Don't assume the machine does the job correctly, there are over 100 solder connections that have to be made all at once, and none of them can be visually inspected. It's far from a simple process and sometimes needs to be repleted until you get a successful attachment.

Why can't you go into the bios???

Because it doesn´t boot at all, only lights, other than HDD are flashing for a while, DVD flashes, fan spins and then nothing is happening, jus lights for charging, battery and the funny Z stays on, all other are down, and that´s it....

When I remember it well, I got a problem that my T61 just froze, so I restarted it on the hard way, by pressing the power button for 10 secs, it shut down, when I wanted to turn it on, this was the behavior I got.

So I was thinking...OK, it is the GPU, that just has failed, I ordered one, from which i believed is the new version, ´cos someone posted here that his new T61 MoBo came with g86-741-a2 chip, instead of g86-740-a2, let it replaced, put it together, and the problem still be the same, from my ponit of view.

Some equal behavior as here, but without beeps and no loght for HDD:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pm4Lklr6-Rk

...or, another suggestion, could it be something worng with bios, or, maybe with CPU? When I plugged mega old Intel M380 instead of that dual core, that is normaly inside, just the lights for battery and chatging went up, couldn´t start the laptop at all.

...btw I have one 42W7652 board at home, which is completely dead, if it would be the bios, could I use the bios chip from 42W7652 to my at the moment nonworking 41W1489? Are bioses and chips the same for both boards?

The "Z" is the power light.

If you're machine turns on, and remains on, but the screen is totally dead and POST never proceeds further, then you very likely have that GPU issue (that is the problem that my T61p) had. Note that I did not have the beeps, and in some cases when the GPU fails you won't get beeps.

If you want, you could buy a PCIex or Parallel port POST card. Then you can see do some basic investigation such as checking if the CPU is alive and if so, where the BIOS initialisation is stopping. When I used this on my machine, I could see where it was happening (GPU related).

When Lenovo replaced my motherboard there was no new part number! It is a mistake to assume that "fixed" chips have a different part number. The only thing that might matter is the date code of the GPU.

Take a look at this picture of my fixed motherboard from Lenovo:



The part number is the same that I used to have in my broken board but the date code is very recent (2011).

The date code on the chip can be a tool to help give you an idea of when the chip left the factory, but it can't tell you what is inside the chip. In this case the date code of 1105 means the 5th week of 2011, so the chip is obviously new. We aren't exactly sure when the first improved chips were made by nVidia, some evidence suggests as far back as febuary 2008, but if they were made then, it was only a slow rolling out as they retooled the factories. They were producing these chips by the millions, so they probably produced the old and new design simultaneously, stamped with the same date, which is why lenovo needed to dispose of all boards in July 2008, because there was no way to sort the good from the bad. If a chip has a date of 0824 (2008 24th week) or newer, then it's probably the new design. I've seen at least 50 chips from units built in 08/08, 08/09 and 08/10 and the chip date ranges from 0824 to 0828, but follows no chronological pattern. I've seen 0824 in units from 08/09, and 0828 in units from 08/08, but 90%+ of them have chips dated 0825.

Bottom line is the date is only useful in determining if the chip was replaced. If the chip was made in 2009 or later, then you'll know it was replaced, unless you're the victim of a rebadged chip, which unfortunately happens alot. I suspect someone got a large supply of the bad chips, perhaps from the trash at nVidia and relabeled them, so it's important to get the chips from an authorized reseller.

So update:

I bought some Post card for laptops, mini pci-e.

I switched the wifi with this card to see what is the problem. The radings showed code 0, which, as I discussed it with the seller, might be either corrupt BIOS, as the bios doesn´t send any information over the bus, or the CPU. Earlier, I tried to exchange the CPU with some old Pentium M380, but the laptop did not start at all...probably due to different buss speed those cpus have.

Any suggestion?

So if it is the bios itself...where can I find the chip? Can anyone post a picture? May I just exchange the bios chip on 41W1489 (14,1 wide T61) with the chip from 42W7652 (15,4 T61)?

Thanx.

Hi,

You can put the POST card in the other PCI-E slot on the motherboard, without removing the WiFi card (the one where the 3G or 'Intel Turbo' card is installed).

The Celeron M 380 is a Dothan CPU, that was used in T40 series. It's not just the wrong speed, it's totally the wrong CPU for the T61 and you could have caused even more damage when you tried to use it.

If your POST card stays blank (usually there is no 0, they just don't show anything at all if the BIOS never starts) then the motherboard probably has a serious problem. You could play with the BIOS chip but it's really unlikely that anything is wrong with it and probably your motherboard has some other major failure. Sorry that there is not much more I can suggest..

Hi, Amigaman!

The Post card in reality shows code 0, it is not, that it would be totaly blank..

Tomorrow I will try it in the other slot, and see what is the result...

Update:
I tried post card in turbo memory slot...still be there the code 0. I had even pulled out the CPU, tried it without CPU, and with T5550 CPU...the result is always the same..the card shows code 0.

CAPS lock, NUM lock lights are flashing for a second, then only the power on, battery and AC power are flashing constantly. In the mean time, also DVD rom light flashes, spins for a while and stops. At the time num and caps lock are on and off again, the cpu fan spins for a few secs....

Could it be wrong BIOS, or should I get "new" mobo?

Thanx.

If your bios is bad, the easiest thing to do is just replace the board, but if this was caused by installing the wrong cpu, then this board is probably fried.

I can't think of a reason anyone would want to install something less then a core2 in one of these, the base level cpu (T7100) are so cheap these days that it's not even funny. I've sold a "lot" of 10 of them that ended up netting me less then $5 each, so it was hardly worth the trouble of testing/pulling/packaging them. They can be handy for upgrading some cheap "department store" class laptops that come with celeron or pentium chips, but there is no other use for them so they are dirt cheap.

As far as your bios chip goes, if you did find a board with the same exact chip, I think you'd still have to manually burn the bios. I've never tried it, but I'm told the chips are serialized to the board, but even if it were possible, it's not going to be an easy task to resolder a new bios chip onto your board, but good luck and please let us know if your successful.

The charging/power lights and the CPU fan are run by dedicated circuits on the motherboard and the embedded controller. They will run even if your motherboard is "brain-dead". The DVD light is just the DVD drive powering up, the same with the keyboard.

It is not really easy to determine if it is the BIOS or the motherbard, but unless you were doing something with the BIOS (e.g you were flashing, and it failed) it is unlikely that anything is wrong with it. Since the POST card shows no difference, even with CPU removed, your motherboard is probably damaged.

If you are technically inclined you could try to identify the BIOS and then find the datasheet, and monitor the pins to see if the board tries to read from the BIOS at power up, but this is becomes more time consuming and technical unless you are already accustomed to this level of diagnosis.

As TuuS says, it's probably not worth your time to try and replace the BIOS because it probably will not be the solution anyway..

Hopefully you can find a replacement motherboard for a good price..

Regards.

I just checked with CPU-Z. Thank god both my T61's have the nVidia A2 chipset. Awesome. What a relief?

Now, if I could only find a solution to the hindge problem where both the screens are swaying 1-1.5 inches when in open position.

Replace both hinges, and you're done.

From what I read in this thread, the A2 doesn't mean anything regarding the failure potential. Looks like a few folks were speculating that might be the difference, but the older chips were also A2. I'm no authority on this - that's just my impression.

This doesn't really matter and is no indication for a faultless chip at all. You should have read on further in this thread than just the first page to find the relevant information. The only thing that would give some real relief would be to find out the exact date code printed on the physical chip which indicates the actual production time of the chip, and which cannot be read out with any software utility like GPU-Z.

To verify the actual production date, you have no other means but to open up the machine, remove the cooler unit from the board, wipe off the thermal grease from the chip having the term nVIDIA printed on it, and note down the numbers printed on the physical chip. For a photo showing what you can expect to see, please refer to forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?p=633146#p633146 (which BTW is on page 5 of this very same thread). The article forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?p=627753#p627753 shows two samples explaining how to interpret the date code printed on the respective GPU chips.

Here is what was printed on one the faulty nVIDIA GPU's from one of my own broken T61's and, as you can see, the pointless A2 indicator is also present:


The relevant information is the date code shown in the right half of the second line. In this case, it refers to year 07 and week 51, meaning that it was produced during the third week of December 2007, which is about half a year before the production of fixed chips finally happened.

Here is a sample of a fixed GPU, which was present on the replacement mainboard for above mentioned machine, and which i subsequently sold in favour of an T61 with Intel graphics as i have no use for any power hungry GPU performance:

According to the date code shown in the right half of the second line, this chip was produced by nVIDIA in year 10 and week 41, meaning it was produced during the first week of October 2010. So this board is definitely on the safe side and the buyer of this machine is most probably still happily using it for his daily work.

When reassembling the machine after having performed the above described inspection, make sure to apply some fresh thermal paste on both the GPU and the CPU. Don't even think about performing this visual inspection before you haven't purchased some suitable thermal paste to apply, unless you purposedly want to fry your T6a's GPU and CPU afterwards.

Rumbero is correct, the A2 is meaningless. I've also come to believe that nVidia was producing both old and new design at the same time, perhaps for several months as they slowly retooled one production line at a time, so it's very likely that you could have a good chip and a bad chip with the same dates on them. Some of this is speculation, but what we do know is that Lenovo destroyed thousands of boards in July 2008 and replaced them with boards made with a new shipment of chips from nVidia after some negotiations. If they could have identified which were good by the dates alone, they wouldn't have needed to destroy them all. The reason for this major confusing is nVidia didn't want to label one chips as "new" and render billions of dollars of inventory as worthless, so instead of considering it as a revision, they treated it as enforcement of quality control... in otherwords, they wanted to sell the bad chips too and tried to coverup the problem. We have seen evidence that the new chips were introduced long before august, as the failure rates dropped dramatically somethime around febuary 2008, but to be sure of a good chip you need one from a laptop with 08/08 production date (thats 2008/august, not august/2008).

I've seen the nVidia chips from close to 100 units built in 08/08, 08/09 and 08/10, and they follow no logical order, but typical dates on these chips are 0823 to 0829, but about 90% of these units seem to have 0825. All of these chips are equally good as long as they came out of an 08/08 or newer system, but this doesn't mean that nvidia didn't have other factories or production lines that were still making the old design in that same time frame. Also consider that the date is etched into the chip as it leaves production. They could have had thousands of chips sitting in boxes for months and didn't etch them until a much later date.

Now to further complicate things, there are part stripping factories in china that pull these old gpu chips off the boards, clean them up and re-etch the dates on them and sell them as new, so if you buy a board that is refurbished by a 3rd party and has a 2012 date on the chip, it's probably a 2007 chip with a new date. If you do a google search on "fake chips" and "china", you'll see that even the US military was scammed into buying fake chips. They were purchasing them from legitimate suppliers who bought them from other suppliers, but somewhere in the chain someone found a cheaper source and ended up getting used ones with fake dates. This as turned the quest for a good GPU into a very complicated adventure, so if you can get an 08/08 board, grab it... but only if it comes with the lower chassis and the numbers match. I wouldn't trust any board with a new chip unless it was a genuine lenovo refurb, and many of them don't even have new gpu chips on them.

However, I've been using an nvidia board in my frankNpad that was from an 08/03 unit for over a year and it runs just as good as the day it was new, and there is a very good chance it will run for many years to come. If it does ever fail I have a spare handy, but if you have a good working board that's never failed, then it's very likely it won't.

As an aside, it seems that Lenovo was probably able to obtain (good) refurbed chips with "new" dates on them.

This is the GPU on my Lenovo repaired T61p:




Date code is early 2011, my motherboard was replaced in 2011. NVidia would not be making this GPU in 2011 anymore, but a well informed person told me that NVidia was refurbishing old GPUs to supply companies like Lenovo with good chips for their refurbed mainboards.

No problems since then, and many of the issues I had which I used to blame on Windows (machine would sometimes fail to come out of sleep mode) have disappeared. Looks like it will be fine for the long term.

I have a couple that also have new gpu chips on them, but some lenovo refurb boards don't. The problem is when old chips get new dates etched on them and sold as new.


Since you have a new gpu and your board survived the reballing process, it will probably be a very reliable replacement.

I am now consider buying a 2-year-old W510 with Quadro FX 880M. Are those free of this bug?

Yes, it was only the T61 with nVidia GPU that had the problems. T61 with Intel GPU are fine.

The problem with the nVidia chips is believed to have effected less then 1% of the total manufactured and the cause was isolated and corrected sometime after febuary 2008, but it wasn't until August 2008 that the new chip was used exclusively in T61 models, so production dates of 08/08 and newer are fine, older dates you just need to accept that they may last for ten years or ten days, but if you just bought one and it failed suddenly, you were most likely sold one with improper repairs, reflowed, baked, etc...

In september 2008 Lenovo replaced the T61 line with the T/W500, which went back to the ATI graphics similar to the T60 line. The T/W510 line then reverted to nVidia again and is safe and reliable. It's a shame that they cancelled the T61 line just after fixing the problem, and even more so that nVidia wasn't used in the T500 systems, the one shortfalling of this line is the graphics.

It's also a shame that the 510 lines went even further in the wrong direction with aspect ratio. 4:3 (16:12) was classic, the T61 widescreen went to 16:10 which is a nice format, but the 16:9 aspect ratio isn't very good for viewing web pages or documents. It's great for viewing HD movies, but Lenovo just doesn't understand their core customers don't want it, which is why many of us are retrofitting T61 boards into 15" T60 systems, so we can have the 4:3 aspect ratio with an IPS flexview screen. However when doing this you need to either settle for integrated graphics, or accept the risk of the older nVidia boards because the 4:3 systems were discontinued long before the nVidia problems were fixed.

Hah, my affected R61 is 08/08, and as for only 1% of chips being affected - my last three laptops were: Lenovo, Compaq and HP. According to your 1%, chances of me getting three lemons in a row are 0,01%

But thanks for the elaboration on newer models. Much appreciated.

Hi, just bought a T61 with an nVidia G86-740-A2. It's in transit now. Eventually want to make a T60/T61 Frankenpad. It already has the Middleton BIOS installed and Windows 7 64-bit. I really dislike the squatty wide-screen format of newer laptops, and miss the 1600 x 1200 Flexview screen of my R50p, which died from the loose GPU problem. It gave me nearly 7 years of excellent service.

I'm hoping the T61 will have the updated GPU. (Didn't realize the scope of this problem until reading this thread.) The warranty ran out on 6/3/2011 and it had a 3-year warranty, so it must have been purchased on 6/3/2008. So it is in the real iffy period, but perhaps not without hope. It has a high serial number (assuming they are alphabetically/numerically ascending): L3-Y6128 (the leading "Y" gives me hope).

Also, the IBM parts listing shows two system board MPN/FRU entries, the first as 42W3417/44C3924 and the second as 44C3923/44C3924. I can't find anything on 42W3417 or 44C3923, but the FRU, 44C3924, appears to indicate that this is a native Penryn board (awesome!). Just wondering if they have a practice of adding an entry to the parts listing when they replace a part, and that's why there are two system board entries?

The machine type is 8889-CTO, based on 8889-W1C. On the other hand, I found a forum post wherein someone sold the exact same model with a serial number very close to mine (L3-Y6182) in which the GPU was replaced: http://www.thinkpads.com/forum/viewtopi ... 11&t=94986 The parts listing for that machine also shows the two entries.

In trolling around, checking other serial numbers just beyond mine, I see they also have the two system board entries; so my hypothesis is probably wrong (unless these were all bought by a corporation that had their fleet fixed).

Guess I need to ask the seller if he knows whether the GPU was replaced or not (something that would have been good to check on before purchasing ).

If you're talking about the fact that there are two different FRUs for system boards with the same GPU, it's because one's meant for Merom CPUs and the other Penryn. I believe the Merom system board can use a Penryn CPU with the Middleton BIOS.

Yep in total it does not seem toooo bad. In the german thinkpad forum we made a poll which showed that 55% (n=44!, total n=80, 07/2012) of Nvidia based Tp out of C2D generation are still working w/o any replacement. I would assume that most of them were produced in 2007 and the percentage of 100% error free chips cannot change the stats too much.

I'm typing this from a Thinkpad with a dying Nvidia GPU. I'd hesitate to buy another.

The FRU numbers beginning with 44c are equivilent numbers for boards mostly if not entirely manufactured in 2008. These probably come from a different factory then the 42w boards, but the 44c I believe are all penryn where the 42w (or 41w in some cases) come in Merom and Penryn versions. These numbers have no bearing on the type of GPU used, nor do the numbers on the GPU itself. It's complicated, but suffice it to say the gpu redesign was done quietly to not draw attention to the problem.

Tuus, thank you for the additional information. You truly are a maven when it comes to Thinkpads!

Would you know why IBM lists two entries for the system board?:

Mfg    	FRU
part #	part #	Description                          	   Serviceable?
39T0494	39T0495	WRLSS ADPT FRU ADONID MDC-1.5                	Y
39T5624	41W1155	FRU USB SUB CARD                              	Y
39T7209	0000000	TOUCHPAD PLATE:PADS                      	N
41R0594	40Y8403	1GB PC2 5300NP FRU                         	Y
41R0594	40Y8403	1GB PC2 5300NP FRU                         	Y
41U5626	42W7849	FRU CPU ASM INTEL CORE-2 DUO PROCESSOR M	Y
41V9556	0000000	LABELS; LABEL HOMOLOGATION -IIPC:LABELS   	N
41V9757	41V9756	RUBBER SHEET FRU                            	Y
41W1156	39T0497	WRLSS ADPT FRU CALLISTO BDC-2                  	Y
41W4528	0000000	HDD BRACKET:BRACKETS/STIFFENERS            	N
42R9978	42W3820	FRU PALMREST ASM W/ FINGER PRINT 14 W/ T	Y
42T0437	42T0438	FLT PNL DS FRU 14.1 SXGA+                      	Y
42T0864	42T0865	WRLSS ADPT FRU KEDRON_N                       	Y
42T0906	42T0907	SUB CARD FRU                                   	Y
42T1056	42T1485	HRD DSK DR                                   	Y
42T1459	42T1485	HRD DSK DR                                   	Y
42T2503	39T2687	CD/DVD DRV UBSS COMBO2 HL                    	Y
42T3177	42T3209	KEYBOARD KBD ALPS US                         	Y
42T5008	0000000	LINE CORD:LINE CORDS                         	N
42T5276	42T5277	AC ADAPTER DELTA90W20V2P                      	Y
42V8504	46V0812	VB32 US ENGLISH                               	Y
42V8619	0000000	BOMS, NOT SHIPPABLE ACROSS BORDERS; 14 S	N
42W2143	44M4361	NOT AVAILABLE                                  	N
42W2427	0000000	LABELS; FCC LABEL FOR WLAN:LABELS              	N
42W2739	0000000	LABELS; MS WINDOWS VISTA PREMIUM LOGO:LA	N
42W3007	0000000	FINGER PRINT READER ASM:MECHANICAL ASSEM	N
42W3417	44C3924	SYSTMBRD ASSEMBLY FRU                   	Y
42W3620	0000000	LABELS; PRODUCT LABEL 8889CTO:LABELS       	N
42X3558	0000000	T61(DAVINCI3/CORONADO3 DISCRETE MODEL):P	N
42X4075	0000000	ENERGYSTAR4.0:PUBLICATIONS MISC               	N
42X4525	0000000	LABELS; ENERGY STAR LOGO LABEL - SYSTEM       	N
42Y6242	44M4360	VISTA BUSINESS 32 BIT ALL WW:LABELS          	N
44C3923	44C3924	SYSTMBRD ASSEMBLY FRU                   	Y
44C4142	44W4800	IDATAPLEX 2.5 INCH PAPOOSE BACKPLANE CAR	N
91P8421	0000000	TRACKPOINT CAP KIT:MECHANICAL ASSEMBLIES	N
92P1134	42T4620	RCHRGBL BT PANASONIC 9 CELL FRU               	Y
93P8979	44W4800	IDATAPLEX 2.5 INCH PAPOOSE BACKPLANE CAR	N

Does this mean that the original board was replaced at some point?

Most importantly, can you tell me if this machine supports Penryn natively?

Also, would you know what the entry for "T61(DAVINCI3/CORONADO3 DISCRETE MODEL):P" is for? There is a "P" at the end, but I have a T61, not a T61p.

This laptop is a CTO, based on 8889-W1C.

P.S.: In my original post, I said my T61 had an nVidia G86-740-A2; but I haven't actually seen the top of the GPU yet. I should have stated instead that the machine has an nVIDIA Quadro NVS 140M.

No.



It's actually the other way around, 8889-W1C based on 8889-CTO...


ThinkPad T61 (8889-W1C)
Based 8889-CTO: T7500(2.2GHz), 2GB RAM, 100GB 7200rpm HD, 14.1in 1400x1050 LCD, 128MB nVIDIA Quadro NVS 140M, CDRW/DVD, Intel 802.11agn wireless, Bluetooth, Modem, 1Gb Ether, UltraNav, Sec Chip, FPR, 9c Li-Ion, WinVista Business

You do indeed have a Penryn board, it's an equivalent to the 42w7873 board which is a Penryn version of the T61 4:3 with NVS140m graphics. Your model number was a volume special order that was placed sometime in 2008, long after the 4:3 units were available as pre-configured. At the time your machines were ordered there were no more Merom boards, so you got lucky there, but the lifespan of the gpu will always be in question, but I'd say it's more then likely it will still be working next year and the next few to follow, as long as it's never been baked or reflowed. If you're thinking of swapping in a Penryn cpu (recommended if you're so inclined), then take a look at your GPU, if the date code reads 081x to 082x (x=0-9), then it's likely original, if it reads 09xx-11xx, then it's been replaced. If it's been replaced you can remove the bottom cover from the laptop and look for the orange "serviceable used part" sticker, some also have a white Lenovo label too. This will confirm it's a genuine Lenovo refurb board not a cheap chinese knock-off with recycled (fake) gpu chip. If you want to see some photos of a genuine lenovo refurb board you can see some here...


viewtopic.php?f=11&t=106691


Also notice the sticker on top of the ram socket, you can usually spot that without removing more then the palmrest which is a sign that you have a refurb board, but note that the chinese knockoff boards also have this sticker. If there is none present, then you most likely have the original board.

TuuS, you are the man! Thank you! I don't know how you know all this information.

Yes, I will definitely be upgrading... to a T9500. Am keenly anticipating the uncovering of the GPU to see what hand I have been dealt.

Just bought a Samsung 830 256GB SSD at clearance prices ($155), which I plan to install also. Machine has already been upflashed to Middleton BIOS, and has Win 7 Ultimate installed. Snagged some Mushkin 2x4GB PC2-5300 modules off eBay for a very reasonable price also.

This machine has an SXGA+ display (1400x1050), which is pretty nice in its own right. But I miss the 1600x1200 display of my dead R50p, and so my plans are to put together a T60(p)/T61 Frankenpad. Just need to get a decent-looking T60(p). Once I get that, I will be reviewing a number of Frankenpad links that I have culled to do the job. But any tips/help/parts you can provide, I'd appreciate.

I am a developer/software consultant, so I am not fond of the squatty 16x9/10 screen formats that are now the only choice foisted upon the public. (Though I would buy a high-resolution Thinkpad 17" if Lenovo would only offer it.)

Thanks again. - BitEngineer

You're welcome. I can get the T9500 cpu, but they are costly so you might consider the T9300, it's build on an identical die, same amount of cache just a slightly slower clock speed and a huge difference in price.

Also, if you want a 17" 1920x1200 screen, I just posted an HP laptop in the marketplace that has one and it's even WVA (wide viewing angle), which is HPs version of the IPS Flexview. Lenovo did make a similar model, the W700, but they didn't get ips screens, nor did any of the lenovo widescreens larger then 12". I'm not a huge HP fan, but if you want a huge screen you can't beat it (under $300).