, end up with something like this:

View attachment 25059

Those microcodes will boot any Coffee Lake chip, as well as production Skylake and Kaby Lake chips - the i5-6500T booted just fine, and the E-2286M does too:

View attachment 25060

Long story short, yep, should work fine

I need to do the bios advanced menu unlock still, but, details.

Thanks for taking the time to reply. Its good to know these 9th Gen mobile chips will work fine and do not need a pin mod!

How are you finding the temperatures and boost clocks with the 8 core CPU? How much power is it drawing under heavy workloads too?

 

[agapitox]

Hi,

I have a processor bought on aliexpress E-2286M and I had intended to mount it on a M710Q, but it seems that it is too much processor and does not end up going well.

What model of tiny is the most recommended for that processor and that I can modify the bios to make it work like a charm?

My intention is to use it as a desktop computer connected to a 32" 4k screen.


Thank you very much

 

[AnUrbanPenguin]

Hi,

I have a processor bought on aliexpress E-2286M and I had intended to mount it on a M710Q, but it seems that it is too much processor and does not end up going well.

What model of tiny is the most recommended for that processor and that I can modify the bios to make it work like a charm?

My intention is to use it as a desktop computer connected to a 32" 4k screen.


Thank you very much

What do you mean by "does not end up going well"? Does it get too hot? Consume too much power?

 

[RolloZ170]

What model of tiny is the most recommended for that processor and that I can modify the bios to make it work like a charm?

710q & 910q have only 2+1 VRM (one phase is not equipped) and are designed to drive 35W continous, little more for a short time.
720q & 920q have 3+1 VRM (one phase is not equipped) - much better because 8th and 9th gens 'T' SKUs have more cores.

 

[AnUrbanPenguin]

710q & 910q have only 2+1 VRM (one is missing) and are designed to drive 35W continous, little more for a short time.
720q & 920q have 3+1 VRM - much better because 8th and 9th gens 'T' SKUs have more cores.

The tiny version of the M910Q lists 65w CPUs in its compatible parts list on the lenovo website? Lenovo Parts
EDIT: Change commodity to processors at the top.

 

[AnUrbanPenguin]

The tiny version of the M910Q lists 65w CPUs in its compatible parts list on the lenovo website? Lenovo Parts
EDIT: Change commodity to processors at the top.

Turns out it doesnt filter it correctly and still shows parts for the bigger ones too. So that may be misleading!

 

[RolloZ170]

The tiny version of the M910Q lists 65w CPUs in its compatible parts list on the lenovo website?

they work with the issues i have described. have you still the 90W power adapter ? i mean to run a CPU which needs 65W at turbo with a 65W PSU is not the best idea.

 

[AnUrbanPenguin]

they work with the issues i have described. have you still the 90W power adapter ? i mean to run a CPU which needs 65W at turbo with a 65W PSU is not the best idea.

I have the 90w power brick. The AliExpress laptop CPUs are 45w so that should be fine. I ran an i3 6100 in the m910q for a while rated at 51w as I needed the higher clock speeds for some lightly threaded things. I guess the problem would be if the 45w CPUs boost above 45w.

 

[RolloZ170]

I guess the problem would be if the 45w CPUs boost above 45w.

there may be a BIOS block but the VRMs are not designed for that and one phase is missing. they are also not actively cooled.

 

[AnUrbanPenguin]

there may be a BIOS block but the VRMs are not designed for that and one phase is missing. they are also not actively cooled.

Hopefully Neggles above who has installed the 8 core CPU in an M910Q can provide some insight into wether there are any problems with cooling and what the boost power draw of the CPU is.

 

[agapitox]

What do you mean by "does not end up going well"? Does it get too hot? Consume too much power?

Exactly, it gets too hot and consumes too much. It even shuts down at full load.

 

[agapitox]

Yesterday after going through the different forum threads, I started searching on ebay and in a local buying and selling website (wallapop) in my country (Spain), I found a M910x at a good price.
This one supports 65W cpu's and the heatsink is copper and with two heatpipes.
I understand that I can modify the bios with Coffee Time and update the microcodes.