Thinkpads Forum

Of my three almost identically configured X61s, one occasionally freezed. It was so occasional, so subtle, I let it go for around 8 months, continuing to use the machine. I began to associate it with heavy wireless use, so I blamed Intel, because there was actually an ancient bug of this nature.

When I got to work on it, my first tool was memtest86, recommended by others in this forum. I thought I had it nailed when, with both cores enabled, a host of errors ensued. But it turns out this is an Intel bug, because all 3 laptops exhibit errors with memtest86 when multicore is enabled. Swapping ram gave the initial impression of a fix, but it was just coincidence.

Returning to Intel wireless, I swapped the wireless card. No difference.

The SSD then came under suspicion, so it was swapped for a Seagate 750, the same as in the other machines. Still, it froze. I decommissioned the machine. A motherboard showed up on eBay. I bought it, and put the mess aside.

Now, having finally replaced the motherboard, and most relevant things (the LCD, bluetooth module, and keyboard remaining), the problem appears to have been fixed. Of course, next month, it could freeze. Any component in the machine with an associated kernel driver can cause a freeze that is caused by a combination of hardware and software.

To make a better story, I left a relevant fact to the end. The machine with the freeze had a broken card reader. The Ricoh chip, or subtle ESD damage that blew the Ricoh chip, could cause the freeze.

Any stories of weird freezes, and if/how you solved them?

Yeah any defective/broken hardware and/or driver can cause random freeze. Random freezing due to hardware failure is uncommon these days as, in general, hardware is very reliable. I'm always amaze at the efforet required to kill a modern CPU. Much more common, especially with laptops of this vintage, is overheating due to dirt/dust and/or dried up less effective TIM. I'm an avid overclocker on the desktop side and willing and frequently bring everything to a shutdown mode in order to find a most stable state.

I have http://www.cpuid.com/softwares/hwmonitor.html on all my laptops. Heat was not part of this particular freeze.

Wouldn't a Thinkpad-specific monitoring tool like TPFC or IBM_ECW display more sensors than HWmonitor?
Just asking, since I've rarely used HWMonitor on my Thinkpads.

I've never used it. HW Monitor displays all the monitored points of the Intel chipset, the graphics chip in dual-graphics laptops, and the drive temperature as well. The almost universal solution is possible because, under the skin, almost all (maybe all?) laptops are based on the same chips. The diversity has actually narrowed since Taiwan companies, and AMD, dropped out of the chipset game for mainstream laptops.

precip9 wrote:Any stories of weird freezes, and if/how you solved them?

Probably not relevant to systems around the age of your X61s, but here's my weirdest problem seen in a T23: http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... 14#p271414

Short version: a hairline fracture in the solder joint of one of the crystals on the motherboard caused it to suspend operations at times.

precip9 wrote:
Any stories of weird freezes, and if/how you solved them?

Here I have a T60p (2007-92U) that I sold to my brother-in-law last year. Very clean and well-kept machine. Easily a 9.25 on a 1-10 scale.

Random freezes that render both the trackpoint and the touchpad useless. External mouse works.

Tested everything I could possibly think of, swapped RAM, keyboard, palmrest, HDD, CPU, wireless card, battery...

No go. Freezes come and go as they please, regardless of OS and/or hardware configuration.

Now he's a proud owner of an exceptionally nice T61, and this machine is becoming my next FrankenPad.

My T410s has had freezes since new. Screen goes black, stops responding.

I started this thread with the optimism that the freeze problem was solved, by replacing all of the usual culprits: motherboard, ram, hard drive, hard disk, and wireless card.
When the motherboard was replaced, the bottom cover and power connectors came with it.

It froze yesterday, while downloading ~150mb of Microsoft updates via an Intel 5100 adapter. The mouse pointer was still mobile, but ctl-alt-delete did not bring up the menu that offers the system monitor. So I hit the reset button and started over.

The machine started normally, and accomplished these tasks:
download updates
install updates
update Adobe reader
update Firefox
disk cleanup, including system files
SSD trim

Prior to that, the machine accomplished W8 install, W8.1 upgrade, and numerous updates without freezes. One suspicious event occurred while Bitlocking the hard disk, but since Bitlocker has a somewhat suspicious reputation, I don't know whether to count it against the machine. I probably should.
There is one difference between the behavior with the replaced motherboard: the freeze left the mouse point mobile.

Care to vote? My opinion is that the eBay salvager sold me another defective motherboard.

5100 does not have the best of reputations!
Get a 6200N or 6205N (if half-size, also get a half-size bracket).

Freezes have also been reported with the 6200 series. It's also worth noting that with the 6200 series, Intel reduced the geometry, to save power, to the point where semi life becomes observably finite. They offer a separate, "long life", industrial version. Laptops are equipped with the short-life version.

But, responding to your suggestion, I'll "revert" to a 5300. I have the 5300 in five active machines with no problems. I put the 5100 in as part of the diagnostic parts swap, and to save power, since the X61s has only two antennas.