Thinkpads Forum

Can I operate my P53 closed with a Lenovo external keyboard and monitor?

Yes. Use your operating system's power management settings to prevent the system from going to sleep or hibernation with the lid closed and that should be all you need to do.

Would it have to be kept on standby? I don't see any way to turn it back on from a USB keyboard without lifting the lid to access the power button.

Standby or hibernate are non-responsive states; with the lid closed it must stay fully powered up if you need to be able to use it.

On Windows 7 you can get to the power options control panel applet with the run command powercfg.cpl. From there, click "Change what closing the lid does" and set them all to "Do nothing". You should be able to do something similar on Windows 10.

Well I was wondering because some of those Lenovo USB keyboards have the Fn key and hotkey combinations, so I wondered if you could use that Fn key to wake up as you can with a built-in Thinkpad keyboard.... I take it you can't? What if you used an always-on USB port of the laptop? I'm curious to try that when it comes back from the repair depot, LOL.

I think some Thinkpads allow general wake from USB keyboard, but not all of them. I never investigated it enough to know which / how to set it up.

The Fn key on the special Lenovo USB keyboards? That would be interesting to test. Once again, I never owned one, so I don't know.

I routinely use many of my Thinkpads with the lid closed, but they are docked, so I use the dock power button.

Yes, unfortunately there is no dock for the P53, not in the traditional sense.

USB-C / Thunderbolt docks should work the same in this regard, but it does mean you have an extra box on your desk (instead of a cradle the laptop would sit on). It is also hard to justify their cost if all you need from them is a power button...

Yes, I wish they had a real, traditional dock for it.

Mindfulness Quebec wrote: ↑

Thu Apr 29, 2021 12:43 am

[...] some of those Lenovo USB keyboards have the Fn key and hotkey combinations, so I wondered if you could use that Fn key to wake up as you can with a built-in Thinkpad keyboard.... I take it you can't? What if you used an always-on USB port of the laptop? [...]

I would say probably not, if only because the "always on" USB ports are only "always on" in the sense that they provide full USB power to supported devices when connected - mostly for charging purposes. I don't believe there's any active data path between the USB control logic and the system as a whole when it's in standby or off.

But, just because I've never seen it...

I just got my laptop back from Lenovo, who were treating it for power supply issues. Surprisingly, it can be awakened by any USB keyboard input, whether or not I'm using the always-on USB port. It also wakes on USB mouse input. It is a very woke laptop.

As mentioned already, yes, but I certainly would not recommend it. If the plan is to just use the thing sitting on a desk, honestly, what I would do is leave it open and remove the keyboard. This drastically lowers thermals as the keyboard smothers the fans from the top. If you don't plan on going anywhere with it any time soon, this is a pretty good idea. I've gotten ~10 C down off my idle temps and ~20 C down off my combined load temps by doing this. Its fairly easy too, just 2 screws and the keyboard comes out. Obviously this isn't a good thing to do if you have to move the laptop frequently, but for the duration of the pandemic, my P53 has basically been a desktop, and this has been great for keeping noise and temps down, and probably will also help my CPU/GPU in the long run since P53 is notorious for heating up to its thermal stops, which isn't good for the longevity of either of them.