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Hello everyone,
I have a Lenovo ThinkCentre M73 Tiny PC with a normal 2.5 SATA hdd, I looked at the motherboard which had solder markings and room for an optional msata 1 slot, so I headed online and got a port and soldered it onboard. Then I inserted my msata ssd hoping for the magical upgrade to do its thing, but unfortunately it didn't appear in the BIOS. I noted that in the bios screen it only shows SATA 1 and no other port. So I was hoping if ant of the experts out there can help me out and unlock/add the extra SATA port?

Note: I found the same motherboard (m4500q model) with working msata port on one of the chinese sites online. (http://club.lenovo.cn/detail/897726)
Which confirms that it's possible

PC model: ThinkCentre M73 Tiny
Motherboard: Lenovo IS8XT v1.1
BIOS: AMI FHKT70AUS
http://support.lenovo.com/ae/en/downloads/ds038325
UPDATE: I successfully unlocked the msata port in the bios using the AMIBCP. It now shows that its enabled, however the msata drive is not showing either in BIOS or Windows!??
Can this be due to missing capacitors/transistors for the port (because I compared my motherboard to the one on the Chinese site which had an extra capacitor near the msata port), or is it a software issue?
What is the best way I can test this?
The photos above are from the chinese site, the photos attached below are my motherboard.
Notice one capacitor and one diode missing near the msata slot compared to the photos above.
Can this be the solution????
[attachment=11892]
[attachment=11893]
(02-08-2017, 03:42 AM)Modnnkh Wrote: [ -> ]Can this be the solution????

I've soldered in the jumper and the capacitor.
No success so far.
Hi, I'm very interested in this discussion (even if it's almost 6 years old) this is because I'm planning on doing a little hackintosh and I wanted to use the msata disk as an operating system disk if possible.

I would like to know if you were able to solve the problems that did not allow the detection of the msata disk and if so to know what caused them

Thanks for everything
(03-29-2023, 03:39 PM)daltanious78 Wrote: [ -> ]Hi, I'm very interested in this discussion (even if it's almost 6 years old) this is because I'm planning on doing a little hackintosh and I wanted to use the msata disk as an operating system disk if possible.

I would like to know if you were able to solve the problems that did not allow the detection of the msata disk and if so to know what caused them

Thanks for everything

Yes, I was able to eventually solve it by soldering in the missing resistors and capacitors (it wasn't easy with all those tiny SMD's) by comparing my motherboard to photos I found online of a similar motherboard with factory-included mSATA port.

From what I recall, I had bought these:
0402 0 ohm SMD resistors (x6)
0402 8K2 SMD resistor (x1)
220uF 10V 6.3mm capacitor (x1)
0402 100nF SMD capacitors (x3)
0402 330pF SMD capacitor (x1)
0603 SMD inductor (x1)
2N7002 SOT-23 transistor (MMBT7002LT1G) (x1)
mSATA slot

Reference used:
Repair Lenovo ThinkCentre m93p mini console, restore MSATA functionality - Daily Headlines (kknews.cc)

Another guide:
TheStaticTurtle - Adding an mSATA port to a Lenovo M73