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Upgrade old i3 370m CPU in dying laptop

David_1276
By David_1276
in Laptops and Pre-Built Systems
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The other day, I came across a 1st Gen i3 system, the Toshiba Portege m780-112, that was being given away at an office clear out. I picked it up, brought it home, cleaned it and successfully installed windows 10 on the old hard drive. After giving the machine a quick spin, I noticed how remarkably efficient it was, even to the point of having it as a daily driver, since I don't/ never have had a laptop, and with a bit more power (I.e a new ~500GB SSD, 8GB RAM (both of which I have)) I feel that this machine could be a winner as a cheap but efficient little netbook for work. However, that dual core i3 is certainly a problem, and would be the bottleneck in the system if I decided to use this PC.

 

Finally, my question; which, if any, i7s could I fit in this? I figured that would be the call, since they are super cheap considering they are so old now. In terms of TDP, the i3 is 35W, but there are only 2 i7s, the 620 and 640, both dual core,  that share this. I have been informed that for some reason, you can't just swap a dual core for a quad core on PGA988, however if this was possible I'd definitely go for the 45W quad core i7 840qm, the best price/ performance CPU of PGA 988. So, basically, can I put only a 35W dual core i7, 45W dual core i7 or 45W quad core i7, or even only an i5 or no upgrade path despite the modularity? And will the motherboard natively support any of the better CPUs, or need a bios update? Thanks for any info, If you need any more, I'll try to provide, but I just don't want to fry this old piece of kit!

Quote

"Good things might come to those who wait, but not to those who wait too late" Bill Withers, 1981

 

My PC:

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 2700x Motherboard: MSI X470 Gaming M7 AC  RAM: 16GB TeamGroup T-Force Delta RGB (2×8GB 3200MHz) GPU:AMD Radeon RX VEGA 64 MSI Air Boost OC Case: Lian Li Lancool 2 (With all accessories) Storage: Seagate Barracuda 510 512GB NVME M.2 SSD, 2× 5400RPM Seagate NAS 2TB HDDs PSU: GameMax RGB-850 850W Modular RGB 80+ Gold Display: Viotek GN32DB 32″ Curved Monitor – 144Hz 1440p WQHD VA with FreeSync Cooling: AMD Wraith Prism RGB Keyboard: Anne Pro 2 60% NKRO Bluetooth 4.0 Type-C RGB 61 Keys Mechanical Gaming Keyboard, Gateron Brown Switches Mouse: Logitech G402 Hyperion Fury Wired Gaming Mouse Sound: RAZER Kraken Gaming Headset Operating System: Windows 10 Pro Laptop: Clevo P641RE Gaming Laptop (14.1", i7-6700HQ, GTX 970M, 500GB NVME M.2, 16GB DDR4) Phone: Samsung Galaxy S9 128GB Coral Blue Earphones: Sennheiser Momentum True Wireless 2

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That CPU is PGA-988A.

Someone else asked a similar in the past on Tom's Hardware:https://forums.tomshardware.com/threads/pga988-socket-processor-recommendation.2006127/

Apparently - according to this user- an Core i7 920XM is possible to use. Although you apparently have to double check the CPU is actually socketed and not soldered. A BIOS update may also be needed..

"We're all in this together, might as well be friends" Tom, Toonami.

 

mini eLiXiVy: my open source 65% mechanical PCB, a build log, PCB anatomy and discussing open source licenses: https://linustechtips.com/topic/1366493-elixivy-a-65-mechanical-keyboard-build-log-pcb-anatomy-and-how-i-open-sourced-this-project/

 

mini_cardboard: a 4% keyboard build log and how keyboards work: https://linustechtips.com/topic/1328547-mini_cardboard-a-4-keyboard-build-log-and-how-keyboards-work/

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3 minutes ago, minibois said:

That CPU is PGA-988A.

Someone else asked a similar in the past on Tom's Hardware:https://forums.tomshardware.com/threads/pga988-socket-processor-recommendation.2006127/

Apparently - according to this user- an Core i7 920XM is possible to use. Although you apparently have to double check the CPU is actually socketed and not soldered. A BIOS update may also be needed..

Thanks so what your saying is is that the i7 840qm or whatever is not compatible with the i3 370m socket? I know there are 2 types of PGA988, A and B, but I thought A encompassed all 1st gen, and B encompassed 2nd and 3rd gen, similar to LGA 1156 and 1155. The CPU is sockets as I checked when disassembling the laptop. When I get home I'll check the most recent BIOS released for that laptop, and install it. Thanks!

Quote

"Good things might come to those who wait, but not to those who wait too late" Bill Withers, 1981

 

My PC:

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 2700x Motherboard: MSI X470 Gaming M7 AC  RAM: 16GB TeamGroup T-Force Delta RGB (2×8GB 3200MHz) GPU:AMD Radeon RX VEGA 64 MSI Air Boost OC Case: Lian Li Lancool 2 (With all accessories) Storage: Seagate Barracuda 510 512GB NVME M.2 SSD, 2× 5400RPM Seagate NAS 2TB HDDs PSU: GameMax RGB-850 850W Modular RGB 80+ Gold Display: Viotek GN32DB 32″ Curved Monitor – 144Hz 1440p WQHD VA with FreeSync Cooling: AMD Wraith Prism RGB Keyboard: Anne Pro 2 60% NKRO Bluetooth 4.0 Type-C RGB 61 Keys Mechanical Gaming Keyboard, Gateron Brown Switches Mouse: Logitech G402 Hyperion Fury Wired Gaming Mouse Sound: RAZER Kraken Gaming Headset Operating System: Windows 10 Pro Laptop: Clevo P641RE Gaming Laptop (14.1", i7-6700HQ, GTX 970M, 500GB NVME M.2, 16GB DDR4) Phone: Samsung Galaxy S9 128GB Coral Blue Earphones: Sennheiser Momentum True Wireless 2

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4 minutes ago, David_1276 said:

Thanks so what your saying is is that the i7 840qm or whatever is not compatible with the i3 370m socket? I know there are 2 types of PGA988, A and B, but I thought A encompassed all 1st gen, and B encompassed 2nd and 3rd gen, similar to LGA 1156 and 1155. The CPU is sockets as I checked when disassembling the laptop. When I get home I'll check the most recent BIOS released for that laptop, and install it. Thanks!

Looks like the current CPU is A. The i7-840QM  is too: 

https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Core+i7-840QM+%40+1.87GHz&id=854

 

And looks like indeed the i7-920XM is indeed B: 

https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Core+i7-920XM+%40+2.00GHz&id=864

 

Not sure if both would work..

I saw someone mention this on another video about upgrading:

Quote

To find compatibility: first, find what chipset your motherboard uses, search what cpus are compatible with that chipset, those are your options, second type the name of your current processor into google and click the intel webpage with information on it, see if the socket and tdp matches the  processor you want to upgrade to, also check what speed your ram is and see if that speed is supported by your cpu, if not you can aalso upgrade that, and also there could be bios compatibility issues, but usually updating your bios to its newest version will fix it. Also use userbenchmark to find what processors are better please

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rBPB90jKKNY

 

Although looking at the chipset's ARK page, I don't even see the 370M on the compatible page...

https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/43187/mobile-intel-qm57-express-chipset.html

"We're all in this together, might as well be friends" Tom, Toonami.

 

mini eLiXiVy: my open source 65% mechanical PCB, a build log, PCB anatomy and discussing open source licenses: https://linustechtips.com/topic/1366493-elixivy-a-65-mechanical-keyboard-build-log-pcb-anatomy-and-how-i-open-sourced-this-project/

 

mini_cardboard: a 4% keyboard build log and how keyboards work: https://linustechtips.com/topic/1328547-mini_cardboard-a-4-keyboard-build-log-and-how-keyboards-work/

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11 hours ago, minibois said:

Looks like the current CPU is A. The i7-840QM  is too: 

https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Core+i7-840QM+%40+1.87GHz&id=854

 

And looks like indeed the i7-920XM is indeed B: 

https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Core+i7-920XM+%40+2.00GHz&id=864

 

Not sure if both would work..

I saw someone mention this on another video about upgrading:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rBPB90jKKNY

 

Although looking at the chipset's ARK page, I don't even see the 370M on the compatible page...

https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/43187/mobile-intel-qm57-express-chipset.html

Thanks very much for the info  I did see that on the ARK page which confused me but I guess they just forgot about it, as there is no way it has a different chipset.

Quote

"Good things might come to those who wait, but not to those who wait too late" Bill Withers, 1981

 

My PC:

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 2700x Motherboard: MSI X470 Gaming M7 AC  RAM: 16GB TeamGroup T-Force Delta RGB (2×8GB 3200MHz) GPU:AMD Radeon RX VEGA 64 MSI Air Boost OC Case: Lian Li Lancool 2 (With all accessories) Storage: Seagate Barracuda 510 512GB NVME M.2 SSD, 2× 5400RPM Seagate NAS 2TB HDDs PSU: GameMax RGB-850 850W Modular RGB 80+ Gold Display: Viotek GN32DB 32″ Curved Monitor – 144Hz 1440p WQHD VA with FreeSync Cooling: AMD Wraith Prism RGB Keyboard: Anne Pro 2 60% NKRO Bluetooth 4.0 Type-C RGB 61 Keys Mechanical Gaming Keyboard, Gateron Brown Switches Mouse: Logitech G402 Hyperion Fury Wired Gaming Mouse Sound: RAZER Kraken Gaming Headset Operating System: Windows 10 Pro Laptop: Clevo P641RE Gaming Laptop (14.1", i7-6700HQ, GTX 970M, 500GB NVME M.2, 16GB DDR4) Phone: Samsung Galaxy S9 128GB Coral Blue Earphones: Sennheiser Momentum True Wireless 2

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