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Hi folks-
I got my T101MT from Newegg on Tuesday. Straight-away I wanted to replace the disk with an SSD. I've disassembled many laptops in my years but this is my first netbook. It was a huge pain in the butt, and belatedly I realized that i should take pictures and post here so people can get an idea of screw locations and difficulties involved in taking the case apart.
There was a fair amount of "jimmying" involved since the audio ports needed to be pried away from the case before I could slip it over and off of the VGA output. Because the VGA output was also holding it in place it was difficult and nerve-wracking and required a strange angle in which to apply pressure. Again, this was difficult for me, but from the looks of some of the posts here it will be child's play to some of these pros.
First thing is to take the keyboard off. Gently pry up at the four locations marked with notches. The ribbon cable is very short so go slowly! I needed needle nose pliers to reattach this cable due to the angle at which I needed to hold the keyboard.
Once it's off you will see the following. I've marked the screw locations but they are pretty obvious. The only tricky one is the one located under the "Warranty void if removed" sticker, of which you can see the remains below. It's thin and scored so the instant you touch it it tears through.
After that, flip the damn thing over and pop out the screws. There is a screw underneath the rubber foot near the hinge on the right side as shown in the image below. All screws so far are identical, including those marked on the back. The only exceptions are four small screws under the battery (they are obvious once the battery is removed) and two under the strip at the top.
The strip at the top is attached with adhesive and is easily removed and reattached. Underneath you will find screws at the marked locations. The two closest to the center point of the hinge, further from the edge, are the other different screws, they are 2 of 4 that attach the hinge to the case.
Flip it back over and pop off the plastic piece covering the hinge (it has the arrow symbol showing you what direction to swivel the screen). It very easily just pops right off. Remove the remaining two screws from the hinge. I've marked the approximate location of the other two hinge screws that you remove from the underside.
Now you will break your netbook. No, I kid. As I mentioned, to me it was a terrifying experience to twist, no matter how gently, the case and see PCB flex etc.
Anyway push the bottom case section over so you can gently pry it over the audio ports, at which point you can swing it down and unhook it from the VGA port.
Here's a shot of the screws and various pieces that are now loose. Of some interest is the piece circled in blue, which is a guard that attaches to the hinge on the oddly-shaped side and the two inside screws underneath the battery on the other side. Circled in red is the small plastic piece covering the hinge when looking at the top of the machine.
Here's a picture of the entire PCB. Wireless card in the middle there with a single antenna cable. USB PCB is separate and held in place by the HDD assembly screw circled in red. The fan part of the HSF is held in place by case screws so it is wobbly once everything is removed. I didn't remove the board from the machine so I couldn't really see much between the upper case and the PCB.
Well there you have it. Again, I hope this just gives semi-pro's like myself a little help in finding all the stupid screws and such you need to remove the access the innards. This site and it's users have given me a lot of help with my various EEE devices so I wanted to give back.
Some general notes about the thing:
- The touchscreen is mostly very responsive. It's a bit weird with the stylus but you get used to keeping things straight on. It is blurry due to the touch layer or coating or something, but it's not terrible when you don't have lots of glare.
- No bluetooth for the US versions. If you see it advertised, don't you believe it. If someone finds one that does actually ship with bluetooth in the US, please let me know. Newegg comes through yet again in at least NOT saying there's bluetooth.
- Wireless radio supports 802.11N but only 2.4ghz, not in the 5ghz band, at least I've not been able to find my 5ghz network. ** Confirmed with this PDF, 2.4ghz only and max of 150Mbps
- Windows 7 Starter is a disaster. I'm serious. I can't say enough bad things about it. You can't disable system sounds or modify the "theme" in any way. You can't enable the transparency effects of Aero, but at least the Snap effect works. It doesn't support multi touch which, for this particular unit, seems sort of stupid.
- I hate the Asus software. The power profile software, the rotation-button software, the strange flip-the-screen-over-for-shortcuts-to-useless-programs-on-the-desktop software, all of it. The 500 gigs of online storage is nice, I guess, because data backup is always nice.
I installed a 64GB Kingston SSD and another gig of RAM for the hell of it and installed Win7 x64 Professional. The multitouch makes this machine worth it, and the performance is totally acceptable, even for someone like me who has Chrome with 1-50 tabs, Pidgin, Outlook open at all times, plus anything from photos to HTML editors and multiple explorer windows open. I love this thing.
***A note about RAM upgrades***
This machine has a max of 2GB. It also seems picky: I installed a generic stick of 800mhz DDR2 and the machine wouldn't even post. MonkeyBiz from this forum tried with a stick of 667mhz DDR2 and his machine would lock up (the existing RAM is 667mhz). I had several sticks of Hynix PC2-5300 (timings 5-5-5-12) laying around that worked perfectly, so take from that what you will.
Last edited by phertiker (2010-04-18 2:27:39 pm)
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Thanks phertiker, welcome to the board. Such tear downs are much appreciated and I'm sure other T101MT users will find this useful. But where you able to determine where the Bluetooth would go or is that connection missing altogether from this model?
As for Windows 7, there are work arounds for some of the limitations of Starter Edition but I agree it is absolutely useless for a Multi-Touch like the T101MT.
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hmm, do i need to open the whole damn thing to upgrade the ram? i'd be glad if that's not the case...
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Thanks for the welcome! I'm sorry it wasn't much of a tear down, but I figure identifying the screw locations for people will be a big help.
I wasn't able to see any place to install a bluetooth module, but again I didn't get a good look at the bottom of the mainboard. I assume there's a little four-pin header or such on there somewhere.
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dangsquall wrote:
hmm, do i need to open the whole damn thing to upgrade the ram? i'd be glad if that's not the case...
You don't. On the image of the bottom of the machine you can see the small panel offset from center; it has venting. That is the RAM upgrade slot.
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Word spreads quickly...
http://eeepc.net/asus-eee-pc-t101mt-torn-asunder/
http://www.liliputing.com/2010/04/how-t … 101mt.html
http://netbooked.net/blog/asus-eee-pc-t … assembled/
Last edited by zeo (2010-04-17 10:09:42 pm)
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its possible to upgrade asus t101mt to 3gb??I have an t101mt whit 1gb preinstaled and i what to upgrade.i see on ather forums that its not posible that becouse of pine trail platform to not work[but in ather laptop whit pine trail platform work whit 4gb of ram]this problem may be from the limitation bios from asus t101mt?
and another issue that i have its to upgrade wireles..its possible to upgrade or to put a new device like dual band?[in the 5ghz band]if its possible what piese i have to buy and where to assemble?it have a special slot for that?
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how much has the performance improved since you installed a SSD and since a fresh "un(asus)tainted"OS? is installing a ssd drive worth the extra money and trouble or is a fresh OS enough "upgrading"?
And how is the performance for video playback? I heard HD vids are not good enough. but how is xvid? or youtube HD vids?
I plan on buying the t101mt with 2 gigs and win7 premium in netherlands (if it ever comes out) If you've been told that europe recieves this stuff first then you are wrong (with the exception of amazon in germany).
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I am in the UK and have a T101MT on order. The standard spec for the UK is 320GB HDD, 2GB Ram and Windows 7 Premium - very different from the US.
The T101MT is to replace a 901 and I have a few concerns about speed. However, from what Phertiker says it should be perfectly OK. As long as it is not slower than the 901, I will be happy.
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loren28 wrote:
its possible to upgrade asus t101mt to 3gb??
It isn't. I tried a 2 gig stick in the upgrade slot, but whether it's a platform limitation as you mentioned or something Asus decided it only addresses 2 gigs. It might also have something to do with Microsoft licensing requirements, that's the reason most original netbooks came with 1 gig is that Microsoft licensing only allowed 1 gig. It sounds good anyway.
loren28 wrote:
and another issue that i have its to upgrade wireles..its possible to upgrade or to put a new device like dual band?[in the 5ghz band]if its possible what piese i have to buy and where to assemble?it have a special slot for that?
Yes, the wireless card you can see in the middle of the shot of the PCB. It's just a mini-PCI slot.
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Damien_psi wrote:
how much has the performance improved since you installed a SSD and since a fresh "un(asus)tainted"OS? is installing a ssd drive worth the extra money and trouble or is a fresh OS enough "upgrading"?
And how is the performance for video playback? I heard HD vids are not good enough. but how is xvid? or youtube HD vids?
I plan on buying the t101mt with 2 gigs and win7 premium in netherlands (if it ever comes out) If you've been told that europe recieves this stuff first then you are wrong (with the exception of amazon in germany).
It's worth upgrading to a better version of Windows 7 or one of the netbook-centric Linux distros before swapping out the disk. Kernel 2.6.31 added multi-touch. Mostly what I hated about 7 Starter is that it didn't take advantage of the screen's abilities.
Performance with the drive was acceptable once things got going, it's mostly load times that sucked. I think the upgrade to an SSD was worth it, but I was lucky enough to have work by it for me so I guess I'd try cheaper avenues first.
Xvid/Divx seems to be fine as long as you keep the bit rate low. SD stuff, basically. Youtube is acceptable up to 480p but even then it isn't perfectly smooth, and HD Flash or anything else is right out. This is essentially a productivity machine.
Last edited by phertiker (2010-04-18 12:50:52 pm)
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I just realized something:
Look at the picture of the entire PCB. The blue oval on the right side that shows the audio ports, right at the bottom, there is an empty connector there labeled "BLT CON 1". I'm going to assume that's the Bluetooth connection port there.
Looks like I'd better go tear apart an old laptop and see if the interface is the same on the Bluetooth card!
It's either that or a bacon-lettuce-tomato connector. Either way, win-win baby!
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Yes, the connector is usually labeled BLT_CON... If you can, just post a pic of it on the T101MT, preferably close enough to count the pinout. There's already pics of the connector on other models on this site already for comparison.
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zeo wrote:
Yes, the connector is usually labeled BLT_CON... If you can, just post a pic of it on the T101MT, preferably close enough to count the pinout. There's already pics of the connector on other models on this site already for comparison.
You can see it in the picture I mentioned above. The connector is facing 90 degrees at the edge of the PCB. If I find a spare bluetooth card I'll open my T101MT up again on the off chance that the pinout IS the same, but if not I'll let someone else do it. :-)
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I see, the blue oval was covering the "B" but it looks like the standard connector. Though right against the edge means it may be tricky getting the plug in it and still close the case.
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zeo wrote:
I see, the blue oval was covering the "B" but it looks like the standard connector. Though right against the edge means it may be tricky getting the plug in it and still close the case.
Yah, looks like a 6 pin connector. Hopefully they didn't change the pinout with this one!
I don't think it will be too difficult, the cladding on a cable like the one for a bluetooth module stops well short of the connector, and the wire gauge is so high that you could easily fold them over for a 180 degree connection.
I'm wondering where to mount the board, if there is a dedicated space on the underside of the PCB or what.
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what sort of SDD/HDD interface (SATA I, II, III etc.) is used in the eee T101MT?
Last edited by Iode78 (2010-04-28 1:03:34 am)
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SSD's are preserved for the sub 10" models, so it uses a HDD, and SATA is SATA. The I/II/III reference is just to indicate the available potential data bandwidth. Though as a Pine Trail, the T101MT should technically support up to SATA II...
http://www.intel.com/products/Internet_ … erview.htm
But actual performance, according to benchmarks from those who upgraded other Pine Trail models with SSD's, may still be bottle-necked to SATA I, like pretty much all netbooks...
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Thanks for the info.
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Well, my LCD died. I was adjusting screen brightness via the Windows 7 Power slider when it suddenly went black.
A hard reboot would cause the back light to flash for a second before going out again, and now it no longer does even that much.
I sent it to Asus on Tuesday. I'm excited to see what they say about the voided warranty. :-)
Oh well.
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Hi I have a T101mt too. Twice mine did exactly what you are describing with yours, a flash at the boot but nothing else. I realized it was still booting so I plugged in an LCD. Some how the bios gets stuck only outputting to VGA. Once you login to windows, switch displays and it works fine. It seems to only happen if I have an improper shutdown. If it happens again I am going to call ASUS. I hope this helps if they send it back to you with out fixing it.
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Hey - thanks for the tutorial! Everything went smoothly for me - I installed a 64 GB Kingston SSD as well, bumped the RAM to 2 GB and installed Win 7 Professional.
Note about warranty sticker - I was able to remove and reattach the warranty sticker without damaging it. What I did was took small screw driver, slid it underneath the sticker at the edge of the hole its sitting on top of, and gently pushed upwards. I don't know if Asus techs would figure out it had been tampered with, but I figure its worth a try.
Thanks for the heads up about the audio jack 'jimmying'. It can be difficult to tell 'how much pressure I should be using' when disassembling things - the amount of pressure necessary to disassemble one component would break another. So having a heads up gave me a bit more confidence when I got to that step.
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Europe model is great! Normal Windows, 2 Gb RAM, 320 Gb HDD. Great thing!
Minus: sometimes the screen is a bit floppy in two position (in my case appx. 30 degrees), the loft is about 2 mm max.
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pellegew wrote:
Hi I have a T101mt too. Twice mine did exactly what you are describing with yours, a flash at the boot but nothing else. I realized it was still booting so I plugged in an LCD. Some how the bios gets stuck only outputting to VGA. Once you login to windows, switch displays and it works fine. It seems to only happen if I have an improper shutdown. If it happens again I am going to call ASUS. I hope this helps if they send it back to you with out fixing it.
Thanks for the tip! I hope that's all it was, because Asus support is taking their sweet time with it.
So far my RMA status is "waiting for parts" which has been the case for way too long now. The website claims a 3 day turn-around, one CS rep quoted 7 days, and the last rep quoted 10-14 days. Pretty sweet support so far, yawn.
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simplyletgo wrote:
Hey - thanks for the tutorial! Everything went smoothly for me - I installed a 64 GB Kingston SSD as well, bumped the RAM to 2 GB and installed Win 7 Professional.
Note about warranty sticker - I was able to remove and reattach the warranty sticker without damaging it. What I did was took small screw driver, slid it underneath the sticker at the edge of the hole its sitting on top of, and gently pushed upwards. I don't know if Asus techs would figure out it had been tampered with, but I figure its worth a try.
Thanks for the heads up about the audio jack 'jimmying'. It can be difficult to tell 'how much pressure I should be using' when disassembling things - the amount of pressure necessary to disassemble one component would break another. So having a heads up gave me a bit more confidence when I got to that step.
Glad it helped! Interesting that you could remove the sticker; mine was scored right down the middle so that any tampering would split it in half.
I ended up just scraping the rest off and cleaning it up a bit. If they complain, oh well, that's what I get I guess!
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