New T42 motherboard ATI 9600 vidoe crashes

[gdepetro]

I put a brand new T42 motherboard in a T43 case. Installed XP. The viedo ATI 9600 crashes and will not run. Use the Lenovo video drive. Also notice there is a white wire coming from the display to the motherboard. What is it for?> Can't see where to connect it. Did not notice where it was connected to the T43 when I disassembled.

Thanks for any help.
Gerry

[axur-delmeria]

It's likely the the ATI video chip is malfunctioning, and given the age of these motherboards, it's not unexpected.

As for the white wire, can you post a picture of it? It's been years since I last opened up a T40 series Thinkpad.

[kfzhu1229]

You have to use the long heatsinks with GPU cooling for the Radeon 9600 chip. Moreover, it is a unique heatsink that has the diamond shaped protrusion in the centre of the contact pad to make contact with the GPU die. If you use the wrong heatsink, the graphics will die in a matter of hours

[RealBlackStuff]

The white wire is the 3rd antenna wire (for the middle) on wifi-cards with 3 connectors.
Usually only grey and black are used.

[axur-delmeria]

I think the white cable is for the Bluetooth card. I don't remember a WiFi card on the T40 series that requires 3 antennas.

[ThinkPad560X]

Don't forget to clean out the dust inside the heatsink fan. Found out just because it is blowing hot air out its working. I recently had problems with a laptop shutting off after an hour of being on. Even new thermal paste and cleaned the outside of the vent fan. Then saw a video of a wall of dust inside the vent. Sometimes you cannot even open the heatsink to clean it out. I think if I remember the T40 series you can't open. I used a toothbrush and removed the fan to get at the wall, then a Qtip where the toothbrush can't reach. After I did that the laptop hasn't shut off since.

But as for the T40,T41,T42 and T43 They all had ATi Graphics problems. That is why I bought a Intel GPU board for my T40 and T43.

[kfzhu1229]

Don't forget to clean out the dust inside the heatsink fan. Found out just because it is blowing hot air out its working. I recently had problems with a laptop shutting off after an hour of being on. Even new thermal paste and cleaned the outside of the vent fan. Then saw a video of a wall of dust inside the vent. Sometimes you cannot even open the heatsink to clean it out. I think if I remember the T40 series you can't open. I used a toothbrush and removed the fan to get at the wall, then a Qtip where the toothbrush can't reach. After I did that the laptop hasn't shut off since.

But as for the T40,T41,T42 and T43 They all had ATi Graphics problems. That is why I bought a Intel GPU board for my T40 and T43.

You can't open easily, but you can try to carefully pry the joints open with flat head screwdrivers and then clean thoroughly while giving the fan some fresh lubricant. That goes a long way in making the exhaust efficient.
Also, graphics failure is possible on T43 but usually not the culprit. Usually the culprit is the southbridge on T43 as the southbridge on Sonoma platform ran hotter than anticipated.