Drag to reposition cover

Lenovo Thinkcentre/ThinkStation Tiny (Project TinyMiniMicro) Reference Thread

Notice: Page may contain affiliate links for which we may earn a small commission through services like Amazon Affiliates or Skimlinks.

cadillac

New Member
Aug 16, 2022
26
14
3
IIRC, the first few attempts were without secureboot both win10 and win11. I confirmed that the messed up stick created by Etcher was not proper UEFI boot media, at least it did not contain the EFI partition.
@Parallax I suggest this addition to Your FAQ on the first page "With M90Q, Windows installer does not recognize Intel RST even with proper drivers supplied during install, if the boot method is not UEFI.

Also i found out that with the 65W power supply, utilizing the PCI-E slot configures the CPU to "c-TDP Down", which has negative impact on CPU performance

And to anyone considering the Mellanox Connect-X3 hardware, both the slim and "fat" PCB fits well in the unit, but beware that this NIC has no proper ASPM support in linux, and adds about 10W (o_O) to the consumption with inactive links ans also prohibits the CPU package to enter deeper sleep states than C2.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: Parallax

Vorwrath

Member
Feb 24, 2020
21
28
13
Took delivery of my new P360 Tiny with an i7-12700T yesterday, so posting a few pictures and details on that in case they're helpful to anyone. I've included a couple of pictures of the PCIe riser, so hopefully somebody can work out if it's the same or different to older models (I don't have an older one to compare).

I took some idle power consumption measurements and got the following: -
Preinstalled Windows 11 desktop idle (GPU installed): 18.3w
Preinstalled Windows 11 desktop idle (after removing GPU): 10.2w
Ubuntu 22.04.1 live booted from USB stick (after removing GPU): 17.3w
Those are just measured with a TP-Link smart plug, not some scientific device, so treat them as plus/minus 10%.

Not sure why the power consumption in Ubuntu was noticeably worse. Possibly it has less power saving enabled by default, or maybe the supplied kernel is too old for good Alder Lake support.

BIOS output seemed to go to the Nvidia T400 GPU by default, so I initially couldn't get into the BIOS on the HDMI TV I was using for testing (screen was just blank until Windows booted). After removing the GPU, I did get the initial boot splash screen and BIOS output over HDMI as expected.

Another weird thing I noticed is that it kept complaining about the PSU being lower power than recommended when booting. I was just using the 170W adapter Lenovo supplied with the system, which should be more than sufficient. I suspect that is probably some kind of early BIOS bug (will have to check if there are any updates available).

I'm planning to use it as a home Proxmox server, but still want to acquire some other components first like additional RAM and an i350-T4 NIC, so won't be rolling it out for a while.

Front:
front.jpg
Rear:
rear.jpg
Internals (GPU installed as supplied)
internals.jpg
Internals (GPU removed)
internals2.jpg
NVIDIA T400 GPU and baffle
gpu.jpg
PCIe riser (front)
riser1.jpg
PCIe riser (rear)
riser2.jpg
 

Cartwheel8704

New Member
Sep 10, 2022
3
2
3
Interesting approach to a NAS. Do you end up with two power switches that you have to manually sequence or are you able to slave one power supply to the other?
Currently I've just got a 240v/5v molex power supply powering the enclosure, it's dumb and always on.

Currently looking at putting a simple 5v relay running off a USB port so that when power is on, the enclosure powers up.

The SATA controller I'm using supports hotswapping so this should work pretty well.

Hmm -- I just added in a Connect-Tech GPS receiver to the M.2 WiFi slot and it's not showing up in lsusb... do these still whitelist what is in the M.2 slot? AFAIK the receiver shouldn't be PCIe, just USB, so I'd expect it to show up, unless it's pulling some pins low / being kept in reset...
WIFI slots are whitelisted AFAIK. The M.2 2280 slot is not.

I believe you can get around the whitelisting by reflashing the BIOS and setting the model and serial #'s to "INVALID". More details here - https://www.reddit.com/r/Lenovo/comments/dcf0lw/_/fbpy0c5
I did this proactively, but not planning on using the WiFi slot for anything. Apparently works great (and saves fubbing about with manually editing the BIOS whitelist values).


I am also interest in making a JBOD box.
Please show us what type of cables / connectors between M.2 card to external JOBX enclosure.
I've got a full write-up on reddit here https://www.reddit.com/r/homelab/comments/xfh8p9 with pics.

In short, it's just a simple m.2>SATA controller with a JMB585 chip. I used a SEEED studio 103990543, but there's plenty of other models around. If you're looking for something more reputable, Silverstone make one, as do IO-CREST. Personally I was fine with just rolling the dice with a cheap one. From there it's just SATA cables to your enclosure.

Obviously you're going to be limited to 5x drives with this setup. If you're wanting something a bit more rock-solid, a m.2 > PCI-E > LSI HBA card should work too.

But if you're needing more than 5 drives and are going to these lengths, you should probably be looking at a full size rig (or at least an ITX). There's limits to even my crazy.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Marsh and poulpor

Helzy

Active Member
Oct 19, 2017
190
60
28
56
Does anyone know the Lenovo FRU at encompass for the T400 with that proper 3 port baffle in Vorwrath's post?
 

Occamsrazor

Member
Feb 23, 2018
47
13
8
This is a super-useful thread especially the table in the first post. It's interesting that the M90q Gen 2 has more storage options than the P350 (2x m.2, 1x 2.5" vs 2x m.2 only). I presume you can also put a network card in the M90q Gen 2 with a riser like the other models?
It would be great if the first post could be updated with information on the latest models i.e. M90q Gen 3 and P360....
 

joeribl

Active Member
Jun 6, 2021
128
45
28
I have discovered that the M90Q x8 PCIE connector is also wired to the PCH...
If i look at the block diagram for the Q470 chipset, that is not strange. There are 16 lanes PCI 3.0 available straight from the CPU. And then 24 lanes from the PCH. The CPU is connected with DMI 3.0 to the PCH. Supposedly the bandwith for the DMI is 8 GT/s.
 

cadillac

New Member
Aug 16, 2022
26
14
3
If i look at the block diagram for the Q470 chipset, that is not strange. There are 16 lanes PCI 3.0 available straight from the CPU. And then 24 lanes from the PCH. The CPU is connected with DMI 3.0 to the PCH. Supposedly the bandwith for the DMI is 8 GT/s.
I assumed that it's wired to the CPU. This basically limits that x8 port to x4 bandwith. And it is also shared between SATA, and the two NVME ports. None of the CPU PCI-E lanes are utilized, and the offered 3 high-bandwidth expansion ports (x8,x4,x4) all share a x4 DMI uplink to the CPU which is basically x4 PCI-E bandwidth
 
Last edited:

Parallax

Active Member
Nov 8, 2020
417
208
43
London, UK
It would be great if the first post could be updated with information on the latest models i.e. M90q Gen 3 and P360....
I was waiting for the info to be formalised by Lenovo and (ideally) STH to review one, but I suppose I could pull the datasheet and add it in if people would like that.
 
Last edited:

Parallax

Active Member
Nov 8, 2020
417
208
43
London, UK
This is a super-useful thread especially the table in the first post. It's interesting that the M90q Gen 2 has more storage options than the P350 (2x m.2, 1x 2.5" vs 2x m.2 only). I presume you can also put a network card in the M90q Gen 2 with a riser like the other models?
To be honest I am not sure of the situation with the M90q Gen 2, I just know that in my P350 Tiny although the SATA port exists on the motherboard, it doesn't come with either the ZIF cable/connector for SATA or a drive caddy. There is also no FRU to buy the caddy/cable for a P350 and if you try to add the caddy it doesn't have anywhere to clip in to the fan assembly like it does on other models. And finally, there are no 2.5" drive models in the PSRef.

Could somone with an M70q/M90q Gen 2 confirm that they do come with a caddy etc?

Otherwise yes, there is an extremely hard-to-source currently riser which then allows you to deploy PCIe cards in both the M90q Gen 2 and the P350, but note we've discovered the slot is PCIe 3 and not 4, no idea why.
 

Parallax

Active Member
Nov 8, 2020
417
208
43
London, UK
Took delivery of my new P360 Tiny with an i7-12700T yesterday, so posting a few pictures and details on that in case they're helpful to anyone. I've included a couple of pictures of the PCIe riser, so hopefully somebody can work out if it's the same or different to older models (I don't have an older one to compare).
It's a different part number (the M90q Gen 2/P350 Tiny one is 5C50W00877) so I would say it is different and presumably supports PCIe 4.
 

Parallax

Active Member
Nov 8, 2020
417
208
43
London, UK
So, I am shocked that the max SSD storage is spec'd as 250GB and max M.2 SSD as 1 TB ... I am also curious as to why this might be the case.

Is this still accurate ? Has anyone put these limitations to test ?
I think that's more to do with the max configuration available at the time from Lenovo. I have tried a 4TB SSD and 2TB NVMe drive with no issues.
 

Parallax

Active Member
Nov 8, 2020
417
208
43
London, UK
Apologies all for a long quiet period - I was on holiday without internet access for a couple of weeks. I'll try to get some time this weekend to update the main post.
 
  • Like
Reactions: cadillac

TonyTheTiger

New Member
Oct 6, 2022
3
4
3
I just got my m90q Gen1 i9-10900 and PNY T1000 8 GB GPU (normal fan model - not Lenovo custom heat pipe version). Additional required part was 5C50W00877 PCIe 3.0 x16 riser and 5M10U50348 bezel to give some support at the rear of the card. Would be doable with only the riser.

I played a bit of CS:GO (Auto:High settings @ 1440p) with FPS ranging roughly between 60 and 120.

Thermals rise quite fast to the thermal limits of both CPU and GPU. Logically full power CPU didn't come near to it's power limit while the 50 W GPU throttled from either power or thermals.

Despite thermal throttling the gaming experience was nice however I will try to figure out could there be some way to make the components more efficient. As far as I know there is no way to undervolt Intel 10th gen CPUs anymore but perhaps there is something that can be done to the T1000. I'm not doing any professional work on the machine so some rare instability is acceptable.

Starting gaming:
CSGO_start.jpg

While gaming:
CSGO_steady.jpg
 
Last edited:

Occamsrazor

Member
Feb 23, 2018
47
13
8
It's a different part number (the M90q Gen 2/P350 Tiny one is 5C50W00877) so I would say it is different and presumably supports PCIe 4.
A search for the FRU 5c50w00910 that Vorwrath has in the P360 finds these, in case it's of use to anyone:
 

Wasmachineman_NL

Wittgenstein the Supercomputer FTW!
Aug 7, 2019
1,872
617
113
I just got my m90q Gen1 i9-10900 and PNY T1000 8 GB GPU (normal fan model - not Lenovo custom heat pipe version). Additional required part was 5C50W00877 PCIe 3.0 x16 riser and 5M10U50348 bezel to give some support at the rear of the card. Would be doable with only the riser.

I played a bit of CS:GO (Auto:High settings @ 1440p) with FPS ranging roughly between 60 and 120.

Thermals rise quite fast to the thermal limits of both CPU and GPU. Logically full power CPU didn't come near to it's power limit while the 50 W GPU throttled from either power or thermals.

Despite thermal throttling the gaming experience was nice however I will try to figure out could there be some way to make the components more efficient. As far as I know there is no way to undervolt Intel 10th gen CPUs anymore but perhaps there is something that can be done to the T1000. I'm not doing any professional work on the machine so some rare instability is acceptable.

Starting gaming:
View attachment 24734

While gaming:
View attachment 24735
Could try ThrottleStop to undervolt.
 

TonyTheTiger

New Member
Oct 6, 2022
3
4
3
It's a different part number (the M90q Gen 2/P350 Tiny one is 5C50W00877) so I would say it is different and presumably supports PCIe 4.
M90q Gen 1/P340 and Gen 2/P350 share the 5C50W00877 riser. Gen 1/P340 has Q370 chipset whereas Gen 2/P350 has Q470 chipset but both chipsets support only PCIe 3.
M90q Gen 3/P360 on the other hand has Q670 chipset which supports PCIe 4 (also PCIe 3). It would be quite insane for the riser to be PCIe 3 but I could not find any details about it.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Occamsrazor

TonyTheTiger

New Member
Oct 6, 2022
3
4
3
Could try ThrottleStop to undervolt.
In up-to-date Intel 6-10th gen CPU machines undervolt is supposedly blocked by CPU microcode and/or BIOS. On my system it looks like that - or at least all voltage adjustments are greyed out in Throttlestop. Turbo power limits seemed to be the only variables to play with. Supposedly BIOS can be downgraded to an older version where undervolting is not blocked but the Intel microcode change is supposed to be irreversible.
 

Wasmachineman_NL

Wittgenstein the Supercomputer FTW!
Aug 7, 2019
1,872
617
113
In up-to-date Intel 6-10th gen CPU machines undervolt is supposedly blocked by CPU microcode and/or BIOS. On my system it looks like that - or at least all voltage adjustments are greyed out in Throttlestop. Turbo power limits seemed to be the only variables to play with. Supposedly BIOS can be downgraded to an older version where undervolting is not blocked but the Intel microcode change is supposed to be irreversible.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Lenovo/comments/id0457
 

Parallax

Active Member
Nov 8, 2020
417
208
43
London, UK
For folks in the UK looking for a M90q/Gen 2/P340/P350 PCIe riser, there's one on eBay for £20 + shipping.

I bought four from China, which averaged out at about £35 each after shipping so this is a good price, especially as nowhere else seems to have stock.