Thinkpads Forum

Posted: **Wed Aug 23, 2006 11:26 am**

I have a T60 that is about a month old. I just got to school and registered my MAC address with the school so that I can get onto their network.

After registering the address, when I boot, I get the following two errors:

Initializing Intel(R) Boot Agent GE v1.2.31

PXE-E05: The LAN adapter's configuation is corrupted or has not been initialized. The Boot Agent cannot continue.

and after a few seconds

ERROR
Expansion ROM not initialized - PCI on Motherboard
Bus:00, Device:00, Function:00

Press <ESC> to continue

I took the computer in to the tech desk here to see if they thought it had something to do with the MAC registration. They didn't think so but tried for half an hour to fix the problem, but we were unable to do so.

I've tried:

Taking the PCI-LAN out of the boot order. This changes nothing.
Disabling the LAN card in the BIOS. This gets rid of the message but I can't connect via ethernet (obviously).
System Restore (computer won't load a previous restore point).
Updating the drivers for the card (Windows says they're up to date).
Disabling power management for the card so that it doesn't turn off when not connected to AC power (this changes nothing)

Does anyone have any idea what is causing this?

Posted: **Wed Aug 23, 2006 1:52 pm**

Try updating or reflashing the BIOS, other than that i'm not sure what would have caused that as I've not seen the error before - would indicate that you might need to get the motherboard changed though.

Posted: **Sun Aug 27, 2006 11:12 pm**

I got an error like this when trying to use my advanced mini docking station. Since then I have replaced the buggy station with a new one. All is well so far.

I'd try reflashing to the newest BIOS.

Posted: **Tue Aug 29, 2006 4:40 pm**

The BIOS upgrade should be tried as other have stated. If that doesn't work what happens if you boot the system off the network then connect the ethernet cable? Does the system go online? More than likley it is a bad NIC which is on the motherboard.

Posted: **Tue Aug 29, 2006 9:12 pm**

You might want to go through the bios and make sure it is not trying to boot to the nic before booting to the hard drive.
Usually you get that error when it can no longer boot from the hard drive.

Posted: **Fri Sep 29, 2006 6:49 am**

I have exactly the same error on 3 client machines.
T60 Thinkpads, brand new only a few weeks old.

Tried BIOS update, it did not help.

Did anyone get another solution?

Posted: **Fri Sep 29, 2006 7:01 am**

Just an idea. Go into the BIOS and set the Hard Drive to compatibility mode. Save changes and exit. See what happens.

Posted: **Fri Sep 29, 2006 7:07 am**

I just had exactly the same experience this morning. The computer was weirdly started by my pressing the left mouse button - and then it went to that LAN boot again and again (I press Ctrl+Alt+Del to reboot every time I saw that). It was not responsive to F11 or F12. I got mad and turned it off by pressing the power button and this time it was fixed. God knows what went wrong.[/quote]

Posted: **Fri Sep 29, 2006 7:13 am**

You can also try loading the defaults in the bios .. F1 to SETUP .. then F9 to LOAD THE DEFAULTS .. then F10 to SAVE AND EXIT .. if that does not work try reseating the hard drive
http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... MIGR-62826

Posted: **Tue Oct 10, 2006 12:20 pm**

Still not the best solution but it works

I fixed this by going into BIOS and disabling "Read Network ROM on Startup" under Config/Networking. That was right after wake-on-LAN and flash-BIOS-over-LAN, which I also disabled. Those were my only changes. For the benefit of googlers, the hardware diagnostic error message code for the Thinkpad T60p was "405-199-000-2006925-05 Ethernet ... EEPROM Tests Failed."

Credited to http://ryxi.com/laptops/220-358-thinkpa ... read.shtml

Posted: **Wed Oct 11, 2006 3:44 am**

Thanks all.

leeDscott's BIOS changes seemed to at least get rid of the error for now where nothing else would.

Posted: **Fri Oct 13, 2006 7:45 pm**

I have had the same error on my T60 for about 2 months now. It occurred after using the Lenovo Software installer after it not only flashed the system BIOS but the BIOS to the NIC.

After igorning it, I finally shut off it's ability to boot (as stated above) but have yet to contact support about it.

I do not think it was caused by the system board update, but by the NIC card flash.

Posted: **Tue Oct 31, 2006 12:27 pm**

Has anyone came up with a real solution for this yet? Shutting off the lan boot in the bios just suppresses the boot error. The network card still has issues with drivers after this happens.

I haven't had any response from Lenovo customer service.

I actually tracked down the flash upgrade for the intel network card but their utility says that the nic rom is controlled by the system rom. This really does seem to be a bad system firmware.

Posted: **Tue Nov 07, 2006 10:02 pm**

I found this site by typing in the error message for the expansion ROM not initialized, on my T60p.

On advice from the ibm.com/support, I tried running System Update - which downloaded and installed about 15 things since I last updated about two months ago - and it gave me a new BIOS.

It didn't help.

I plan to go thru the channels to see what I can find out. It's interesting that this is a relatively common problem but there is nothing on their Web site about it.

Posted: **Wed Nov 08, 2006 1:09 am**

One thing about PXE Boot.

Its the last thing that runs in a Boot Order.

Check your BIOS and look at your boot order.

Verify that IDE HDD0 is seen.

If it is seen. Verify that there is something after it.

If it says. IDE HDD0:

Then the HDD Controller is not seeing your hard drive.

Reseat the drive and restart and go into BIOS

If that does not work. Then the HDD could be having issues.

Best way to check for that. Run a DFT. Also known as a Drive Fitness Test.

You can find a DFT on the Ultimate Boot CD.

Hope that helps.

Posted: **Wed Nov 08, 2006 1:49 pm**

Straight from Intel:

"PXE-E05: The LAN adapter's configuration is corrupted or has not been initialized. The Intel Boot Agent cannot continue. The adapter's EEPROM is corrupted. The Intel Boot Agent determined that the adapter EEPROM checksum is incorrect. The agent will return control to the BIOS and not attempt to remote boot. Try to update the flash image. If this does not solve the problem, contact your system administrator or Intel Customer Support. "

I recommend calling Intel if updating the flash image doesn't work.

Posted: **Wed Nov 08, 2006 4:09 pm**

I've had the error since July... http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... highlight=

Posted: **Thu Nov 09, 2006 9:07 pm**

For those who like to experiment and live dangerously try this link at Intel: http://www.intel.com/support/network/ad ... s_util.htm

This may be the utility you can use to flash the eeprom. Looks promising and potentially risky.

Here's another link which suggests that built in nics should be programmed with a bios update.

http://www.intel.com/support/network/ad ... 008362.htm

Perhaps flashing the bios with a slightly earlier version might fix the problem.

Posted: **Sun Nov 12, 2006 3:24 pm**

Can someone point me in the right direction to create a bootable DOS DVD so that I can try to flash the eeprom using the Intel utility? I've tried the first couple of links from Google, including "Bart's way to create bootable CD-Roms" without success.

Would really like to get rid of this Checksum error.

Posted: **Sun Nov 12, 2006 5:16 pm**

r1ych wrote:Can someone point me in the right direction to create a bootable DOS DVD so that I can try to flash the eeprom using the Intel utility? I've tried the first couple of links from Google, including "Bart's way to create bootable CD-Roms" without success.

Would really like to get rid of this Checksum error.

r1ych, You can use Nero or Roxio Easy CD Creator to create a bootable cd. I find the utility Ultraiso excellent for this and lots of other cd\dvd related tasks. That being said, if your tech skills are not up to the task, I strongly recommend not experimenting trying to flash the eeprom with utilities not really designed for flashing a built in nic. You could clobber your bios making you laptop unbootable and unusable. I strongly recommend you contact Lenovo and let them fix the problem.

If Lenovo gives you a solution would you please post it on the forum so we can all benefit.

If you would like to learn more about making bootable cds just enter "how to make a bootable cd" in any search engine. There are many types of bootable cds and numerous techniques for creating them.

Posted: **Tue Nov 21, 2006 10:19 am**

Lenovo solution: Return laptop to service center.

I opened a ticket with IBM support and they want me to return the whole laptop. I don't know if that's standard procedure or not, but the guy acted like it's something they hear a lot. (He was able to tell me the rest of the error message while I was looking it up.) Now I just have to figure out how I'm going to make due without a laptop for a week.

For what it's worth. I tried using the intel rom flash tool and it doesn't work on the t60. It says it's controlled by the system rom.

EDIT: I just sent the laptop in. They were actually really quick about it. They paid for overnight air there, had it fixed in about 8 hours and overnighted it back. The report said they replaced the "planar card". I guess that update really did brick the bios...

Posted: **Fri Dec 08, 2006 7:03 pm**

nocents wrote:I have a T60 that is about a month old. I just got to school and registered my MAC address with the school so that I can get onto their network.

After registering the address, when I boot, I get the following two errors:
Initializing Intel(R) Boot Agent GE v1.2.31

PXE-E05: The LAN adapter's configuation is corrupted or has not been initialized. The Boot Agent cannot continue.
and after a few seconds

ERROR
Expansion ROM not initialized - PCI on Motherboard
Bus:00, Device:00, Function:00

Press <ESC> to continue
I took the computer in to the tech desk here to see if they thought it had something to do with the MAC registration. They didn't think so but tried for half an hour to fix the problem, but we were unable to do so.

I've tried:
Taking the PCI-LAN out of the boot order. This changes nothing.
Disabling the LAN card in the BIOS. This gets rid of the message but I can't connect via ethernet (obviously).
System Restore (computer won't load a previous restore point).
Updating the drivers for the card (Windows says they're up to date).
Disabling power management for the card so that it doesn't turn off when not connected to AC power (this changes nothing)
Does anyone have any idea what is causing this?

Posted: **Sun Dec 10, 2006 4:34 am**

Planer Card is System Board.

Good to see you got your computer working again.

Posted: **Sun Dec 10, 2006 5:11 am**

leeDscott wrote:Still not the best solution but it works

I fixed this by going into BIOS and disabling "Read Network ROM on Startup" under Config/Networking. That was right after wake-on-LAN and flash-BIOS-over-LAN, which I also disabled. Those were my only changes. For the benefit of googlers, the hardware diagnostic error message code for the Thinkpad T60p was "405-199-000-2006925-05 Ethernet ... EEPROM Tests Failed."

Credited to http://ryxi.com/laptops/220-358-thinkpa ... read.shtml

On almost any motherboard with network boot capabilities, if that feature is enabled, it will throw a very similar error if the machine is not configured for a remote boot setup. all of my desktop machines do this. It almost sounds like somehow the default setting for this particular bios had it set to enabled instead of disabled.

The reason for the error is chances are no one has ever flashed their network cards bootrom with a capable image, because they have never needed to. It is usually specific to a certain network situation, and until that was done, your card will throw tons of errors if the network bootrom is enabled without an image present. So unless you work at some really odd company that still operates with this setup, you should always have that option disabled.

Posted: **Thu Jan 04, 2007 2:45 am**

In case someone still has that issue, here is what worked for me:
From steveg47 message , the second link download PROBOOT.EXE from Intel, or just use: http://downloadfinder.intel.com/scripts ... roboot.exe
Get the first one from the list - the one without Network adapter, it says only "Intel® Boot Agent PROBOOT.exe version: 11.2" Install that - it will create a folder with some files - put these on a bootable floppy (or two) or a bootable CD. Boot to DOS with the floppy or CD and run "IBAUtil.exe -DEFCFG" that will reset the configuration and all should be OK. There are many other options, however this is what worked for me.

---------------------------------------------
Updated by RBS, 30/08/2020: above link is dead, try this: https://downloadcenter.intel.com/download/29137
And the file is called PREBOOT.EXE
---------------------------------------------

Posted: **Fri Jan 05, 2007 11:50 pm**

Thanks, that worked for me as well.

Posted: **Fri Oct 26, 2007 10:59 am**

Thank you, mvc from Doha, this worked for me on the second try. (On the first try the cd command failed after booting from the CD, and didn't fix the problem, and it bluescreened. But on the 2nd try - same CD - it worked fine, no error on bootup, no bluescreen).

Posted: **Fri Jan 11, 2008 3:26 pm**

mvc's solution worked for me too. IBM TS wasn't helpful. They recommended I install PC Doctor and run network diagnosis tools.

Getting a boot disk that would work took awhile though. Sonic Record Now's bootdisk failed to work. I ended up using Nero 6. You have to download the updates from Nero's website. Then choose to burn a Data Disc -> Bootable Data Disc. Drag and drop the files onto the cd and choose the option to User Standard Boot Image.

Boot from the cd and then type d: or e: or f: etc at the prompt to get to the files. Run as stated.

This was also on a T60.

Posted: **Sat Feb 23, 2008 6:17 pm**

Hello there,

I did all the necessary to reset the eeprom of the network card but now the mac adress has changed and not working.

I change it in windows and it work now but in the bios there is still the old mac adress. When i boot on a live-cd, the ethernet doesn't work.

A workaround is to install the system and change the ethernet mac adress after but i want to know if anyone succeed in resolv this problem.

Thanks,

Gabriel.

Posted: **Sun May 04, 2008 6:11 pm**

Help! I'm a very un-techy person, and I've started getting this error whenever i start up. It doesn't really impact me that much, but it is kind of a hassle to click escape every time. And then a friend told me recently it was caused by a virus/spywhere/something malicious put on by a website?

So, how is this thing caused, and what is it? I've read the thread, but...yikes. Layman's terms please?

Thinkpads Forum

T60 - Boot Agent and PXE-E05 errors. Help!

T60 - Boot Agent and PXE-E05 errors. Help!

PXE-E05: The LAN adapter's configuation -- FIX

me too

Re: T60 - Boot Agent and PXE-E05 errors. Help!

Re: PXE-E05: The LAN adapter's configuation -- FIX

Here is the solution that works perfect

Re: Here is the solution that works perfect

worked for me too