Lenovo Thinkcentre/ThinkStation Tiny (Project TinyMiniMicro) Reference Thread

[kayson]

Hey @j4cbo awesome riser btw!

Just to confirm, m920q's would require some resistor soldering for pcie bifurcation to work in order to use your riser, correct?

It does. See GitHub - j4cbo/tiny5-m2-riser

If you can't do it yourself, you might find someone to do the mod for you either here or just a soldering tech in your area. It's pretty easy as far as a mod goes, though. I could do it, but might take a while.

 

[senso]

I mean, I guess... but since you're connecting the clip directly to the chip and all of those components are on the other side of the connection between the chip and the clip, I don't think you have to worry about interference from those components to the point where unsoldering it from the board is the better answer.

Don't think I've run into an issue caused by this in the past, but who knows... in any case it's always been easier/safer to just reflash with the clip then getting involved with soldering chips.

Personal opinion of course.

Anyways, this is probably an off-topic philosophical tangent I guess.

I never had much luck with those clips, even using genuine Pomona ones. In another life when I repaired laptops, I flashed hundreds of BIOS, when Windows 8 started to become common, it would kill so many first gen UEFI laptops with corrupted BIOS..

So after 20-30 laptops that it only fully flashed at the 3rd or 4th time I just remove the BIOS chips, always. It takes 30 seconds to remove them with a simple soldering iron. Better safe than sorry.

 

[damex]

any idea if p3 ultra and p360 ultra have bifurcation support for 'upper' pcie 3.0 x8 slot?

not sure where else to ask

 

[RedneckBob]

> no luck to find 2 or 4 ports u.2.

> https://www.amazon.com/Adapter-SFF-8643-Expansion-Indicator-Windows/dp/B0B7SNH23Y - needs pci-e bifurcation support, works in my a520 ryzen board with bifurcation set to x8x4x4 (second port not working due to x8 bifurcation).
PCIe Switch Adapter for U.2 SSD (PEX Controller), PCIe X8 to 4 SAS SFF-8643 | eBay (on the way to me, should work fully in m920x)
looked to the oculink cards as well, but the cables are made of gold I think.

Most all the u.2 NVMe boards above the x4 slot require bifurcation. At least that was the case when I bought my PCIe -> NVMe u.2 adapter back in 2020. It is quite a robust setup, I used this card: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B089SQ84CH/. I bought 4 Intel datacenter drives off ebay (from the same vendor and all had 100% of life left). This was back in 2020 and it's run non-stop since and I've had zero issues. It does multiplex 4 x4 PCIe lanes over a single x8 PCIe lane and I'm positive this impacts the speed, but no clue by how much. Primarily I needed datacenter drives because I chewed through a set of temporary consumer SSDs from BestBuy in what felt like record time.

I have all this stuffed in a rackmount with each drive wired directly to the card -- so no backpane. I'm not sure what *exactly* you're searching for, but there are a number of backplanes that support 4 u.2 NVMe drives. I don't know if the propritary ones on ebay have non-standard connectors:

• DELL POWEREDGE R740xd SERVER 4 NVMe PCIe EXTENDER EXPANSION CARD & CABLE 4X2.5 | eBay
• Dell R7525 R750 backplane NVME expansion card kit 16+8 YD2C2 CD9FM | eBay
• New Dell T630 4*2.5" PCIE U.2 nvme backplane HDD Cage Kit WYNC0 with cables | eBay
• DELL PowerEdge T620 4x 2.5" Express Flash U.2 PCIe NVME SSD Backplane & Cables | eBay

But, I'm pretty sure the non-propritary ones do use standard connectors. Like these:

• MB699VP-B_4 Bay 2.5" U.2/U.3 NVMe SSD PCIe 4.0 Mobile Rack Enclosure for External 5.25" Drive Bay (4 x Mini-SAS HD SFF-8643, no Tri-mode support)
• https://global.icydock.com/product_351.html
• https://global.icydock.com/product_252.html
• https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005005089515763.html
• https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005006890292787.html

 

[kayson]

In case anyone is curious, I did all the mods to one M920q, giving me a total of:

• 4x M.2 2280 SSDs
• 1x M.2 2230 SSD
• 1x 3.5" HDD
• 1x 10Gb NIC

See:

• GitHub - badger707/m920q-pcie-bifurcation: Lenovo M920Q PCIe x8 bifuration to x4x4
• GitHub - badger707/m920q-dual-NVME: Lenovo M920Q dual NVME, conversion to M920X.
• GitHub - kaysond/m920q-3.5in-drive-mod: Simple mod to use a 3.5" drive in a Lenovo M920q
• GitHub - j4cbo/tiny5-m2-riser

Totally overkill for my purposes, and I'm not going to keep it this way, but it was fun to play around with. You can really pack a lot into these tiny things!

 

[evil_santa]

I found an p350 Tiny with 3 NVMe drives and wwan port on Xianyu marketplace.
It's a pre release board (rev0,5)
There is also a p3 tiny pre release board available there.

https://m.tb.cn/h.g4JVPWd?tk=Y9XdWya5ILD

 

[aqz5xkn1]

In case anyone is curious, I did all the mods to one M920q, giving me a total of:

• 4x M.2 2280 SSDs
• 1x M.2 2230 SSD
• 1x 3.5" HDD
• 1x 10Gb NIC

See:

• GitHub - badger707/m920q-pcie-bifurcation: Lenovo M920Q PCIe x8 bifuration to x4x4
• GitHub - badger707/m920q-dual-NVME: Lenovo M920Q dual NVME, conversion to M920X.
• GitHub - kaysond/m920q-3.5in-drive-mod: Simple mod to use a 3.5" drive in a Lenovo M920q
• GitHub - j4cbo/tiny5-m2-riser

Totally overkill for my purposes, and I'm not going to keep it this way, but it was fun to play around with. You can really pack a lot into these tiny things!

View attachment 37317View attachment 37321View attachment 37320View attachment 37318View attachment 37319View attachment 37316

Nice experiment! Where did you get the A E Key adapter to 2230 NVMe?

 

[lluxury]

hi!

I am interested in connecting an external video card to ThinkStation P350 tiny. On Lenovo forums I found instructions on how to connect a thunderbolt expansion card, there I also found part numbers of spare parts (FRU ....).

The problem is that I don't see parts for P350 tiny anywhere, but Ebay.com has parts for P330-340.
Does anyone have any experience with this topic?

 

[kayson]

Nice experiment! Where did you get the A E Key adapter to 2230 NVMe?

Amazon. There are tons there as well as on aliexpress. Mine was actually one that supported many M.2 lengths, and the PCB was perforated so you could snap it off to the exact desired length.

 

[Jorge Perez]

Has anyone considered adding a second SATA port to the M90Q Gen 2?

There is an unpopulated pad labeled SATA 2 on the board, but I don't know if it's just missing the connector or some passives as well.

 

[evil_santa]

Has anyone considered adding a second SATA port to the M90Q Gen 2?

There is an unpopulated pad labeled SATA 2 on the board, but I don't know if it's just missing the connector or some passives as well.

View attachment 37350

I'm getting an gen2/p350 soon and will look into it.
But without boardview and schematic it's really hard to figure out the parts.

 

[senso]

The photo is a bit blurry, but it seems like its missing the coupling caps on the SATA TX/RX lines, nothing that a 1-10nF cap wont fix (4 in fact)

 

[Parallax]

I'm taking a punt (for science!) on a Lenovo ThinkSmart Core. They're really part of a very fancy videoconferencing setup from Lenovo but in reality they look to me like Tinys with a special set of rear connectors with their own hinged cover.

The CPU is an i5-1145G7E (4C/8T) and I don't know if it only has a single memory slot - given it's supposed to be just a VC control unit it might be limited. It has an m.2 SSD.

Normally £2k or so they're now discontinued and starting to appear on eBay for a tenth of that. The CPU has a TDP of 15W so it may be a low power option.

I'll report back if folks are interested.

 

[Parallax]

P3 TINY - Can't configure Thunderbolt in BIOS
P3 Tiny Workstation (ThinkStation) , bios version : M4WKT4AA/1.0.0.74 ( newest updated at 14 May 2024)

As the pic shows , the option about intel thunderbolt is unselectable , even through i have thunderbolt 4 card without enable thunderbolt setting in bios which means i cant find anything about thunderbolt in windows. Any suggestion will be appreciated.

View attachment 36710

I've had such a hard time understanding how these are set up for Thunderbolt. I think the BIOS expects the card to be the Lenovo one, which has two wired connectors that plug into the motherboard, thereby enabling that option you've highlighted.

 

[sprucestream]

I'm taking a punt (for science!) on a Lenovo ThinkSmart Core. They're really part of a very fancy videoconferencing setup from Lenovo but in reality they look to me like Tinys with a special set of rear connectors with their own hinged cover.

The CPU is an i5-1145G7E (4C/8T) and I don't know if it only has a single memory slot - given it's supposed to be just a VC control unit it might be limited. It has an m.2 SSD.

Normally £2k or so they're now discontinued and starting to appear on eBay for a tenth of that. The CPU has a TDP of 15W so it may be a low power option.

I'll report back if folks are interested.

neat!! Glanced around on eBay as well but didn’t see anything showing the sodimms- looking like a PCB sandwich or it’s just on the other side

 

[Gallamoth]

Does anyone here have the M80q Gen 3 and managed to remove the Wi-Fi card for a 2.5gb Nic?
Any adapter recommendation for this? Specially if it's from AliExpress as it's the only place I can get now.

 

[Parallax]

All right. I've not taken it apart yet but first impressions :

• Really nice case, gently rounded corners and edges, bright red base. Some might call it stylish.
• There's a clamshell that closes over the top of the rear ports and cables, with clamps on the cords keep everything tidy and in place. There's a screw to keep it shut.
• There are two HDMI out, one USB type C video out and one USB power connection, plus three 10Gbps USB type A ports. 1GbE, m.2 WiFi card, no vPro.
• The overall size is the same as a Tiny but it's longer thanks to the cord arrangement at the back.
• It comes with a 65W power brick.
• There are no field replaceable parts so the case is an adventure to get into.
• As far as I can tell from the hardware manual the 8GB RAM is soldered onto the motherboard and there's a 2240 m.2 NVME which is replaceable.
• The Skype version seems to have a hardware encoder of some sort.

At the moment given the lack of expansion and RAM I'd say the use is limited, but it definitely looks great and it should do well as a RPi 4 or 5 alternative. I'd say if you pay £150 / $190 or so that's a fair price, more than £200 / $250 not worth it. If I make more discoveries, I'll let you know.

 

[evil_santa]

Can you please take some pictures from the inside?

 

[Parallax]

Does anyone here have the M80q Gen 3 and managed to remove the Wi-Fi card for a 2.5gb Nic?
Any adapter recommendation for this? Specially if it's from AliExpress as it's the only place I can get now.

Not the M80q Gen3, but I have with the M75q Gen 2. I just got one of the 2240 Realtek 2.5GbE cards (make sure it's type A, most aren't) with a long cord and the RJ45 port on a small block, a bit like an old serial port. You can knock out one of the rear blanks and then use screws to keep it in place. It's tidy and works well.

 

[Gallamoth]

Not the M80q Gen3, but I have with the M75q Gen 2. I just got one of the 2240 Realtek 2.5GbE cards (make sure it's type A, most aren't) with a long cord and the RJ45 port on a small block, a bit like an old serial port. You can knock out one of the rear blanks and then use screws to keep it in place. It's tidy and works well.

That's what I'm seeking and trying to confirm, which k type the slot is as I don't have the machine on hands to check.