by Ciro Santilli (@cirosantilli, 36)
Machines used extensively while developing the Linux Kernel Module Cheat will be documented there for reference performance.
They never claimed it back at the end of the contract so I'm keeping it.
Takes two AAA rechargeable batteries.
2021-08: rechargeable battery charges were in, nominal marked 1.2V nickel metal hydride, measured as 1.38V and 1.42V.
Some reviews:
  • the keyboard is kind of crap. Notably the key "a" is very hard to press!!
  • the lack of a sleep state indication LED and "I'm powering on LED" compared to Lenovo is really sad
  • it gets way too hot doing work (Monero bootstrap) with lid closed, likely brought system down
OPSEC: will run only cryptocurrency wallets and nothing else. Will connect to Internet, but never ever to a non clean USB flash drive.
The OPSEC for this machine supposes:
Bootstrap OPSEC:
It must have taken about one week running full time to sync the Monero blockchain which at the time was at about 3.1M blocks! I checked on system explorer, and CPU and internet usage was never maxed out, suggesting simply slow network. But the computer still overheated quite a bit and froze a few times.
Bought: November 2023 during Black Friday sale for £1,323.00 to be Ciro Santilli's main personal laptop.
Six years after, and we are 2x on every key spec (except processor Hz ;-) at about 1/2 the price and 1/2 the weight (though smaller 14" screen for greater portability), so not bad! Customized to max out each hardware spec:
Specs:
Identifiers:
Upon arrival:
  • Weight: 1490 g
  • Charger weight: 323 g
  • Firmware according to sudo dmidecode -t bios:
    Vendor: LENOVO
Version: R2FET33W (1.13 )
Release Date: 09/08/2023
Buy research:
Log:
2024-01-17: firmware update:
Vendor: LENOVO
Version: R2FET36W (1.16 )
Release Date: 10/24/2023
Actually fixed performance mode: askubuntu.com/questions/604720/setting-to-high-performance/1343879#1343879
On Ubuntu 23.10, under Settings > Displays, Mirror works, but "Join" does not allow to Apply with message:
Changes Cannot be Applied. This could be due to hardware limitations.
Works on X Window System, it is a Wayland bug.
glmark2 -b build:duration=3:model=horse
~22K
The P51 is a bit too heavy, and the battery could be better!
Bought: 2017 for approximately 2400 pounds to be Ciro Santilli's main personal laptop.
Specs:
Identifiers:
lspci
output:
00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Xeon E3-1200 v6/7th Gen Core Processor Host Bridge/DRAM Registers (rev 05)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 6th-10th Gen Core Processor PCIe Controller (x16) (rev 05)
00:08.0 System peripheral: Intel Corporation Xeon E3-1200 v5/v6 / E3-1500 v5 / 6th/7th/8th Gen Core Processor Gaussian Mixture Model
00:14.0 USB controller: Intel Corporation 100 Series/C230 Series Chipset Family USB 3.0 xHCI Controller (rev 31)
00:14.2 Signal processing controller: Intel Corporation 100 Series/C230 Series Chipset Family Thermal Subsystem (rev 31)
00:15.0 Signal processing controller: Intel Corporation 100 Series/C230 Series Chipset Family Serial IO I2C Controller #0 (rev 31)
00:16.0 Communication controller: Intel Corporation 100 Series/C230 Series Chipset Family MEI Controller #1 (rev 31)
00:17.0 SATA controller: Intel Corporation Q170/Q150/B150/H170/H110/Z170/CM236 Chipset SATA Controller [AHCI Mode] (rev 31)
00:1c.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 100 Series/C230 Series Chipset Family PCI Express Root Port #1 (rev f1)
00:1c.2 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 100 Series/C230 Series Chipset Family PCI Express Root Port #3 (rev f1)
00:1c.4 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 100 Series/C230 Series Chipset Family PCI Express Root Port #5 (rev f1)
00:1d.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 100 Series/C230 Series Chipset Family PCI Express Root Port #9 (rev f1)
00:1d.4 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 100 Series/C230 Series Chipset Family PCI Express Root Port #13 (rev f1)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation CM238 Chipset LPC/eSPI Controller (rev 31)
00:1f.2 Memory controller: Intel Corporation 100 Series/C230 Series Chipset Family Power Management Controller (rev 31)
00:1f.3 Audio device: Intel Corporation CM238 HD Audio Controller (rev 31)
00:1f.4 SMBus: Intel Corporation 100 Series/C230 Series Chipset Family SMBus (rev 31)
00:1f.6 Ethernet controller: Intel Corporation Ethernet Connection (5) I219-LM (rev 31)
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: NVIDIA Corporation GM107GLM [Quadro M1200 Mobile] (rev a2)
01:00.1 Audio device: NVIDIA Corporation GM107 High Definition Audio Controller [GeForce 940MX] (rev a1)
04:00.0 Network controller: Intel Corporation Wireless 8265 / 8275 (rev 78)
3e:00.0 Non-Volatile memory controller: Samsung Electronics Co Ltd NVMe SSD Controller SM981/PM981/PM983
3f:00.0 Unassigned class [ff00]: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTS525A PCI Express Card Reader (rev 01)
lspci -t
output:
-[0000:00]-+-00.0
           +-00.2
           +-01.0
           +-02.0
           +-02.1-[01]----00.0
           +-02.2-[02]----00.0
           +-02.4-[03]----00.0
           +-03.0
           +-04.0
           +-04.1-[04-63]--
           +-08.0
           +-08.1-[64]--+-00.0
           |            +-00.1
           |            +-00.2
           |            +-00.3
           |            +-00.4
           |            +-00.5
           |            \-00.6
           +-08.2-[65]--+-00.0
           |            \-00.1
           +-08.3-[66]--+-00.0
           |            +-00.3
           |            +-00.4
           |            \-00.6
           +-14.0
           +-14.3
           +-18.0
           +-18.1
           +-18.2
           +-18.3
           +-18.4
           +-18.5
           +-18.6
           \-18.7
PCIe TLC OPAL2.
sudo hdparm -Tt /dev/nvme0n1p5 on Ubuntu 20.04:
 Timing cached reads:   29812 MB in  1.99 seconds = 15007.00 MB/sec
 HDIO_DRIVE_CMD(identify) failed: Inappropriate ioctl for device
 Timing buffered disk reads: 6328 MB in  3.00 seconds = 2109.00 MB/sec
Nominal maximum sequential read speed: 3,000 MB/s
1TB.
sudo hdparm -Tt /dev/sda3 on Ubuntu 20.04:
 Timing cached reads:   29594 MB in  1.99 seconds = 14893.89 MB/sec
 Timing buffered disk reads: 386 MB in  3.01 seconds = 128.07 MB/sec
....
Nominal maximum speed: 140 MB/s
  • battery life:
    • 2023-04: on-browser streaming + light browsing on Ubuntu 22.10: about 2h45. Too low! Gotta try buying a new battery.
  • 2022-01-04 updated firmward after noticing that ubuntu 21.10 does not wake up from suspend seemed to happen every time when not connected to external power. dmidecode diff excerpt:
     BIOS Information
        Vendor: LENOVO
-       Version: N1UET40W (1.14 )
-       Release Date: 09/28/2017
+       Version: N1UET71W (1.45 )
+       Release Date: 07/18/2018
    used the "Ubuntu Software" GUI as mentioned at: support.lenovo.com/gb/en/solutions/ht510810-how-to-do-software-updates-linux. Kudos for making this accessible to newbs.
    After doing that, another update became available to: 0.1.56, clicked it and was much faster than the previous one, and didn't auto reboot. After manual reboot, dmidecode diffed again:
     BIOS Information
        Vendor: LENOVO
-       Version: N1UET71W (1.45 )
-       Release Date: 07/18/2018
+       Version: N1UET82W (1.56 )
+       Release Date: 08/12/2021
    plus a bunch of other lines.
  • 2021-06-05 upgraded to Ubuntu 21.04 with a clean install from an ISO. Selected
    • "Minimal installation"
    • "Erase disk and install Ubuntu". Notably, this erased the Microsoft Windows that came with the computer and was never used not even once
    • "Erase disk ans use ZFS"
    • Encrypt the new Ubuntu installation for security
    After this, the GUI felt fast, who would have thought that erasing a bunch of stuff would make the system faster!
    lsblk contains:
    zd0               230:0    0   500M  0 disk
└─keystore-rpool  253:0    0   484M  0 crypt /run/keystore/rpool
nvme0n1           259:0    0 476.9G  0 disk
├─nvme0n1p1       259:1    0   512M  0 part  /boot/efi
├─nvme0n1p2       259:2    0     2G  0 part
│ └─cryptoswap    253:1    0     2G  0 crypt
├─nvme0n1p3       259:3    0     2G  0 part
└─nvme0n1p4       259:4    0 472.4G  0 part
    and lsblk -f:
    zd0               crypto_LUKS 2
└─keystore-rpool  ext4        1.0   keystore-rpool
nvme0n1
├─nvme0n1p1       vfat        FAT32
├─nvme0n1p2       crypto_LUKS 2
│ └─cryptoswap
├─nvme0n1p3       zfs_member  5000  bpool
└─nvme0n1p4       zfs_member  5000  rpoo
    Then:
    grep '[rb]pool' /proc/mounts
    contains:
    rpool/ROOT/ubuntu_uvs1fq / zfs rw,relatime,xattr,posixacl 0 0
rpool/USERDATA/ciro_czngbg /home/ciro zfs rw,relatime,xattr,posixacl 0 0
rpool/USERDATA/root_czngbg /root zfs rw,relatime,xattr,posixacl 0 0
rpool/ROOT/ubuntu_uvs1fq/srv /srv zfs rw,relatime,xattr,posixacl 0 0
rpool/ROOT/ubuntu_uvs1fq/usr/local /usr/local zfs rw,relatime,xattr,posixacl 0 0
rpool/ROOT/ubuntu_uvs1fq/var/games /var/games zfs rw,relatime,xattr,posixacl 0 0
rpool/ROOT/ubuntu_uvs1fq/var/log /var/log zfs rw,relatime,xattr,posixacl 0 0
rpool/ROOT/ubuntu_uvs1fq/var/lib /var/lib zfs rw,relatime,xattr,posixacl 0 0
rpool/ROOT/ubuntu_uvs1fq/var/mail /var/mail zfs rw,relatime,xattr,posixacl 0 0
rpool/ROOT/ubuntu_uvs1fq/var/snap /var/snap zfs rw,relatime,xattr,posixacl 0 0
rpool/ROOT/ubuntu_uvs1fq/var/www /var/www zfs rw,relatime,xattr,posixacl 0 0
rpool/ROOT/ubuntu_uvs1fq/var/spool /var/spool zfs rw,relatime,xattr,posixacl 0 0
rpool/ROOT/ubuntu_uvs1fq/var/lib/AccountsService /var/lib/AccountsService zfs rw,relatime,xattr,posixacl 0 0
rpool/ROOT/ubuntu_uvs1fq/var/lib/NetworkManager /var/lib/NetworkManager zfs rw,relatime,xattr,posixacl 0 0
rpool/ROOT/ubuntu_uvs1fq/var/lib/apt /var/lib/apt zfs rw,relatime,xattr,posixacl 0 0
rpool/ROOT/ubuntu_uvs1fq/var/lib/dpkg /var/lib/dpkg zfs rw,relatime,xattr,posixacl 0 0
bpool/BOOT/ubuntu_uvs1fq /boot zfs rw,nodev,relatime,xattr,posixacl 0 0
    which gives an idea of how the above map to mountpoints.
    Had two GUI freezes since installation, a fixed images shows no matter what I do, possibly graphics only, but impossible to tell (next time I'll try SSH access). No Nvidia drivers installed yet.
2020-06-06: dropped some lemon juice on the bottom left of touchpad. Bottom left button not working anymore... I'm an idiot. There are many other alternatives, but very aggravating, I'll replace it for sure. Can't find the exact replacement part or any videos showing its replacement online easliy, dang. For the T430: www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3lzV9uXRjU Asked at: forums.lenovo.com/t5/ThinkPad-P-and-W-Series-Mobile-Workstations/P51-left-bottom-button-below-trackpad-mouse-left-click-stopped-working-possible-to-replace/m-p/5019903 Also I could not access it because you need to remove the HDD first: www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Klawxc7T_Y and I can't pull it out even with considerable force, unlike in the video... And OMG, those button caps are impossible to re-install once removed!!! Then when I put the whole thing back together, the upper buttons were not working anymore. FUUUUUUUUCK. When first opening I pulled on it without properly removing the cap and it came off, but it didn't look broken in any way and I put it back in. Keyboard works thank God, so right black connector is fine, left white one oppears to be the one for upper keys and trackpoint, both of which stopped working. The hardware manual confirms that they are both part of the same device, so basically a mouse :-) TODO can it be bought separately from te keyboard? Doesn't look like it, photo of keyboard part includes those buttons. The manual also confirms that the bottom buttons are one device with the trackpad "trackpad with buttons", thus forming the second entire mouse.
2019-04-17: popup asking about "ThinkPad P51 Management Engine Update" from from 182.29.3287 to 184.60.3561, said yes.
Ubuntu 17.10 setup after buying it:
Battery life shown by Ubuntu battery app after installation:
  • before NVIDIA driver setup: 8h
  • after: 6.5h
glmark2 -b build:duration=3:model=horse
~4.8K
Monero 0.18.3.1 hashrate: 2.6 KH/s
Board LED does not turn on (turned on on first plug, Ethernet always turns on):
Now just HDMI does not work. Possibly a monitor vs television problem:
The file:
/media/$USER/MICROBIT/DETAILS.TXT
contains:
DAPLink Firmware - see https://mbed.com/daplink
Version: 0234
Build:   Oct 12 2015 14:53:22
2022-10-14: stopped being able to connect to Ubuntu 22.04. Was trying to do a UART video demo, connected USB, disconnected, connected, disconnected several times on different filming attempts. Was working some of the time, Ubuntu did recognize it, I even saw UART output for sure, but was a bit unstable. But then at one point it just stopped getting recognized by Ubuntu 100% of the time. The board is still being powered by USB, and the previously flashed program still runs, but nothing showed on sudo dmesg -w at all, and I can't reprogram it!
A day later, managed to get tit to connect once more with a different cable, but just once!
[15310.385055] usb 1-5: new full-speed USB device number 38 using xhci_hcd
[15310.534996] usb 1-5: New USB device found, idVendor=0d28, idProduct=0204, bcdDevice=10.00
[15310.535000] usb 1-5: New USB device strings: Mfr=1, Product=2, SerialNumber=3
[15310.535001] usb 1-5: Product: MBED CMSIS-DAP
[15310.535002] usb 1-5: Manufacturer: MBED
[15310.535003] usb 1-5: SerialNumber: 9900023436424e45001d30150000005d00000000cb8928bd
[15310.541267] usb-storage 1-5:1.0: USB Mass Storage device detected
[15310.541643] scsi host4: usb-storage 1-5:1.0
[15310.542658] hid-generic 0003:0D28:0204.000A: hiddev1,hidraw2: USB HID v1.00 Device [MBED MBED CMSIS-DAP] on usb-0000:00:14.0-5/input3
[15310.543121] cdc_acm 1-5:1.1: ttyACM0: USB ACM device
[15311.549969] scsi 4:0:0:0: Direct-Access     MBED     DAPLINK VFS      0.1  PQ: 0 ANSI: 2
[15311.550273] scsi 4:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg1 type 0
[15311.550825] sd 4:0:0:0: [sdb] 16512 512-byte logical blocks: (8.45 MB/8.06 MiB)
[15311.551052] sd 4:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off
[15311.551054] sd 4:0:0:0: [sdb] Mode Sense: 03 00 00 00
[15311.551204] sd 4:0:0:0: [sdb] No Caching mode page found
[15311.551207] sd 4:0:0:0: [sdb] Assuming drive cache: write through
[15311.572160] sd 4:0:0:0: [sdb] Attached SCSI removable disk
[15316.317438] usb 1-5: reset full-speed USB device number 38 using xhci_hcd
[15316.445093] usb 1-5: device descriptor read/64, error -71
[15316.681102] usb 1-5: device descriptor read/64, error -71
[15316.917102] usb 1-5: reset full-speed USB device number 38 using xhci_hcd
[15317.045028] usb 1-5: device descriptor read/64, error -71
[15317.281149] usb 1-5: device descriptor read/64, error -71
[15317.517154] usb 1-5: reset full-speed USB device number 38 using xhci_hcd
[15317.517466] usb 1-5: Device not responding to setup address.
[15317.725358] usb 1-5: Device not responding to setup address.
[15317.933042] usb 1-5: device not accepting address 38, error -71
[15318.061027] usb 1-5: reset full-speed USB device number 38 using xhci_hcd
[15318.061347] usb 1-5: Device not responding to setup address.
[15318.269270] usb 1-5: Device not responding to setup address.
[15318.477018] usb 1-5: device not accepting address 38, error -71
[15318.477153] usb 1-5: USB disconnect, device number 38
[15318.652912] usb 1-5: new full-speed USB device number 39 using xhci_hcd
[15318.785044] usb 1-5: device descriptor read/64, error -71
[15319.021068] usb 1-5: device descriptor read/64, error -71
[15319.257030] usb 1-5: new full-speed USB device number 40 using xhci_hcd
[15319.385075] usb 1-5: device descriptor read/64, error -71
[15319.621147] usb 1-5: device descriptor read/64, error -71
[15319.729170] usb usb1-port5: attempt power cycle
[15320.384941] usb 1-5: new full-speed USB device number 41 using xhci_hcd
[15320.385176] usb 1-5: Device not responding to setup address.
[15320.593188] usb 1-5: Device not responding to setup address.
[15320.801023] usb 1-5: device not accepting address 41, error -71
[15320.928909] usb 1-5: new full-speed USB device number 42 using xhci_hcd
[15320.929073] usb 1-5: Device not responding to setup address.
[15321.137244] usb 1-5: Device not responding to setup address.
[15321.344947] usb 1-5: device not accepting address 42, error -71
[15321.345173] usb usb1-port5: unable to enumerate USB device
[15321.384929] FAT-fs (sdb): unable to read boot sector to mark fs as dirty
Exact same USB and port could still mount the Raspberry Pi Pico.
About the brand: Raspberry Pi
With pre-soldered male pin headers.
>>> machine.unique_id()
b'\xe6ad\x08C8%$'
As of 2018-12, I believe that I might have fried the UART on this board when I burnt my last UART to USB converter by connecting ground to 5V.
Linux kernel logs don't show, but do show with the exact same components on the Pi 3 (SD card with enable_uart=1 + image Raspbian Lite 2018-11-03 and UART cables).
Serial from cat /proc/cpuinfo: 00000000a50c1f69
Datasheets: Raspberry Pi 2.
Linux on SSH and bare metal blinker both work on this board, so the rest of the board seems alive.
Serial from cat /proc/cpuinfo: 00000000c77ddb77
Datasheets: Raspberry Pi 3.
The cartridge is number 33 or 33 XL.
27 Inch QHD (2560x1440) Monitor, 60Hz, IPS, 5ms, Ultrathin Bezel, 99% sRGB, DisplayPort, HDMI, 5x USB, 3 Year Warranty
Home 2017 TalkTalk 38Mbps nominal, Google M-lab speed test:
Home 2023:
  • cell phone wifi: 260 Mps download
Bought December 2023 for 300 pounds, so 15 pounds / TB. Needs power supply unfrotunately besides USB, the largest one without needing power supply was only 5 TB at the time so not worth it, given that my P14s alreay carriers 2 TB. 10x is a must for the external crap.
Noise: it has a constant pleasant hum, with a not so nice click every 5 seconds or so. Reasonable, but not amazingly incredible.
The size is reasonable, not megaportable, but definitely reasonable.
~1TB.
Internal hard drive likely removed from some old computer I lost track of, kept in a crappy case, incredible stuff.
Ubuntu 20.04 gnome-disks benchmark, NTFS partition: 40MB/s.
~1TB.
Has a separate power cord, not USB powered. Unbelievable. Edit: actually high ends are still like that as of 2023, e.g. at that time, a the max non-cabled was 5 TB, but top of line was 20 TB.
Disk label: wd1t.
Ubuntu 20.04 gnome-disks benchmark, ext4 partition: 37MB/s.
Marked read speeds up to 150 MB/s
Write speed burning 5 GB Ubuntu ISO from Dell Inspiron 15: 5.4 MB/s
For clean Dell Inspiron 15 3520 cryptocurrenty laptop bootstrap and backup.
~8GB, lsblk reports 7796176 * 1KB = 7983284224 bytes.
We got a handful of those from École Polytechnique at the end of studies I think.
They are shaped like bicornes, which is super cool, but also super impractical!
Markings: "AX ÉCOLE POLYTECHNIQUE PROMOTION X2009"
20.04 gnome-disks program reports it as: "SMI USB DISK".
From Ubuntu 20.04 on an ext4 formatted one:
/dev/sdb:
 Timing cached reads:   28656 MB in  1.99 seconds = 14421.31 MB/sec
SG_IO: bad/missing sense data, sb[]:  70 00 05 00 00 00 00 0a 00 00 00 00 20 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
 Timing buffered disk reads:  42 MB in  3.03 seconds =  13.88 MB/sec
With Linux Unified Key Setup + ext4 the results are similar, maybe hdparam bypasses it?
/dev/sdb:
 Timing cached reads:   28326 MB in  1.99 seconds = 14251.55 MB/sec
SG_IO: bad/missing sense data, sb[]:  70 00 05 00 00 00 00 0a 00 00 00 00 20 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
 Timing buffered disk reads:  38 MB in  3.11 seconds =  12.23 MB/sec
gnome-disks LUKS + ext4 benchmark with default params also gives about 14 MB/s.
Skullcandy earphones, first one circa. 2016 most likely. Used them a lot, these are good.
2023-07: one of the sides broke near center, rebuying.
2021-07: wire half broke near connector, only works in some positions. The funny thing is: only voices seem to be blocked out! Rebuying.
2021-06: a small bottom piece of the left earpiece broke. Wire seems find, that is like a little extension to protect wire. Let's see for how long.
2020-20: wires at one of ears broke, not sure how.
Tech specs:
Connection Type: 3.5mm AUX Cable
Impedence: 32 ohms
Driver Diameter: 9mm
THD: <0.1% (1mW/500Hz) (0.0234)
Sound Pressure Level: 95 dB (1mW/500Hz)
Frequency Response: 20kHz - 20Hz
Headphone Type: In-Ear
Bought: 2022.
Noticeably worse than the Skullcandy Smokin' Buds 2 for a similar price.

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