Lenovo Thinkcentre/ThinkStation Tiny (Project TinyMiniMicro) Reference Thread

[harblhat]

Thanks to everyone's contributions in this thread. I recently bought an old m720q and installed the 01AJ940 riser with a Mellanox MCX312A (IBM OEM part) dual port 10GB NIC to use as an opnsense router. So far so good and no real hiccups other than discovering the NIC was an IBM and firmware wasn't easily flashed to OEM, so I left it. However opnsense recognized it with the standard driver set so no biggie. NIC low profile bracket didn't fit, but a bit of bending solved that and it's stable enough.

 

[evil_santa]

Bifurcation mod on ThinkStation p330 with switch to activate or deactivate it.
Based on the Great work from @badger707

GitHub - badger707/m920q-pcie-bifurcation: Lenovo M920Q PCIe x8 bifuration to x4x4

Lenovo M920Q PCIe x8 bifuration to x4x4. Contribute to badger707/m920q-pcie-bifurcation development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

Also little spoiler to p350, 3rd NVMe slot works after soldering.

 

[Carts]

I’m having trouble finding the right part number for the m90q gen4 x16 riser. The sticky at the beginning of this thread only gives the gen3 part number. Does anyone know what it is? My googlefu is coming up empty.

 

[jackfrost]

I’m having trouble finding the right part number for the m90q gen4 x16 riser. The sticky at the beginning of this thread only gives the gen3 part number. Does anyone know what it is? My googlefu is coming up empty.

Same risers will work in gen3 and gen4... you can always check the lenovo site to check, eg: https://pcsupport.lenovo.com/us/en/...ntre-m90q-gen-4/12eh/parts/display/compatible

You can also use the lenovo parts site, for example: https://support.lenovo.com/us/en/parts-lookup?partid=5C50W00909 or https://support.lenovo.com/us/en/parts-lookup?partid=5C50W00910

It's a little less useful because it doesn't always list full compatibility (eg the 5C50W00909 link lists m90q gen 5 as compatible, but nothing previous, even though the support site lists it as compatible for the gen3 lol) but it also sometimes shows compatible alternatives, like 5C50W00933 being a compatible substitute for 5C50W00910.

 

[nded]

So I purchased a M90q Gen 3, AMD RX6400 low profile + 5C50W00933 riser hoping to make a small Bazzite gaming machine but I'm not able to get a video signal out of the GPU. While checking to see if a BIOS update would help I discovered my serial number indicates my particular M90q is a "Type 11U6" which according to the parts list appears to only support the 5C50W00909 riser. Tested the two risers with the serial port card that came with the computer and that appears to be the case: Windows detects it with the 5C50W00909 riser but not with the 5C50W00933. Am I just out of luck?

 

[jackfrost]

So I purchased a M90q Gen 3, AMD RX6400 low profile + 5C50W00933 riser hoping to make a small Bazzite gaming machine but I'm not able to get a video signal out of the GPU. While checking to see if a BIOS update would help I discovered my serial number indicates my particular M90q is a "Type 11U6" which according to the parts list appears to only support the 5C50W00909 riser. Tested the two risers with the serial port card that came with the computer and that appears to be the case: Windows detects it with the 5C50W00909 riser but not with the 5C50W00933. Am I just out of luck?

Have you tried the solution listed in this post?

 

[nickkor]

Hey. What fans with heatsink can fit for thincentre m75 gen2? Can models from intel versions of m70, m80, m90 or others fit?

 

[CantankerousRex]

So I purchased a M90q Gen 3, AMD RX6400 low profile + 5C50W00933 riser hoping to make a small Bazzite gaming machine but I'm not able to get a video signal out of the GPU. While checking to see if a BIOS update would help I discovered my serial number indicates my particular M90q is a "Type 11U6" which according to the parts list appears to only support the 5C50W00909 riser. Tested the two risers with the serial port card that came with the computer and that appears to be the case: Windows detects it with the 5C50W00909 riser but not with the 5C50W00933. Am I just out of luck?

Not exactly; the 11U6 type is only sold with the 909 riser, but should be compatible with both the 909 and 933. The issue has more to do with the riser's compatibility with the GPU.

Tagging @livingtiny since this seems relevant to some discussion from a few weeks ago, and might be helpful with what you were working on:

I ran into a similar problem with AMD and Intel GPUs on the P360 (which to my knowledge is physically identical to the M90q Gen3. details in this comment).All of the Nvidia GPUs that I tried worked without issue. I'm not sure exactly what the difference is, however Jackfrost references a post that likely explains why. quoting for emphasis:

Have you tried the solution listed in this post?

Essentially, there's a sense pin that the 933 riser doesn't use, but there's a workaround involving jumping a pair of the riser pins to spoof it:

jumping the A1 and B31 pins (for x4 cards) or B48 (for x8 cards) on the i4 card did the trick and it got detected by the system as expected.

Don't know if this works for GPUs, but i'm likely going to give it a try in the next couple of days.


If it's any consolation, the RX6400 is only a 4x card, so there's no obvious advantage to using the 5C50W00933 beyond not having to make any modifications; I'm also not sure that most of the pins on the connector edge of the card actually do anything* - you could try the jumper technique, but you might also be able to grind out a slot in the rear wall of the 5C50W00909:


*Basis for this theory is that the 6400W actually has no pins past the first four lanes, and I'm like 80% sure that there aren't any major differences between the RX6400 and the W6400.

There may be some differences between the cards so I'm not going to promise that it'll work for the rx6400. I don't have a 5C50W00909 riser, otherwise I'd just test this myself. If you do decide to cut a hole in the 909 riser, let me know if the card works afterwards; I have P360 that I'd bought with the same intended purpose (Bazzite) but i'm currently shackled to windows because Nvidia Reasons.

Hey. What fans with heatsink can fit for thincentre m75 gen2? Can models from intel versions of m70, m80, m90 or others fit?

The best way to know this is to check the Lenovo Parts Lookup page for your model, and compare it to parts from another model. At least in theory, as long as the donor model uses the same socket as the recipient machine, you'll be fine. The specific model number for the fan will be listed for each part entry under the 'fan' tab, alongside which 'Tiny#' generation, or model it is designed for. In this example, Tiny8, and the P360, but comparing this model to the M90q Gen3 shows some overlap in model numbers, indicating that all three of the fan assemblies are compatible with either model:

P360:


M90q Gen3:

 

[Squoblat]

Apologies if this has been answered, but the search function hasn't given me anything conclusive - would anyone happen to know if any of the tiny models support resizable bar? I've built a Frankenstein M920 out of various parts, I'm now mulling over building a second Tiny for Jellyfin and was going to go down the route of an Intel A380 running the A310 cooler (both Sparkle units). I already have a B580 in a bigger machine and they are utterly useless without ReBar, so before I take the plunge on another Tiny - has anyone managed this? Best I can find is a bit of conjecture around some soldering solving the problem.

 

[WarlockSyno]

Apologies if this has been answered, but the search function hasn't given me anything conclusive - would anyone happen to know if any of the tiny models support resizable bar? I've built a Frankenstein M920 out of various parts, I'm now mulling over building a second Tiny for Jellyfin and was going to go down the route of an Intel A380 running the A310 cooler (both Sparkle units). I already have a B580 in a bigger machine and they are utterly useless without ReBar, so before I take the plunge on another Tiny - has anyone managed this? Best I can find is a bit of conjecture around some soldering solving the problem.

I modded the BIOS of a similar generation P310

[HELP] Enabling 4G Decoding/Resizable BAR on Lenovo P310

Okay, with the help of @68k-dude, I was able to flash the BIOS to use 4G decoding. Here’s the sauce. After LOTS of trial and error we tried something similar to this post, where we took the BIOS section from the P320 BIOS ROM that you can download from Lenovo and replaced the entire BIOS...

winraid.level1techs.com

[Help] Enabling Above 4G Decode on Lenovo P330

It’s been over a year since I flashed my P310, so my memory is super spotty on this. I really should documented what I did better, but looking through my downloads from around then it looks like I either used UEFITool_0.21.5 or UEFITool_0.28.0 - I think the NE one would break stuff no matter...

winraid.level1techs.com

So, I guess it might be possible. If the P series of Tinys have it in their BIOS, it would be pretty easy.

 

[evil_santa]

Apologies if this has been answered, but the search function hasn't given me anything conclusive - would anyone happen to know if any of the tiny models support resizable bar? I've built a Frankenstein M920 out of various parts, I'm now mulling over building a second Tiny for Jellyfin and was going to go down the route of an Intel A380 running the A310 cooler (both Sparkle units). I already have a B580 in a bigger machine and they are utterly useless without ReBar, so before I take the plunge on another Tiny - has anyone managed this? Best I can find is a bit of conjecture around some soldering solving the problem.

No it's only possible trough a bios mod.

 

[Squoblat]

Thanks for the responses - just to clarify the question, I'm in the market for any tiny that comes with ReBar as standard - whether that's a P or an M, I'm not looking (necessarily) to modify the M920q to have ReBar.

 

[tinynodes]

Hmm I’m kinda stuck.
I picked up some m920x systems and flashed to latest bios.
I’ve ordered a few different x8 & x16 risers (eBay 01AJ940) but I can’t get any network cards to be detected in these systems.
I’ve tried Intel & Mellanox cards that work in my servers & I’ve attempted the b48 pin mod with no results.
I’m about to start downgrading bios as a last resort, the onboard diag utility also reports no card. I’m concerned there is a vendor whitelist
Anyone else encountered this with m920x systems?

 

[WarlockSyno]

Hmm I’m kinda stuck.
I picked up some m920x systems and flashed to latest bios.
I’ve ordered a few different x8 & x16 risers (eBay 01AJ940) but I can’t get any network cards to be detected in these systems.
I’ve tried Intel & Mellanox cards that work in my servers & I’ve attempted the b48 pin mod with no results.
I’m about to start downgrading bios as a last resort, the onboard diag utility also reports no card. I’m concerned there is a vendor whitelist
Anyone else encountered this with m920x systems?

Does dmesg in Linux report any hardware issues? It's probably highly unlikely that every system has this issue, but that is strange. I haven't seen this behavior with any Lenovo Tiny's I've seen.

 

[Parallax]

An update on Aquantia (Marvell, nowadays) 10Gb NICs - I bought a Trendnet TEG-10GECSFP card (single port SFP+, with an RJ45 version available). The card itself is tiny and although I've not pushed it hard yet and it's early days, it seems to work fine in Ubuntu anyway. I replaced ConnectX-4s and my P350 Tinys' internal temperatures went down from 80C to 60C, so it's a pretty dramatic improvement.

Although it's really more of a consumer grade chipset I have seen Aquantia-based single port cards that have space for a second port screened out on the board, so I'd love to know if anyone has been able to find such a thing?

By the way I was unable to get an Intel x710-DA2 to work (or even POST) in the P350 Tiny, and I found someone else with the same problem in the Lenovo forums. So please note and I'll try to find time to update the main post.

 

[joeribl]

An update on Aquantia (Marvell, nowadays) 10Gb NICs - I bought a Trendnet TEG-10GECSFP card (single port SFP+, with an RJ45 version available). The card itself is tiny and although I've not pushed it hard yet and it's early days, it seems to work fine in Ubuntu anyway. I replaced ConnectX-4s and my P350 Tinys' internal temperatures went down from 80C to 60C, so it's a pretty dramatic improvement.

Although it's really more of a consumer grade chipset I have seen Aquantia-based single port cards that have space for a second port screened out on the board, so I'd love to know if anyone has been able to find such a thing?

By the way I was unable to get an Intel x710-DA2 to work (or even POST) in the P350 Tiny, and I found someone else with the same problem in the Lenovo forums. So please note and I'll try to find time to update the main post.

The Trendnet Is a AQC100 card right?

 

[Parallax]

The Trendnet Is a AQC100 card right?

Yep!

 

[Rundell]

Just wanted to share my build information:

ThinkCentre M920x
Intel Core i7-8700T Processor
64GB (2x32GB) DDR4 3200MHz Memory
(2) 4TB PCIe NVMe M.2 SSD
256GB SATA SSD
Tinyriser (from WifiCable)
AMD Radeon RX 560
Dual 2.5 Gigabit M.2 M+B Key Ethernet
M.2 Wifi Key A+E to Apple Wifi card Adapter
Apple BCM94360CS2 Wifi/Bluetooth card

This machine runs Proxmox where I run several services such as NAS, Pi-Hole, virtual machines, and a few custom scripts. It also runs Mac OS Ventura and uses passthrough with the Radeon video card and Apple card. This enables airplay and other mac services on my tv and network.

I just recently installed the Dual gigabit ethernet and plan to setup pfSense.

 

[tinynodes]

Does dmesg in Linux report any hardware issues? It's probably highly unlikely that every system has this issue, but that is strange. I haven't seen this behavior with any Lenovo Tiny's I've seen.

nothing in dmesg, journalctl shows no ixgbe or Mellanox device, nothing.
You guys are booting uefi right?

 

[WarlockSyno]

nothing in dmesg, journalctl shows no ixgbe or Mellanox device, nothing.
You guys are booting uefi right?

Try taping off pins 5 and 6 on the network cards. Those are sometimes used for the SMBus.