On Wed, Jun 19, 2013 at 03:57:25PM +1000, Toby Corkindale wrote:
I agree - that's very bad practice. The only reasons that come immediately to mind would be (1) trying to make you purchase cards through them or to upgrade the laptop; or (2) some sort of regulatory issue in one or more of their markets. As I recall, wireless regulators in Japan are particularly strict, but they're not the only example.
if they're using that as an excuse, it's pretty lame...and bogus. there are plenty of legal, wifi regulation-compliant wireless mini-PCIe cards that don't have a Lenovo brand or PCI-ID. Using them is not illegal, and does not break legal certification of the device.
Who knows.. Apparently HP do this too, but not really anyone else, and they all seem to sell stuff around the world fine.
they get away with it because people let them, they don't complain and they keep buying crippled standards-breaking shit. the whole point of PCIe (as for other peripheral connection standards) is that it is a *standard* for upgrade/replacement modules from any compliant manufacturer. refusing to boot when a third-party device is installed in the slot is anti-competitive, and possibly illegal in this country. write to the ACCC complaining about Lenovo's false advertising and anti-competitive practices - crippled mini-PCI Express is not mini-PCI Express. also complain to PCI-SIG and advise them of Lenovo abusing their trademark. and/or just return the laptop due to it being not as advertised (crippled/non-standard mini-PCIe) and not fit for purpose under your australian statutory warranty.
As for adjusting the PCI IDs.. It seems that on some old intel cards, you could write to the EEPROM to do so, with some patches to the drivers.
another alternative: this page lists some hacked bioses without the PCI-ID whitelist restrictions for some models of thinkpads. might be worth checking if your model is one of them. http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/MiniPCI_Express_slot craig -- craig sanders <cas@taz.net.au>