Lenovo Thinkcentre/ThinkStation Tiny (Project TinyMiniMicro) Reference Thread

[evil_santa]

good news
my Chinese friend was able to get all the necessary files.
don't have much time rn to check the files.

The following text is translated from Chinese

Accessories BOM
2.5四盘NAS-BOM表2023-3-24

NAS cooling PCB kit
https://item.taobao.com/item.htm?ft=t&id=714266497483

The current test can perfectly use the M3600c cover
M700 M900
The remaining M920 M910 P330 P360 series tests cannot be used

m93 m73 can barely use the top cover of M3600c by changing the buckle and changing some details. Not recommended

The link has all necessary files zipped (bom, stl for printing the HDD cage)
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1x555sSJbA_cINHOewvWo4aOTOspDMGkT/view?usp=sharing


was also able to share idelfish links
You can order the stuff with superbuy (my personal best experience)
click (affiliate link)

click
click

 

[unmesh]

So it is USD116 for the "kit" with everything other than the M900 and the hard drives?

 

[evil_santa]

So it is USD116 for the "kit" with everything other than the M900 and the hard drives?

If I understand the description (translated it) right it's the m900 with complete mod and without drive's.

 

[Parallax]

There's an M910x option which has a lot more customisation available :

 

[evil_santa]

There's an M910x option which has a lot more customisation available :
View attachment 29607

Yes I saw this, it's awesome

 

[unmesh]

I need to run these by one of my colleagues who understands Mandarin

Thanks

 

[Parallax]

My wife is Chinese.

 

[unmesh]

For the M910x, what do the orange and yellow boxes in the flowchart represent?

How are the GPU or NIC or HBA offerings mapped to the expansion slots which I understand to be the PCIe riser, WiFi and M.2 NVMe slots?

 

[Parallax]

My wife is not technical, so we did our best together.

The orange is internal expansion, the yellow is basically ports available - DP, PCIe slot, the i219 it references I think is just the standard onboard NIC.

 

[unmesh]

i219 is indeed the onboard NIC

 

[Parallax]

The purple is essentally customisations available - the first two options can be combined with all the options (except the first) in the blue section above. The third option can only be combined with the first blue box. The fourth option is still under development.

The red CPU section is interesting - you can have vPro support (first box) + gen 6/7 CPUs. Then you can lose vPro but gain what seems to be access to gen 6-10 CPUs (!). Then they have a list of the CPUs they can supply it with.

 

[Parallax]

The blue NIC options are interesting, there's a mix of copper and fibre options.

The first two boxes are single 2.5G and then dual 2.5G, both with space for another 2.5" drive (up to 15mm thick).

 

[joeribl]

A Google translation

 

[AWBbox]

Unrelated to the ongoing NAS mod discussion, I wanted to share my experience with adding PCI-E connected RS232 for NTP PPS input.

USB bus is no good for PPS due to timing issues and having a way to have a serial connection directly via PCI-E is a must. Unlike the COM ports P tiny models before it, the P360 Tiny is restricted to use of the "JBTB" headers which sit directly below the PCI-E slot at the back of the board. The "DCOM2" header name is misleading, it is for Thunderbolt and not for COM/RS232. FRU 04X2733 will NOT work on this header, your computer will not boot.

I'd half hoped I could use one of the RS232 JBTB cards with the DB9 connector de-soldered whilst having my PCI-E NIC installed but there is simply no way, even the height of the JBTB card is too much. Photo 7 shows one potential option, the use of an M.2 key A+E to M.2 key M riser. With the Bluetooth antenna removed, the front bezel has enough room that you could fit a 2240 length card in this space, even on a riser! Unfortunately, RS232, >=2240, M.2, non-USB chipset cards are hard to come by...

I ended up going for this product on AliExpress, a full 2280 length 4x RS232 card based on the ASIX AX99100 chipset, natively supported by BSD. I knew full well that this wouldn't fit in the second M.2 2280 slot on the underside of the case due to the JST-style connectors, which you can see on Photo 8 will not allow the rear of the case to be fitted, let alone cables.

So... why not de-solder them and attach my own ribbon cable (Photo 9)? I only need 4 pins of RS232 off one header for PPS input after all (GND, TXD, RXD, DCD). I don't have the best soldering skills and managed to accidentally remove some of the tracks on the board, but none of the ones I needed so who cares. Photo 10 shows the finished article, not too bad, and the ribbon cable is easily routable to the top side.

As for connectivity outside of the case, I could have just run the ribbon cable out of the back somewhere and soldered a DB9 connector on the end, but that wouldn't look very pretty. Enter Lemo connectors! I have a lot of love for Lemo, the build quality, flexibility and quality of design is undeniable. I picked the smallest 4 pole connectors I could find, and man are they small. Soldering them was a pain but I'm pleased with the result. The plug was fitted on the end of an existing serial cable (Photo 11) and the socket fits in the WiFi antenna hole with only minimal modification to increase its size. The result is seen in Photo 12 which includes a modified bracket for the I350-T4 (FRU 5M10U50350) for the NIC, resulting in a clean and professional finish.

Lastly I have included a wiring diagram for my PPS/RS232/GPS cabling, in case anyone else wants to try something similar in future.

 

[unmesh]

View attachment 29617
A Google translation

Thanks for doing the translation.

The M900 NAS might have enough oomph to be a Synology NAS used only for file storage though the M910x gives more headroom. I'm a little worried about how hot the hard drives will get though.

And I can see using a dual 2.5G Tiny (without the add-on hard drive housing) as a pfSense box and the M2 dual 2.5G NIC gives me some ideas as to how to do that with one of my existing TMMs.

 

[sportal]

So I got VMware ESXi 8.0.1 running on the M90q Gen2 ok, with a SuperMicro AOC-STGN-I2S 10GbE card.

Two caveats on ESXi 8 on the M90q Gen2.

1. First is if you are accessing the Intel AMT remote KVM while the system is booting, the onboard NIC will get stuck at 10 Mbps. If you disconnect the Intel AMT KVM, and let it boot ESXi and then connect the Intel AMT KVM, it works fine.
2. Second issue was enabling secure boot. I had to manually import the VMware Secure Boot certificate into the Lenovo BIOS to get it to boot properly.

I did some stress testing on it running the CPU at 100% with some test VMs, and no issues. When I went to put some real VMs with load on the system, I got two ESXi Purple Screens of Death, images attached. I have updated the system to the latest Lenovo firmware.

Anyone seen behavior like this, or any suggestions?

 

[AWBbox]

So I got VMware ESXi 8.0.1 running on the M90q Gen2 ok, with a SuperMicro AOC-STGN-I2S 10GbE card.

Two caveats on ESXi 8 on the M90q Gen2.

1. First is if you are accessing the Intel AMT remote KVM while the system is booting, the onboard NIC will get stuck at 10 Mbps. If you disconnect the Intel AMT KVM, and let it boot ESXi and then connect the Intel AMT KVM, it works fine.
2. Second issue was enabling secure boot. I had to manually import the VMware Secure Boot certificate into the Lenovo BIOS to get it to boot properly.

I did some stress testing on it running the CPU at 100% with some test VMs, and no issues. When I went to put some real VMs with load on the system, I got two ESXi Purple Screens of Death, images attached. I have updated the system to the latest Lenovo firmware.

Anyone seen behavior like this, or any suggestions?

Reference to TcpIpFlowCleaner in the second screenshot makes me think to focus on the AOC-STGN-I2S NIC. Is that running the latest firmware? You'll need to get that directly from SuperMicro, you mustn't use the Intel NVM update tool. Running the latest firmware will allow you to use much newer drivers in ESXi too. Worth a go maybe?

 

[sportal]

Reference to TcpIpFlowCleaner in the second screenshot makes me think to focus on the AOC-STGN-I2S NIC. Is that running the latest firmware? You'll need to get that directly from SuperMicro, you mustn't use the Intel NVM update tool. Running the latest firmware will allow you to use much newer drivers in ESXi too. Worth a go maybe?

@AWBbox , Thanks for the reply. I'm only finding the Networking Driver CDs, and this FAQ that says to use the Intel BootUtil Utilities.
Any idea where to download directly from SuperMicro?

 

[AWBbox]

@AWBbox , Thanks for the reply. I'm only finding the Networking Driver CDs, and this FAQ that says to use the Intel BootUtil Utilities.
Any idea where to download directly from SuperMicro?

You need to approach their support department directly, via email is best and I have found their European team the most helpful by far. Message them at Support_Europe@supermicro.com and request the firmware package for the AOC-STGN-I2S and they'll send you a private link. The package contains instructions.

I did exactly this with my AOC-STGN-I4S just last week and it work perfectly, I would share the package but it is specifically for the AOC-STGN-I4S and shouldn't be installed on yours! Took my firmware on the X710 up to version 9.00 which is very recent.

 

[livmatus]

good news
my Chinese friend was able to get all the necessary files.
don't have much time rn to check the files.

The following text is translated from Chinese

Accessories BOM
2.5四盘NAS-BOM表2023-3-24

NAS cooling PCB kit
https://item.taobao.com/item.htm?ft=t&id=714266497483

The current test can perfectly use the M3600c cover
M700 M900
The remaining M920 M910 P330 P360 series tests cannot be used

m93 m73 can barely use the top cover of M3600c by changing the buckle and changing some details. Not recommended

The link has all necessary files zipped (bom, stl for printing the HDD cage)
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1x555sSJbA_cINHOewvWo4aOTOspDMGkT/view?usp=sharing
View attachment 29614

was also able to share idelfish links
You can order the stuff with superbuy (my personal best experience)
click (affiliate link)

click
click

ngl if that $116 link is M900 + the whole case and mod I may fail to resist another temper purchase

would be a very nice addition to my "Think" collection and would make a nice NAS and homebridge server ...

the M720q with the RX 6400 would be "just" a Jellyfin server + KODI player + PS1 emulator ...

or maybe the M900 can take 8/9th gen CPU and also take the function of the Jellyfin server ... so the M720q won't have to be up and running the whole time