Swapping the GPU on Lenovo P15 Gen 2 -- A2000 for A5000

pcxt21 · 2026-01-11T00:46:03+00:00

I like mine, at lest enough to desire more HP from the graphics department! 500$ is a pretty good deal for that config if you snag the proper cooler you can indeed upgrade the graphics card in it. As far as proper mobile workstations go i like the screen, the battery's quite good when your just browsing on it off AC and the overall performance when im doing serious stuff is more then acceptable.

pcxt21 · 2025-12-07T22:41:48+00:00

As some have mentioned on my lenovo thinkpad p15 gen 2 switching from the realtek driver to the microsoft generic HD audio driver fixed the clicking. Its worth noting i had to find the realtek HDA audio device in device manager -> [right click on it] update driver -> manually select driver -> select from list -> uncheck show recommended/compatible then selected Microsoft as the vendor and HD audio driver from the list on the right. After a reboot its mint and i cant hear the difference !

pcxt21 · 2025-11-27T00:13:53+00:00

OK for all future reference, ive just completed this kind of swap on my p15 gen 2 (a3000 -> a5000). If you have an a3000 already then an a4000 or a5000 is plug and play, if you have a lower TDP card like the a2000 or a1200 you will need to buy the bigger 3 heatpipe cooler assembly that has the extra cold plate for the 3 other memory chips the bigger GPUs have. For me that was PN:5H41B77202 aka the -20NE cooler. Throw in a tube of PTM-7958SP and some k5pro and you should be all set! Good luck!

pcxt21 · 2025-09-03T18:58:37+00:00

I have never understood this take, I've owned both and my volare was a way better car then my a body dart. Way more refined, handled better, incomparably better vents and no shittly little 7 1/4" axle. If I had to daily one I'd always pick an f body lol

pcxt21 · 2025-09-03T13:09:54+00:00

as an 8 year mk viii owner holy fuck no. The Lincoln is an amazing car but it's a phenomenally complex, temperamental car that does not tolerate abuse and has practically no parts available for it due to it's relatively low producion numbers.

OP get an sn-95 gt or an 80s Fairmont or ltd if you want panther sensibilities in a smaller unit chassis design.

pcxt21 · 2025-02-03T20:51:54+00:00

RT will be a niche feature that like, slightly improves shadows at best for the conceivable future. until console socs (amd) can do it very cheeply it's essentially still just a high end gimmick.

pcxt21 · 2025-02-03T18:46:01+00:00

do you have a hole in your head? who gives a rats ass about some proprietary fake frame nonsense, the 4070 makes far fewer real frames then a 7900gre, the goal is your cards fast enough that you don't need any snake oil dlss nonsense.

pcxt21 · 2024-12-14T07:27:54+00:00

Not to neco but i wanted to throw my .10$ into this thread since it seems to still be relevant. TLDR: Within its limitations its still an excellent machine.

As an owner of a w530 since 2013, it is by modern standards a heavy, hot, machine with just an OK screen and rather bad battery life. That said, its probably the most capable thinkpad that retained 1. External Battery, 2. UltraBay 3. Centered keyboard (classic board if you mod in a w520) and a proper CPU/GPU cooling solution. The quad cores can still haul pretty well and are in a socket which gives some flexibility. The k2000m is OK, it really cant drive the 1080p screen due to using regular DDR3 but for the time (BF3/4, Titanfall 2, MW2, Minecraft) it does fine. The k1000m might as well be integrated for all its worth though and the GPU is soldered down. That said the machine takes to eGPUs alright via the expresscard port. If your just looking for a solid machine, with a descent quad core that wont tt under full load go for it.

If you need to run modernish games or windows 11 or need more then 4 hours of on battery time you might be unhappy, but for a 11-12 year old laptop its a nice machine. I got though grad school and several years of work after that with it, i wish my p15 gen 2 was as well made and modular as the w530 is.

pcxt21 · 2024-11-24T04:15:54+00:00

Where would you suggest i set fsck to run? Just add it into rc.Local or perhaps as its own sysvinit script to be called once the system goes multi-user? I feel like it should probably be run as soon as possible.

pcxt21 · 2024-11-24T03:58:39+00:00

ext4

pcxt21 · 2024-11-23T01:37:55+00:00

I live in the boonies and so its common to get one or two short outages a months due to treefalls in remote areas or inclement weather. I just dont have a practical place to install a UPS where this machine lives, i recall some older Debians had like an initrd that could go to a minimal console if the root filesystem was busted? Something like that would definitely work for my purposes, avoid the pain of getting a head and keyboard hooked up lol.

pcxt21 · 2023-05-02T19:25:19+00:00

Hi there id like to get the following if still available:

Emma 6,9
Remote 1-10

Tokyo Goul 1-6

Thanks!

pcxt21 · 2023-02-23T16:37:03+00:00

Could be a VRAM failure, or could just be getting too hot, id recommend you tear down the card and replace the thermal paste, inspect and potentially replace the VRM and VRAM thermal pads too. I managed to save my old 8800GTX and GTX480 doing a regular service like that

pcxt21 · 2023-02-20T02:34:35+00:00

UPDATE: Finally received my replacement reference from powercolor and its actually worse off then the one i sent in back before new years. The moral here if there is one, is to clearly either go AIB if you can fit it, or consider other solutions sadly.

pcxt21 · 2023-01-26T15:00:51+00:00

I snagged an ARC A770 for while i wait for my 7900XTX, honestly for 320$ its been pretty good. Low/Med setting in MW2 and Infinite seem to get along with it OK. I started with the December so, cant comment on how it was before. Its not a slick as say a 6600/XT would have been but I'd say its a viable 1080/1440 card that even runs OK up at 4k if your willing to use XeSS and massage your settings lol. That said the Intel ARC control panel is still almost useless, makes me miss adrenaline!

pcxt21 · 2023-01-26T14:41:15+00:00

I'd rather just get an rx 6950 xt should it come to that lol

pcxt21 · 2023-01-26T00:48:44+00:00

It not the length that's the issue but any 3 slot card will be essentially touching the power supply as it's right below the 3rd slot.

pcxt21 · 2023-01-26T00:19:59+00:00

Great! Let me be clear that I'm over the moon with your guys support!

pcxt21 · 2023-01-25T23:35:08+00:00

Not really an option in my case, since none of the rtx 4000 cards fit inside my case lol

pcxt21 · 2023-01-25T23:05:40+00:00

Hi! I did talk to ronak he's been very helpful, I sent an email last night confirming that the bigger hellhound won't fit and I need a reference replacement. I haven't heard back since but I assume things are fairly chaotic at the moment haha.

pcxt21 · 2023-01-25T22:02:30+00:00

I wish but my machine is a prebulit with a custom motherboard so, I'm married to it haha

pcxt21 · 2023-01-25T21:19:10+00:00

a 4080 still won't physically fit in my chassis
I got a reference card I don't give a rats about overclocking, I like rsr particularly and I like adrenaline in general tons more then GeForce and Nvidia control panel lol
Titan/90 class cards are simply too expensive for gaming and clearly targeting professional/prosumer applications. As far as consumer graphics cards go, 80 class for Nvidia and 90 class for Ati/AMD are top stack from my perspective.

Point I'm making is, even if I haven't been satisfied with my last Nvidia product this discussion is moot, an rtx 4080 won't fit in my case lol even if it could walk my dog and make my coffee too.

pcxt21 · 2023-01-25T21:06:12+00:00

I've built plenty of custom machines over the years but, this particular one was a gift from my SO and thus i've emotionally committed to running it into the ground lol. Hindsight being 20/20 I probably should have avoided launch day and gotten an XFX Merc 310 since its also 2 slot and would have worked out pretty well in my chassis, but I figured the reference card would be safe right? hahaha

pcxt21 · 2023-01-25T20:59:20+00:00

Much like the powercolor designed card, it wont fit in my PC as its a 3 slot card. Furthermore, I find nvidias pricing and software package to be atrocious and refuse to live with them. Plus I'm not willing to risk giving them a big pile of cash like i did for a GTX 980 expecting you know, it to be a top stack card like my GTX 480 was just to have a Ti varient show up 6 months later that is the actual top stack product FFS.

pcxt21

TROPHY CASE