WiFi 6 in the X220 with LED status light!

Intro

You can add any NGFF WiFi card into the X220 with a NGFF to mini PCIe adapter & antenna adapater from [your favourite online store]. Unfortunately all of these adapters for some reason do not connect the LED signal from the card.

Fortunately it is fairly simple to the connect the LED signal - you can have your cake and eat it too!

Details

The LED status output on the NGFF card is pin 6. On my adapter this is broken out to a component pad.

The LED status input on the mini PCIe is pin 44 (for WiFi LED).

Simply solder a thin wire between these two pins as shown below.

Be sure to double check which pins are which on your adapter.

Third from the right pin on top row (pin 6)

Fifth from the left, pin 44

Results

AX200 showing up under lspci

Woo! LEDs!

Geeky Stuff

The output from the NGFF card is an open drain. The input at the mini PCIe slot is also an open drain with the gate connected to 3.3V. Since we are only pulling signals to ground there is no risk of voltage mismatches. If the input signal is low, the WiFi LED turns on.

X220 repasting - Stock vs Arctic Silver MX-4 test

Intro

A quick and dirty before and after temperature comparison between stock thermal paste and Arctic Silver MX-4.

CPU is a i7 2620M, s-tui was used for stress testing & monitoring (each bar is 2 seconds apart).

Results

• Couple of degrees lower idle temperature
• Lower fan speed at idle
  
• No more thermal throttling
• Max temperature using MX-4 paste will probably be the same as stock but it will take much, much more time to get there, if ever
  

S/PDIF on X220/X230 and other Sandy/Ivy Bridge Thinkpads

Introduction

It turns that out many of the HD Audio chips on the xx20 & xx30 series Thinkpads have a pin for S/PDIF out. These are not connected on the board and not enabled in software. With some hacking you can enable it in software. When I get some SPIDF hardware I'll do some testing to see if it actually works....

The CX20672 Audio IC

Pin 39 on the chip is S/PDIF out. (In the T420 the same chip is used and this pin is labeled SPIDF). The chip is a QFN-40 (Quad flat no lead). Its not impossible to solder a wire to it but it will be pretty difficult.

Location of the pin on the schematic/board

Actual board picture

Enabling SPDIF in Software

For Linux only.

• Disable pulseaudio
• Try pulseaudio --kill
• If pulseaudio automatically starts back up again try
• systemctl --user stop pulseaudio.socket pulseaudio
  
• Use hdajackretask and override pin 0x20 or 0x22 and apply
  
  
• Restart pulseaudio with either
• pulseaudio --start
• OR systemctl --user start pulseaudio.socket pulseaudio
• Check system sound settings
  
  

Unlocking LTE Bands on Xperia Z3 Compact (Spoiler: no luck)

What is this?

Basically on all phones there is a section in flash memory which tells the system which bands the phone supports. Some people have found Qualcomm tools to change these values. You can change UMTS/3G & LTE/4G band support. This of course is only a change in software - if your phone doesn't have the hardware support this won't help.

How to do it

Follow the general instructions here

https://forum.xda-developers.com/crossdevice-dev/sony/thread-progress-please-leave-im-updating-t2871269

and specific instructions for LTE / Xperia phones here

https://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=55394190&postcount=142

Results

For my phone, Z3 Compact (D5803), LTE bands 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 13, 17, 20 are supported of the box.

The D5833 model supports 1, 3, 5, 7, 8, 28, 40.

I was hoping to add band 28 for use with my local networks but no luck. After adding band 28 the phone would no longer connect to a LTE network. I suppose it tries to connect via band 28 but then hardware does not support it so it fails.

I also tried adding band 12 when I was on another network - again no luck.

tdlr;

If your phone has hardware support for the added bands then your in luck else it's a waste of time.

The Xperia Z3 Compact D5803 DOES NOT have hardware support fro LTE Bands 12, 28 & 40.

Extras

The D5803 has a SKY77629 RF power amplifier which supports LTE bands 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 8 (and sub-bands 9, 10, 18, 19, 20, 26). There are no networks near me that use the extra bands (9, 10, 18, 19, 20, and 26). These bands may be worth a shot at enabling if there are networks around you that use them - good luck!