T43 Screen Dims and Computer Becomes Unresponsive

[SurrealMustard]

I fixed up this T43 for my father, but it looks to be having an odd issue. After some time, the screen will get very dim and the computer stops accepting input, although I can see from the clock in the corner that it is still running. The only key it will respond to in this state is the power key, which will, oddly enough, immediately shut the whole thing off. Pressing other keys or trying to use the trackpad elicits no response, but after a while longer, the computer's state will continue to deteriorate, starting with the screen going blank. If this happens, no amount of holding down the power button can shut it off, and the battery must be pulled to bring it back to reality.

I've tested the memory and swapped batteries (but not AC adapters). The software is somewhat fresh (clean install of Windows 7 several months ago with all of the necessary Lenovo drivers and companion programs, plus a few other odds & ends).

Any ideas?

[RealBlackStuff]

Southbridge (most likely) and/or GPU (less likely) may have come a bit loose and would need to be reballed.
Try putting some permanent pressure on the Southbridge (big Intel chip under wifi card) to see if that helps.
Alternative: replace motherboard with a matching T43/R52 one.

[danikayser84]

Also is the battery a generic/third-party? I had a shorted battery damage something on one of my T43s (it would sometimes freeze up and the power management screwed up on it)

Give the machine a full teardown, remove and replace CMOS battery, etc. and see if that changes anything

[SurrealMustard]

Also is the battery a generic/third-party? I had a shorted battery damage something on one of my T43s (it would sometimes freeze up and the power management screwed up on it)

Give the machine a full teardown, remove and replace CMOS battery, etc. and see if that changes anything

It has been running an OEM battery, but I tried swapping it out for a generic, and the same thing happened. As for the CMOS battery, it was just recently replaced when the machine was "refreshed".

Southbridge (most likely) and/or GPU (less likely) may have come a bit loose and would need to be reballed.
Try putting some permanent pressure on the Southbridge (big Intel chip under wifi card) to see if that helps.
Alternative: replace motherboard with a matching T43/R52 one.

That's what I was afraid of.

[kfzhu1229]

Bad RAM and wrong power manager driver will also cause the same thing
Also if your motherboard is dead which I hope not, I have one T43P motherboard in NOS (Bought 3 in China and tested by myself but I used one just today and will need another one for emergency replacement purpose).

[SurrealMustard]

Bad RAM and wrong power manager driver will also cause the same thing
Also if your motherboard is dead which I hope not, I have one T43P motherboard in NOS (Bought 3 in China and tested by myself but I used one just today and will need another one for emergency replacement purpose).

RAM tested good. As for the power manager driver, I initially installed what I know to be the correct one, but was presented with a new one by Windows Update at some point (although I can't remember if it was accepted or not).
Either way, it's not looking good for this board at this point. I left it on today, and when I came back, it was totally locked up, displaying only a solid blue screen. As before, no amount of power-button-holding could shut it off.

[kfzhu1229]

Make a USB boot disk or Windows installation CD/DVD and boot off there. See if your machine still locks up if you try to use that environment
If so, open the computer up and check for short-circuit in any way (usually the white bt antenna can do that) and try to reseat the motherboard if that doesn't work.
FYI when I encountered the power manager driver glitch, the laptop screen flashes once, stays in power brightness and freezes right there but not sure if the clock is still going. After a few minutes the LCD turns off and after another few minutes the machine starts to beep like BIOS errors. I don't remember when I can shut off by power button and when I have to unplug the battery though

[dandreye]

RAM tested good. As for the power manager driver, I initially installed what I know to be the correct one, but was presented with a new one by Windows Update at some point (although I can't remember if it was accepted or not).
Either way, it's not looking good for this board at this point. I left it on today, and when I came back, it was totally locked up, displaying only a solid blue screen. As before, no amount of power-button-holding could shut it off.

Try accessing your laptop in such state remotely from another one, e.g. using Windows Remote Desktop or TeamViewer. Also try using it on AC alone w/o a battery just to see if the issue is still there. My T42 developed something similar soon after I first tried a self refurbished battery in it, which went very hot: now whenever I plug any battery into it, the laptop would cease receiving all sorts of input (even the Power button) soon after, at times silently and w/o LCD going dim while at other times with a fairly loud pop and LCD going as dim as it probably can. It'd keep running fine in such reduced state though (at least for as long as I dared observing it) and I'd always be able to log into it via TeamViewer to try putting it to Sleep or Hibernate, neither of which, however, would go smoothly. Once I remove the battery leaving it on AC the issue goes away: I left it on for entire day and nothing happened, while with a battery it's typically a matter of several minutes. There have never ever been such issues for several years of use before I tried that bad battery in it. Interestingly the issue doesn't seem to be there under Linux: tried booting off a USB key with PartedMagic and leaving it on for entire day and could see a healthy battery being charged/discharged properly in system monitor on the desktop.

Is there an app that'd help diagnose this sort of issues, at least by means of verifying PM related stuff like ACPI, charging circuits etc?

[SurrealMustard]

I still haven't had a chance to try remote desktop while the system is stuck in "limbo," but I did get a chance to do some more experimentation with the computer today. In the morning, I started a YouTube video fullscreen on loop and came back a couple hours later to find the everything completely frozen. Immediately afterward, I booted from a card reader into a Linux Mint Debian Edition live demonstration and ran the same video for about four hours, this time with no problems. After that, I booted back into Windows and tried the video a third time, and within a couple of hours, it got stuck in that weird state of the backlight being turned way down and the system being unresponsive to all input, even though the video was still playing.

It could've been coincidence, but based on these findings, it sounds like a weird software problem. Next time, I'll try it without the battery installed and see if I can connect remotely while the system is stuck in "limbo." Thoughts?

[kfzhu1229]

I'd say you are using the wrong version of power manager. The power manager that's Lenovo branded is guaranteed to cause this problem for some reason and this usually occurs when the fan speed changes

[SurrealMustard]

I'd say you are using the wrong version of power manager. The power manager that's Lenovo branded is guaranteed to cause this problem for some reason and this usually occurs when the fan speed changes

What exactly makes it the wrong version? It was the recommended release for this computer from the product's support page. Granted, the support page has been wrong in the past, (the 3.81 hotkey feature integration debacle comes to mind, but the newer driver didn't work on any computer or operating system as far as I could tell) but this version seemed to work fine on all of my other ThinkPad systems as well as the other T43 that I set up. I'll try to acquisition the next-older version though and see if that makes any difference.

[kfzhu1229]

I use the version that came with IBMTOOLS in a ThinkPad T43. I tried the later versions before because it looked nicer to Windows 7 and it caused that problem.
How does the power manager interface look? If it looks like Windows 7 then it is the version that will freeze your computer. The one came with my T43 looks like Windows XP interface (p.s. the power manager interface itself isn't all that dependent on the OS you are using as my T43 version of Power manager still looks like Windows XP in Windows 10)

[BillP]

Many versions of Power Manager for Vista and Windows 7 can be downloaded from http://support.lenovo.com/us/en/downloads/ds014924. For what it's worth, my T43 (1872-4AU) runs well with Power Manager 6.45 on Windows 7.

[dandreye]

My T43 2669-YJ6 in turn runs fine with PMDriver v1.67.11.8 dated 20/01/2016 (Lenovo package n1lku12w) and Windows 7 style Power Manager v6.68.10 (Lenovo package n1au410w):
https://s15.postimg.org/q2zqqpmnf/n1lku12w-_T43.png
https://s29.postimg.org/ms3dznj07/n1au410w-_T43.png

[BillP]

I updated my T43 from Power Manager 6.45 to 6.68.12 (n1au412w) and it works fine.

[kfzhu1229]

Well I am still using 1.00b from T43's IBMTOOLS folder and there is nothing to complain about. That version works with T series from T23 and above and A3x series. (not sure about X series)

[dandreye]

Just updated my T42 Power Manager to 6.68.12 too. Meanwhile Windows 7 Update offered some system update to v1.67.12.23, which immediately told me it's PM Driver although the latter wasn't mentioned in the title. I agreed and it hasn't had that issue so far even with the battery in it although it's probably too early to say: we'll see. Hope it was just a bad driver indeed.

Update: The Windows 7 system update mentioned above is called "Lenovo - System - 2/15/2017 12:00:00 AM - 1.67.12.23". Upon its installation Lenovo PM Device driver in Device Manager changes to v1.67.12.23 dated 15/02/2017. I later found Lenovo package n1mku58w.exe with that version and a more recent date:

Package Build ID Rev. Issue Date
---------- -------- ---- ---------------
1.67.12.23 n1mku58w 01 2017/03/23

but an attempt to install it over the Windows 7 Update installed one triggered "Your current driver is newer" warning, so I decided not to proceed.

[kfzhu1229]

Hmm. I kinda need someone to make sure that those versions work fine before I put mine into those. I tried to uninstall the wrong version of power manager on a T42 and it doesn't let me go through successfully (It says uninstalled, please restart your computer but then it is there once again after restart)

[SurrealMustard]

I don't think that the Power Manager utility has anything to do with it on this machine. Uninstalled 6.68.10 (which works just fine on our other T43, for the record) and loaded 6.68.12, but the computer still craps up after a while. Guess this particular laptop just doesn't like Windows. We might just need to set my father up with a different system as this thing is just becoming too much of a headache.

[dandreye]

Do you get any entries logged in Windows Event Viewer at the moment when the issue occurs and if so are any of them ACPI related? I get several successive ACPI alarms saying something like "no response received", hence hinting at something power management related. Following the Power Manager and PMDriver update mentioned above the issue didn't actually go away on my T42 completely but it now takes much longer before it occurs, like 8-10 hours vs mere minutes before. I feel a HW issue is the root of the symptom, which is triggered by some Windows functionality that Linux doesn't have. Yours might be different though.

[kfzhu1229]

Well how about just do a clean install of Windows without any special power management drivers and stuff like that and see if the problem persists?