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Lenovo Thinkcentre/ThinkStation Tiny (Project TinyMiniMicro) Reference Thread

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sprucestream

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May 24, 2023
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Would a P360 Ultra with i7-12700T, T400, 16GB RAM for $650 be considered a good deal? Are these things going to plummet in price after a few financial cycles? Thanks
 

sprucestream

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May 24, 2023
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Also to contribute a bit more I was able to clear the supervisor password on an M90q Gen 2 using the vertical position jumper method provided for the M920x (I think positions 2-4 is provided on motherboard vs 1-2 which users reported?)
 

zer0sum

Well-Known Member
Mar 8, 2013
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Would a P360 Ultra with i7-12700T, T400, 16GB RAM for $650 be considered a good deal? Are these things going to plummet in price after a few financial cycles? Thanks
I think the M90q gen 2 with the 11th gen cpu's is the bang for buck champion right now as you can find them for sub $400 on Ebay if you're patient :D
 
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sprucestream

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May 24, 2023
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I think the M90q gen 2 with the 11th gen cpu's is the bang for buck champion right now as you can find them for sub $400 on Ebay if you're patient :D
Ohh that definitely sounds appealing - does the usb c port support TB4? I feel like that would be the perfect eGPU host (im sure its been discussed here, but the thread has become pretty dense lol)
 

sunseeker2k5

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Jul 10, 2023
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This is a SFP-10GM-T from FS.com, they actually leant me one of their FS-BOX-V3 units to recode it myself when it appeared that the Generic coded version wouldn't work. Not affiliated with them but I have been using their products for very many years and can vouch for their quality and the customer service too.
Thank you for dedicating time to measure the temps, much appreciated.
My unit has (p330) has just arrived and i have tested it in Windows thoroughly before the AOC-STGN-i2S Rev2 arrives next week.
I was looking at the SFP+ modules you suggest in your initial post and they were not in stock but now I see plenty in the Global Warehouse of FS.
While it will take some time to arrive to the Netherlands (early August), I will be on vacation anyway so this will be on hold.
 

damex

Member
Apr 7, 2019
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Would a P360 Ultra with i7-12700T, T400, 16GB RAM for $650 be considered a good deal? Are these things going to plummet in price after a few financial cycles? Thanks
imho it is very good price. i would get one if i had an option. we have people selling barebone p360 ultra at 1.2k$~ so there is that.
 

AWBbox

Member
Jul 29, 2021
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London, UK
Thank you for dedicating time to measure the temps, much appreciated.
My unit has (p330) has just arrived and i have tested it in Windows thoroughly before the AOC-STGN-i2S Rev2 arrives next week.
I was looking at the SFP+ modules you suggest in your initial post and they were not in stock but now I see plenty in the Global Warehouse of FS.
While it will take some time to arrive to the Netherlands (early August), I will be on vacation anyway so this will be on hold.
Glad I could help. Let us know how it goes! You might want to get the firmware upgraded on the AOC-STGN-i2S after it arrives too. You'll need to contact Supermicro directly to get the correct firmware image/tooling etc as it doesn't use stock Intel firmware.
 

dylanc

New Member
Jul 7, 2023
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Hey all, figured I could share an interesting option for adding 2.5GbE on these M70q/M80q systems that I have been exploring.

Recently I picked up a set M70q Gen3's and wanted to add a faster 2.5GbE networking interface so I could run them in a proxmox/ceph HA cluster.

I wanted to avoid USB -> 2.5 NICs because of the extra cables, and I wanted to be able to use in internal WiFi M.2 for a boot drive so I could maximize storage space per device without resorting to USB boot. I went down the rabbit hole of the special Lenovo expansion cards, since on their spec/product page it lists that you can expand these with a LAN module. After a bunch of searching I found a expansion card with the part number 5C50W00908 (it was possibly on this thread but I don't remember for sure), and I found a listing on Aliexpress with that part number and an image of a 2.5GbE add in card.

This is the listing I purchased from, at the time I paid $52 for one card, and it arrived within little over a week. I have put the card in the empty slot in one of my M70q's and so far it "just works"! Based on the listing picture I assumed the card would be using a Realtek 8125b chipset, which does seem to be the case as far as the card is reporting in software (see screenshots for details). Windows had zero issues picking up the card, and proxmox only took a small change to set the bridge interface with zero driver issues. I didn't do extensive testing but it had no issues hitting bidirectional ~2.35Gb/s for 10+ minutes in some short iperf testing, as one would expect from this chipset.
1689454237031.png

It is quite a bit more expensive than a USB to 2.5GbE adapter, but it is a viable option for adding 2.5GbE to the lower end M70q/M80qs that lack PCIe expandability. I will be likely ordering 2 more to outfit my remaining M70qs and will give an update if I run into issues. Feel free to ask any questions, these won't be deployed into and actual cluster for a little bit and I don't mind doing some testing for science.
 
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sunseeker2k5

New Member
Jul 10, 2023
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1
Hey all, figured I could share an interesting option for adding 2.5GbE on these M70q/M80q systems that I have been exploring.

Recently I picked up a set M70q Gen3's and wanted to add a faster 2.5GbE networking interface so I could run them in a proxmox/ceph HA cluster.

I wanted to avoid USB -> 2.5 NICs because of the extra cables, and I wanted to be able to use in internal WiFi M.2 for a boot drive so I could maximize storage space per device without resorting to USB boot. I went down the rabbit hole of the special Lenovo expansion cards, since on their spec/product page it lists that you can expand these with a LAN module. After a bunch of searching I found a expansion card with the part number 5C50W00908 (it was possibly on this thread but I don't remember for sure), and I found a listing on Aliexpress with that part number and an image of a 2.5GbE add in card.

This is the listing I purchased from, at the time I paid $52 for one card, and it arrived within little over a week. I have put the card in the empty slot in one of my M70q's and so far it "just works"! Based on the listing picture I assumed the card would be using a Realtek 8125b chipset, which does seem to be the case as far as the card is reporting in software (see screenshots for details). Windows had zero issues picking up the card, and proxmox only took a small change to set the bridge interface with zero driver issues. I didn't do extensive testing but it had no issues hitting bidirectional ~2.35Gb/s for 10+ minutes in some short iperf testing, as one would expect from this chipset.
View attachment 30328

It is quite a bit more expensive than a USB to 2.5GbE adapter, but it is a viable option for adding 2.5GbE to the lower end M70q/M80qs that lack PCIe expandability. I will be likely ordering 2 more to outfit my remaining M70qs and will give an update if I run into issues. Feel free to ask any questions, these won't be deployed into and actual cluster for a little bit and I don't mind doing some testing for science.
Nice find. Does this card work on the 720q/920q models as well ?
I found it for cheaper if anyone's interested: https://www.lenovopartsales.com/Len...S&operation=quickSearch&searchText=5C50W00908
 

dylanc

New Member
Jul 7, 2023
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Nice find. Does this card work on the 720q/920q models as well ?
I found it for cheaper if anyone's interested: https://www.lenovopartsales.com/Len...S&operation=quickSearch&searchText=5C50W00908
I have a few 720q so I will give it a shot, based on the compatibility list I am not super hopeful though.

Looks like you can buy directly from Lenovo's site if your country is set to the UK.
PN: 5C50W00908

Unfortunately it doesn't look like they ship to the US from the UK site. From searching a bit more it looks like there is generally just more availability for this part from European vendors than those in NA.

Also based on the product lookup there is a V2 of this card that exists with the PN 5C50W00942. No pictures on the Lenovo site, so not sure if there are any meaningful differences. Looks to still be 2.5GbE so no improvement's to on that front. I cant seem to find it anywhere at a reasonable price unfortunately, so will probably ignore it for now.
 
I got a 720q 9400t one for free and tossed in 16 GB of RAM and a Quad 2,5 Gbit NIC.
It's running opnSense under Proxmox as my main router atm, but I have that the problem that the fan sounds like it's dragging a little bit when the room temperature reaches around 30 °C. I already tried a new fan, same result.

Is there a know adapter for the little 4 pin fan header?
Anyone has a better/quieter cooling solution?
 

damex

Member
Apr 7, 2019
47
15
8
I got a 720q 9400t one for free and tossed in 16 GB of RAM and a Quad 2,5 Gbit NIC.
It's running opnSense under Proxmox as my main router atm, but I have that the problem that the fan sounds like it's dragging a little bit when the room temperature reaches around 30 °C. I already tried a new fan, same result.

Is there a know adapter for the little 4 pin fan header?
Anyone has a better/quieter cooling solution?
there is quiet mode for fan in bios settings. is it still noisy? which new fan did you try? there is like atleast 2 or 3 different variants of fans available. maybe 'new fan' is old and used fan that have same problem?
 

Helzy

Active Member
Oct 19, 2017
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Let us know how it works out.
Well I did take the plunge and after a bit of back and forth, I ended up with an M910X version of this NAS through Superbuy delivered to Alberta at roughly $500CAD:


this seller has a video on BiliBili


As it turns out, the machine appears to work as advertised (highly modded BIOS BTW) and is running an OS with no issues however, buyer beware.

I bought the V1 which used a 600g connection on the Wi-Fi key to the backplane of the drive cage.
-No RAM
-No NVMe or SSD
-i7-7700T
-4 port 2.5G nic

The seller contacted me after the initial build was decided and offered V2 at no extra cost which used one of the NVMe slots to connect to the drives in the cage. His reason was that the V1 build apparently had a conflict with the Realtek NIC. I said fine. Upon arrival and inspection I have to admit a bit of disappointment, the build quality and fitment is kind of awful. I did get the Realtek NIC, however, he did send a V1 machine which was fine with me as I prefer having two NVMe drives anyway and so far, no issues or conflict with the 2.5g nic. This one appears to be https://www.amazon.ca/GLOTRENDS-RTL8125BG-PCI-Express-Bandwidth-Compatible/dp/B0BLN9VRZM with the fan removed although the seller did include it and the box the nic came in withthe package. I suspect the 'conflict' might have been the card length, this is the shortest 2.5g 4 port nic I've seen and there is plenty of clearance for the power module and the A+EE adapter in the Wi-Fi slot.

The lower mount point on the 3D printed drive cage is broken off, and instead the unit is held together with 2 screws that were drilled through the cover on either side. The front faceplate is broken off and as you can see in the picture that notes the removable memory/NVMe cover it was glued with some sort of black adhesive, it sticks out oddly in that if you have a USB-A connector like a small kingston data traveller with no plastic casing it will work fine, however, if you have a typical USB stick with a plastic casing, it won't fit far enough into the slot to make a connection. The bottom cover has a 2mm hand bent flange that I'll fix with a grinder, but in the process of bending it, it was warped. One of the cpu fan screws was missing, however, I noticed it was actually stuck to some glue on one of the pcb's for the drive cage.

NAS

Kind of odd if you ask me. Suberbuy took pic's but they didn't include either front nor back which I thought odd at the time. I thought they had a reputation for being meticulous but in this case, not so much.

Going to let Hyper-V whirl on it for a bit, but again if I could have only found the M600 cover literally anywhere, I would do my own mod for certain. a DIY from China I guess is again, buyer beware.

Okay I have a lightly used, unmolested M910X in my basement. Anyone know where I can get an M600 cover?

EDIT - Well added known working SSD's in the drive cages. not recognized at all. Boo... I'll remove the 4 port Realtek to see if indeed there is some sort of conflict.
 
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