Thinkpads Forum

Hi,

I snatched up a nice W541 recently for $50! It’s in great shape and already has a quad in it, which I understand means it can take additional RAM? It is the lowest end quad they could ship with so I will be upgrading it at some point.

Anyways - LCD. It has the 1080p TN panel right now and I want it gone. The 3K screens seem unobtainium or overpriced so I’m wondering what my best course of action is. It would be easiest I’m sure to get a nice LG 15” IPS display and straight-swap it out. Does anyone have a part number on hand that they know looks great?
I am however wondering how expensive it would be to put a higher resolution display in. 1440p would be nice. Is the LCD cable compatible with displays above 1080p?

Overall seems like a really nice machine. Mine came with an extended battery that’s still in great health. Plan is to max it out and make it my ultimate Windows 8.1 machine, between my T430 and T480.

I can chime in to say the 3K option and cable (called an "FHD++" cable by Lenovo) use a non-standard 40-pin pinout. So you can't use that 40-pin cable with other 40-pin LCDs such as 1440p and 4K panels used in other laptops. Plugging in a normal panel into the 3K cable will blow up things on the W541 motherboard.

Theoretically the pinout of the connector on the W541 (and W540, T450p) board schematics could be researched and modifications done to adapt it to standard 40-pin LCDs. But this would be a lot of effort for decrepit hardware. Your idea to swap to a 1080p IPS is a solid one. This has been done successfully.

Some part numbers I know are:

AUO B156HAN01.2
SAMSUNG LTN156HL01-102, LTN156HL01-101

You can probably find more models on Panelook: https://www.panelook.com/B156HAN01.2_AU ... 19049.html

If buying a brand new panel I'd favor aliexpress or the Chinese website "lpscreen.com", I've always received the exact item ordered this way. As an American I would not shop for a brand new LCD panel from a stateside seller on eBay, they're largely selling "compatible" panels that aren't what you need, or they've added absurd markup to recoup very narrow profit, or they're just scum who will grief you over any issue or defect on their part. Worst I've encountered was actual mail fraud by some slippery Philadelphians.

Do you know if a 1440p 30-pin LCD would work? Just curious, 1440p on a 15-inch display would be better than 1080p.

One other thing - the hinges in my unit are weak. They still work, but it doesn't take much to make the screen move and it won't stay up at extreme angles. Is this something that could be corrected or are my hinges just worn out?

It appears all 1440p LCDs need 4 edp lanes instead of 2 so that probably wouldn't work.

I bought an LG LP156WF6-SPB1 and now have it installed in the W541. 1080p IPS. Looks pretty good, far far better than the original TN. I wish I could go higher resolution but ah well. I wasn't about to pay $130 for the 3K screen and cable.