Lenovo M71e SFF - i3-2100 -- Boat anchor or still good for light use?

[An0maly_76]

Old friend hooked me up with this machine when it was still fairly up-to-date. I realize the 2100 is generally laughable today, even though it can still run older or less intensive games. Long story short, another member was interested in it, but seems like they might have found something a little more modern, which they said they'd get back to me on.

 

After sitting for two years without powering on, it was fussy as a newborn baby about waking up, but I eventually got it to fire up. RAM module was loose or had dust in it, no big deal. It runs fine. However, I thought I remembered it had a 2400, not the 2100.

 

So, assuming the other member has found a better deal and rolls with it, what could I use this 2100 for? It has 8GB of RAM and a 200GB HDD. I fleetingly thought about a PCIe riser M.2 and upgrading to 16GB RAM, but I'm not sure what I could do with it. Keep in mind, my daily driver is a 5900X with an RTX3060ti and 32GB of RAM, so I'm hardly considering this thing for gaming per se. I just thought maybe it would be an okay setup for web surfing so I could use less power when not gaming or something. Or perhaps a firewall.

 

Thoughts? I'd like to think this thing is still good for something besides a boat anchor.

[tkitch]

Anything that could do, could be replaced by a raspberry Pi, and you'd spend a lot less on electricity to run it, as well as space.
A 2nd gen i3 really is so old that it's not worth much of anything. 

[Needfuldoer]

It's not a bad start for a NAS. You should have room for a couple 3.5" drives (even if you have to replace the optical drive to get there).

 

Unless Lenovo added support for Ivy Bridge in a BIOS update, an i7 2600 is the end of the road for that machine. At least they're about 40 bucks on eBay right now, and will get you up to a hyperthreaded quad core.

[An0maly_76]

Yeah, I didn't realize it was only two-core. I thought initially it was four. I know Ryzen better than I know Intel.

[RONOTHAN##]

It might be a good idea to try loading some sort of Linux distro and using it as a kind of test box, but that can be done by a VM pretty easily. Maybe give it a kid or something to use as their first computer, but there's really not much use for it outside of that. 

[An0maly_76]

4 minutes ago, RONOTHAN## said:

It might be a good idea to try loading some sort of Linux distro and using it as a kind of test box, but that can be done by a VM pretty easily. Maybe give it a kid or something to use as their first computer, but there's really not much use for it outside of that. 

That was kind of the plan, kid on a budget for his first machine, but he found a deal on a 4440. Can't be mad at him for that, but it's not a done deal yet. It's already running Centros. If he jumps on that 4440 (I would) I was thinking about setting it up as a dedicated box for old games like Sierra OnLine Quest games and such.

[RONOTHAN##]

2 minutes ago, An0maly_76 said:

That was kind of the plan, kid on a budget for his first machine, but he found a deal on a 4440. Can't be mad at him for that. It's already running Centros. Was thinking about setting it up as a dedicated box for old games like Sierra OnLine Quest games and such.

Problem is any hardware that will run on that machine will also run on your main system. There's not an architectural difference between the i3 and your main rig like true retro machines would be. It's old enough that it doesn't make sense to try to use for anything important, and it's not old enough to be used as a collectors item or a retro rocket like you were thinking of. 

 

Maybe try to give it to someone else, list it on FB Marketplace for free to anyone who needs it? I can't see a genuine use for it that can't either be done by your main machine with a VM running (or DOS Box), it's basically a case of loading up some sort of lighter weight Linux distro (Lubuntu is a decent option) and hoping someone else just needs a basic web browsing machine. 

[An0maly_76]

I was just thinking in terms of, if I can't find someone else who can use it, I don't need an RTX3060ti and 5900X drawing 400-450W to surf the web or play old games.

 

Actually, I'm thinking about doing some music recording, and I wonder if this dog could do that if this other member doesn't need it. I use Audacity with some electronics that are USB-connected, but don't have to be.

Edited May 29, 2022 by An0maly_76
Revised

[GuiltySpark_]

54 minutes ago, An0maly_76 said:

...I don't need an RTX3060ti and 5900X drawing 400-450W to surf the web or play old games.

 

Surfing the web those parts are pulling 75-85W at most from the wall. If anything, still less than a 100w lightbulb. Unless fully loaded are they drawing the full amount they're designed to draw. 

[Zodiark1593]

A NAS, or a basic Linux PC are pretty sensible uses for that thing. Sandy Bridge is still competent for such uses today. I've a Pentium J2900 machine (really, just a juiced-up Atom) that I threw Ubuntu on, and it runs a heck of a lot faster than with Windows 7. It only has 2 SATA ports, so I'm debating if I should bother with a RAID 1 setup, or if it's not worth my time. If it had 4 or more, I'd probably look into using ZFS.

[An0maly_76]

18 hours ago, GuiltySpark_ said:

Surfing the web those parts are pulling 75-85W at most from the wall. If anything, still less than a 100w lightbulb. Unless fully loaded are they drawing the full amount they're designed to draw. 

At 175W web surfing, and 200-240W playing MP4s, my UPS says otherwise. I have an 850W PSU, a 6TB HDD, 1TB M.2, and seven 120 mm fans that have to run a little harder to work with 34 square inches of intake area. I have a 55" display on that UPS also. But I doubt that 55" draws 250W or more. Of course, I also spawn 15-20 vehicles in BeamNG after spawning 15-20 traffic vehicles and have a demolition derby. I also run 1000-mile loads in American Truck Simulator blowing by traffic at 95 on the shoulder, so yeah, I probably push my rig a little harder at times than some.

Edited May 29, 2022 by An0maly_76
Revised, more info

[An0maly_76]

I was just thinking... Playing video files shouldn't be too much for this thing. If the other member doesn't take it, I hate to scrap it, it runs perfectly. Granted, 2-core performance doesn't do much today, but it could make a decent dedicated media player. And a NAS for a central movie / music storage. For such read-intensive use, I should think a PCIe M.2 could help performance a lot. Only reason for even thinking about this is reduced power consumption for such use. I figure this machine might pull about 50W-80W or less playing movies and music, whereas my 5900X rig pulls about 200-240W.

 

Looking inside, this machine has two x1 slots and one x16. Most adapters for this sort of thing are x4, but I do see a few for x1. Would an M.2's performance be affected by the difference between x1 and x4? Also, the 2100's iGPU is listed as Intel HD Graphics 2000. I found a low-profile NVS 315 for cheap, sources show this would be about 100% better, but not sure it would matter for playing back MP4 files.

 

Also, the case has issues. Doesn't concern me and wouldn't throw a lot of money at it, but some clips are broken, and the lid doesn't fit well, a problem with a PSU lockout switch. Replacement unavailable, so I also thought about a case swap. Would this motherboard be considered mini-ITX or micro-ATX? I can get a microATX desktop case with 265W PSU for about $88, a mini-ITX slimline tower for about $131.

[8tg]

You won’t be able to boot from a pcie m.2 drive on Sandy bridge, you’ll need a sata ssd if the hard drive becomes an issue. Do a fresh install of a modern Linux distro, 4gb of ram will be fine for casual web browsing use, 8gb is plenty and you will not use 16gb at all. I wouldn’t bother upgrading the i3 to an i7 unless you want to game on it, because otherwise the i5 2400 will be a huge jump in cpu performance by going from 2 cores to 4 cores, and the i5 2400 costs like 15$.

This is not obsolete hardware for this use case by any means, I think sometimes it’s forgotten that computer technology has been advancing slower than ever for the past 10 years. Even the i3 in there with its igpu will handle just about anything you could reasonably do with a web browser, 1080p video streaming, whatever. And then it’s got it’s own slew of games which would run well on intel HD3000.

 

I can still browse this forum from a 21 year old Pentium 3 based thinkpad running xp with 256mb of ram:

Spoiler

Old is not obsolete, and definitely not in the case of something as relatively new as Sandy bridge.

[An0maly_76]

 

 

55 minutes ago, 8tg said:

You won’t be able to boot from a pcie m.2 drive on Sandy bridge, you’ll need a sata ssd if the hard drive becomes an issue. Do a fresh install of a modern Linux distro, 4gb of ram will be fine for casual web browsing use, 8gb is plenty and you will not use 16gb at all. I wouldn’t bother upgrading the i3 to an i7 unless you want to game on it, because otherwise the i5 2400 will be a huge jump in cpu performance by going from 2 cores to 4 cores, and the i5 2400 costs like 15$.

This is not obsolete hardware for this use case by any means, I think sometimes it’s forgotten that computer technology has been advancing slower than ever for the past 10 years. Even the i3 in there with its igpu will handle just about anything you could reasonably do with a web browser, 1080p video streaming, whatever. And then it’s got it’s own slew of games which would run well on intel HD3000.

Old is not obsolete, and definitely not in the case of something as relatively new as Sandy bridge.

@8tgYeah, that's kinda what I was thinking. It's entirely suitable for the use I'm thinking. I was editing my last post when you replied.

 

This other member found an i5-4440 with 8GB RAM, a 1050 and 1TBHDD including a monitor for $265, not much more than they'd pay for shipping this M71e. I'd go that route too if it were available. I just don't want to scrap a perfectly good machine if there's a purpose it can still serve, should they not take it.

 

Specs show the 2100 as having Intel Graphics HD 2000, not the 3000, was that a typo?

 

The 2400 / 2500 / 2600 are supported, but where have you seen an i5-2400 for $15? Also, can a 2100 or 2400 (even the 2600) really take full advantage of a 3,500 Mbps M.2? Would an M.2 still deliver that in an x1 PCIe riser? I also found a $20 NVS 315 for about $20, supposedly besting the 2000 iGPU by 100%. Other / better low-profile cards would fit, but are they really necessary, even with the 2400 or 2600?

[8tg]

32 minutes ago, An0maly_76 said:

 

 

@8tgYeah, that's kinda what I was thinking. It's entirely suitable for the use I'm thinking.

 

This other member found an i5-4440 with 8GB RAM, a 1050 and 1TBHDD including a monitor for $265, not much more than they'd pay for shipping this M71e. I'd go that route too if it were available. I just don't want to scrap a perfectly good machine if there's a purpose it can still serve, should they not take it.

 

Be aware that specs show this i3 as having Intel Graphics HD 2000, not the 3000, unless that was a typo. I was editing my last post when you replied.

 

The 2400 / 2500 / 2600 are supported, but where have you seen an i5-2400 for $15? Also, can a 2100 or 2400 (even the 2600) really take full advantage of a 3,500 Mbps M.2? Would an M.2 still deliver that in an x1 PCIe riser? I also found a $20 NVS 315 for about $20, supposedly besting the 2000 iGPU by 100%. Other / better low-profile cards would fit, but are they really necessary, even with the 2400 or 2600?

eBay 

worth upgrading to even for casual use

I forgot the i3’s had lesser igpu than the mobile equivalents. For a dgpu if you wanted a dgpu, I’d get a gt 730 as they’re maybe 30-40$ on eBay as well and will hold their own a lot better than the Quadro nvs options which are mostly meant for having a lot of displays.

Pcie 3.0 x1 is only just shy of 1gbps at best, you’d be better off with something like pcie to msata and using an msata ssd if you wanted to use that slot, or just using a regular sata ssd since that’ll be fast enough by all means

[An0maly_76]

So even the 2600 wouldn't really need an M.2 then? I've found a couple cases that really don't have space for a full SSD, which is why I considered the PCIe riser M.2 idea. I'm also curious which form factor this motherboard might be... It's not mini-ITX, but not quite sure it qualifies as micro-ATX, either, though it seems closest to that.

 

[An0maly_76]

4 hours ago, 8tg said:

You won’t be able to boot from a pcie m.2 drive on Sandy bridge, you’ll need a sata ssd if the hard drive becomes an issue.

 

So you're saying that the Sandy bridge can only boot from the SATA ports and nothing else? What about something like these? Probably not cost-effective after buying an M.2, and I think an SSHD would be better bang-for-the-buck, but it's a thought.

 

https://www.amazon.com/Sabrent-2-5-Inch-Aluminum-Enclosure-EC-M2SA/dp/B01N6PMZLW

 

https://www.amazon.com/SinLoon-Combine-Adapter-Converter-SATA3-0/dp/B07TPBC34D

 

Is it possible to adapt one of the onboard SATA ports to a USB port, say as an expansion slot cover?

[An0maly_76]

So I got to thinking about another angle. Not that I regret building my 5900X, but I wondered about other possibilities that I could suggest to others, since hardware prices don't seem to be going down and there is nearly no comprehensible price difference between certain platforms and variations within. And in poking around, I learned a bit more than I knew before.

 

First, while I knew the 2011-ish H61 mobo in this M71e wasn't the best thing going, I had no idea how bad it really sucked.

 

Secondly, at first glance, the top-shelf LGA1155 CPU's performance is sort of on par with my old R7-1700.

 

However...I found an $86 LGA1155 B75 chipset mobo with (HOLY SH*T) an M.2 slot. One major drawback though -- apparently only 2nd / 3rd gen are available for the LGA1155, leaving the 3770 as the best option. Ermmm... And the point of the M.2 slot was, again?

 

Soooooo... (as MaximBady oft says) Wondering what was possible, I pieced together a hypothetical LGA1155 build, with the idea of scavenging the M71E for what was worth salvaging (spoiler alert: little to nothing) to see what was possible.

 

M71E's RAM is 1333 -- a joke for much beyond basic use. Not a fan of G.Skill, but their Sniper DDR3-2400 was the best thing I could find. $50, roughly.

 

The whole reason for selecting this particular mobo was the M.2, but knowing the fastest would be no help here, I chose an SN570 solely because Amazon current has them cheaper than an SN550. $89.

 

M71E's HDD is a 200GB Seagate -- fairly good for when it was new, not so great now. Not a fan of Seagate, either, but their Constellation 4TB was a suitable upgrade. $60.

 

As another member here pointed out, eBay has i7-2600s dirt-cheap. I even found an i7-3770 for about $40.

Highly recommended for the 3770, the Pure Rock 2 Black is $45 on Amazon.

 

A virtual clone of the M71E's flimsy case, complete with 265W PSU, is available on Amazon for $88.

 

Invidia low-profile GT730 video card with HDMI - $50 on eBay.

 

For $372, the system runs. But I went a little further.

 

The case allows use of a slimline laptop form factor SATA DVD drive, available on Amazon for $30.

 

Now we're up to $402. I didn't count OS because I already have Win10.

 

But how does this system really stack up to my previous R7-1700 rig, somewhat mismatched (GTX1650S, 32GB DDR4-3200, 1TB SN550 M.2)? Sadly, it really does not. Four cores against eight is no fair fight to start with, even with the 1650 struggling to keep up with the 1700, and 32GB is always better than 8GB. The only thing that levels the playing field is the SN570, which I'm not even sure the 3770 can take full advantage of. In reality, it's closer to the Ryzen 2400.

 

I know not every source on the Internet is credible, but CPUAgent rated even this build, a far cry from a bone-stock M71E, quite poorly, reflecting a severe bottleneck and dismally low FPS, and that's using nothing from the original machine when you get right down to it. The M.2 might help with loading, but it would seem that even with its best 4-core / 8-thread i7-3770, and the best storage, RAM and video updates, the LGA1155 platform has little, if anything to offer today beyond basic home use and casual gaming on dated titles... And if it could talk, would say...

 

 

LTT's $69 "Gaming" PC was an LGA775, not as advanced as the LGA1155, but achieved decent low-medium setting gaming by swapping to a four-core processor (a Q9550, $30 IIRC) that is on par with the i3-2100. And a 3770 is cheap enough at $40. BUT... they also had to install faster and more RAM no price mentioned, a GT750 ($150-$170 if you can find one). And even for gaming, 200GB is hardly enough, at least a 1TB HDD is necessary. And LTT actually admitted they kind of cheated by adding an SSD before doing any testing (yes, it saved them time, but it robs us of the improvement such an upgrade made in this case). And realistically, will a 240W power supply handle all this? Not to mention we're starting to push the bang-for-buck / no-buck threshold beyond which it may not be worth it.

 

And a media server needs MUCH MORE storage, upwards of $150-$400. My 5900X rig has a 6TB HDD, only used for movies and backup storage that I could swap for this. And a 120GB M.2 with a SATA adapter would yield a bootable Linux or Windows partition without disturbing the 6TB. It would likely pull 50W-75W as a media server.

 

Hence, it would seem that while this machine is hardly useless, it can only maintain relevance in today's market with about $500-$700 in upgrades. Were it an LGA1151 or LGA1150 with better processor upgrade options, it might be worth it.

 

Hence, I have to concur that while it may still be relevant for non-intensive use such as a media player or even light gaming, unless I can do so without spending money, it's just not worth the hassle. Maybe if I already had some of the parts mentioned here, or if its existing storage had already been upgraded. But even a good-quality 2-4TB SSD costs more than the machine is worth, and there are no other easy or cost-effective solutions that would yield the storage needed for such use.

 

Next best thing is dual 2TB M.2s in a RAID-style SATA adapter, but it's hardly cost-effective. At $170-$180 each, a pair of 2TB SN550s or SN570s would be $340-$360. With the $11 cost of the adapter, it's only $20-$40 less than a 4TB WD Blue SSD. Unless the M.2s maintain their faster read-write through SATA, it's not even worth it. The only real reason to do it is to save electricity, and I'm not even sure it would save that much after the upgrades.

 

One possible use I see without further investment or power consumption, is to load it up with legacy games of yesteryear such as the old Sierra On-Line Quest games and such as a "retro" or "legacy" gaming box for nostalgic purposes. Otherwise, as has been said, perhaps this would be a good donation to someone who needs a basic machine for basic use, or as a foundation for such budget upgrades as mentioned here. But given that these upgrades are top-shelf for the given platform, it's hardly future proof, and it's just a matter of time before it is truly a legacy platform and not that useful even with the upgrades.

 

Does anyone else have any words of wisdom / rebuttal / dissent that could change any of this?

[An0maly_76]

Just as a hypothetical, I pieced together a light LGA1200 build with a 10400 processor for comparison. Comes to twice the price, but probably 4-8x the performance.

[Bitter]

I skipped to the bottom and read nothing. Drop in an i5 or even a low wattage i7, toss modern Xubuntu on it with 8GB of RAM and an inexpensive SATA SSD, and have a compact 'spare' PC for whatever use you find for it. Give to a friend in need, an elderly family member who just needs 'the facebooks', or literally just about anything. If it has a valid Windows key on it even better, save that key and re-use it later when you build another PC.

[Zodiark1593]

On 5/29/2022 at 2:24 PM, 8tg said:

eBay 

worth upgrading to even for casual use

I forgot the i3’s had lesser igpu than the mobile equivalents. For a dgpu if you wanted a dgpu, I’d get a gt 730 as they’re maybe 30-40$ on eBay as well and will hold their own a lot better than the Quadro nvs options which are mostly meant for having a lot of displays.

Pcie 3.0 x1 is only just shy of 1gbps at best, you’d be better off with something like pcie to msata and using an msata ssd if you wanted to use that slot, or just using a regular sata ssd since that’ll be fast enough by all means

The non-K desktop CPUs got the downgraded HD 2000. The K chips, and most mobile parts got the HD 3000. 

[An0maly_76]

27 minutes ago, Zodiark1593 said:

The non-K desktop CPUs got the downgraded HD 2000. The K chips, and most mobile parts got the HD 3000. 

So an uprade to a 2600K would be the move, if there is such a thing.

[8tg]

1 minute ago, An0maly_76 said:

So an uprade to a 2600K would be the move, if there is such a thing.

i7 2700k is an option but they’re around 70$, I’d go for a 2500k which is under 30$ instead if you plan to stick with the igpu and not a dgpu 

[An0maly_76]

17 minutes ago, 8tg said:

i7 2700k is an option but they’re around 70$, I’d go for a 2500k which is under 30$ instead if you plan to stick with the igpu and not a dgpu 

Chipset doesn't support beyond 2600 / 2600S unfortunately.

 

I'm finding that for the 2600, the RX460 is a well-matched, affordable GPU, but they don't seem to be made in low-profile. So to do that, I'd have to compromise some sort of bottleneck or get creative in mounting the GPU.

[Zodiark1593]

18 minutes ago, 8tg said:

i7 2700k is an option but they’re around 70$, I’d go for a 2500k which is under 30$ instead if you plan to stick with the igpu and not a dgpu 

Do you mean the 3770K? There isn’t a 2700K Sandy Bridge. 
 

If the motherboard can take it though, the 3770K gives you the much better HD 4000 as well.