- Tried to upgrade the wifi card for newer standards (that's a fail, as it seems to be locked down in the BIOS what cards the machine can use)
- Managed to set a max frequency to the CPU so now I don't have a thermal shutdown, it works rock solid and still reasonable performance.
It sounds like a lot of pain, but it's still my favourite device to work on ever since, ArchLinux humming away with XFCE. Not sure what my next machine will be, but this current one will give a run for its money...
I patched out the BIOS whitelist from my X201 and ran the image through me_cleaner.
All that stopped working was automatic fan control, I needed a daemon running constantly to set the fan speed.
That thing has been catching dust for about 2 years now since I upgraded to an X270, which is a faster machine but is nowhere near as nice.
In the intervening 12 years:
- I've replaced the disk at least 2x (going to SSD, and replacing a failed one with a current 1TB this year)
- Replaced the cooling fan (1x? 2x? I don't remember)
- Replaced the motherboard (that was fun: https://gergely.imreh.net/blog/2022/07/an-open-heart-motherb...)
- Tried to upgrade the wifi card for newer standards (that's a fail, as it seems to be locked down in the BIOS what cards the machine can use)
- Managed to set a max frequency to the CPU so now I don't have a thermal shutdown, it works rock solid and still reasonable performance.
It sounds like a lot of pain, but it's still my favourite device to work on ever since, ArchLinux humming away with XFCE. Not sure what my next machine will be, but this current one will give a run for its money...