First time setting up
CMOS battery installation
The original X200/X201 CMOS battery is fully compatible with the X2100 motherboard. It’s installed next to the M.2 slot and should fit underneath the palmrest. It is a 2-pin CMOS battery (positive and negative terminal).
Fixing screen tearing on the 3K panel
WARNING: Make sure the motherboard is unpowered (no battery and charger attached) when you install the panel and other peripherals. Please disconnect the power when you install any new hardware peripherals.
Adjusting this should help with panel glitches: BIOS > Advanced > CSM Settings and change video to UEFI.
Turn off SA GV in the chipset settings in BIOS as well. This will prevent the RAM from clocking down.
BIOS adjustments
Check out this post for more info on performance and benchmarks.
PL1/PL2 adjustments (For better temps)
PLEASE DO NOT EXCEED 30W-35W FOR PL1 AS THERE HAS BEEN REPORTS OF FRIED MOSFET DUE TO HIGH PL1
- BIOS > Advanced > Power & Performance > CPU – Power Management Control > Config TDP configuration
- Change TDP Boot mode > Up
- Scroll down to custom settings Up, adjust PL1 and PL2 and PL1 time window (Tau)
- Recommended PL1: 23000 (23W), PL2: 25000 (25W), Time window (tau): 5s
Undervolt (For better performance)
- BIOS > Advanced > Overclocking Performance Menu
- Change Overclock feature to enabled
- Processor > Core/Ring
- Change Voltage offset to the voltage you want
- Recommended value: 70 = 70mV
- Change Offset Prefix to negative for undervolt
CPU C states (For power savings)
- BIOS > Advanced > Power & Performance
- Enable C1 & C3 states
- Enable demotion and promotion of C-states
- Change package C-state limit to auto
Drivers
Windows and Linux should automatically use the latest drivers.
Trackpoint
If trackpoint does not operate properly after sleep on Windows, force install the latest trackpoint driver in device manager:
- Install driver
- Open device manager and find the PS/2 mouse device
- Right click, update driver, browse
- “Let me select from a list of drivers already installed on the system”
- Uncheck “List only compatible”
- Change manufacturer from Microsoft to Lenovo and select the latest Synaptics drivers
- Ignore warning about incompatible driver
If driver still does not work, try out 51nb recommended drivers.
Firmware updates
X2100 Motherboard Installation Guide
Please push the right portion of the 3K display connector towards the left after inserting it in. Pull with a pair of tweezers or your fingernails towards the left as it’s about 1 pin off.
Charger & Battery
This section only applies to 10th gen X2100 machines with stock BIOS only.
The motherboard doesn’t appear to play well with 4-cell batteries and aftermarket batteries. Please ONLY use ORIGINAL 6/9-cell batteries for this laptop.
The X2100 motherboard appears to draw a high current on boot and the recommended charging brick is a 90W brick. The machine appears to boot and charge fine on certain >60W chargers, including the stock Lenovo charger (both barrel and USB-C versions) provided the machine has a battery attached. There are some 65W chargers that don’t seem to charge properly on a high PL1. Please lower the PL1 of the CPU in the BIOS if the system don’t seem to charge properly.