T40 lockup (necessitates total power cycle)

[tintin]

Hi all, first post and first problem with my T40.

Problem is that the T40 locks up hard. A short beep, quite muffled and the computer dies totally. After a lockup I can not restart again without first removing the battery and power cord. There is no bluescreen or anything.

The problem is quite intermittent, sometimes it happens during boot (rarely) and sometimes it takes hours for it to take place.

I have trield lots of things in order to try to nail down the problem.

These have no effect (still lockups):

• Run without battery in place
  Run on battery only
  Remove all internal cards (modem/NIC and wireless)
  Remove memory modules and try to run on a single one (512 and 256 MB ones)
  Reinstall windows XP
  Run with computer fan on maximum (temp with normal fan reach about 45 deg C and lockups happen regardless of measured temp on internal sensors)
  Run with and without power saving features
  Update all drivers and BIOS
  Measure the voltage on CMOS battery and it seems fine
  Reset the BIOS to factory defaults

Test I have done to the computer (no lockups during these)

• Check HD for bad sectors with various tools, windows internal and Spinrite)
  Try to jiggle a little on the MB and applying gentle force to the ATI chip while running
  Run memtest+ for hours on end (no errors)
  Run the included test software for 100+ repeats on all test
  Run the same test on the MB only for 200+ repeats
  Loading the computer really hard with either prime95 or some graphics test suite does not increase the lockup rate

All in all, there are normally no lockups when the computer just sits idle but rather when I am working actively with it. I have never had a lockup outside of windows e.g. during running test software, but again then I have no physical interaction with the computer.

All in all, the Maincard is an obvious candidate for error but could it be something else? Power regulator? The thing that differs from most other reports on erratic T4x's would be that the computer really locks hard and has to be totally powercycled in order to be able to start again, just like a thermal protection stop. Bad CPU?

Phew, lengtly post but this board is my last chance at some tips regarding this problem.

[GACrabill]

If I had done everything that you have tried, I would try using another hard drive. I recently had a tower that would completely lockup at intermittent times. An immediate attempt at restart would not work. Any handling to check memory, fans, heat build-up always made it work again ... until it failed the next time. Many hard drive tests were tried and all ran successfully. I thought that it was heat related and added more fans but it failed again 2 days later. Replacing the hard drive fixed the problem for me. Good luck.

[tintin]

Aha, good tip I'll try to get hold of another disc to test with then. Too bad I don't have any scrap 2,5" drives lying around... Any recommendations on a silent one if I were to buy a new one? Or are there compatibility issues with the T40?

[GACrabill]

[quote="tintin"]Any recommendations on a silent one if I were to buy a new one? Or are there compatibility issues with the T40?[/quote]

There are lots of threads on this forum containing hard drive recommendations. If a different hard drive does not fix your problem, would you rather have an inexpensive spare or a large, more costly spare? If a new hard drive does fix the problem, would you be satisfied with the same size and speed as before or would you want larger and faster?

Many folks like the Hitachi 7K100 7200rpm models. But, others maintain that the Hitachi 5K100 5400rpm models are quiet, faster than older 5400rpm models, and sufficient for everyone except power users.

Tough decisions .... Good luck.

[tintin]

Settled on a Samsung M40 MP0402H, *fingers crossed that it works*

Now the next trouble is to transfer the dang hidden partition, no free lunch anywhere in sight... There ought to be a more convinient way to do it, but then again, people seems to have tried pretty hard Lots of guides here, cheers for that!

[cmarti]

Lots of guides here, cheers for that!

Did you run pc doctor 5? It may help you find where is the problem.

pc doctor 5

[tintin]

Yep, ran all the PC-doctor 5 tests there as well.

Change of HD had no effect, things still crash. Intersting enough it might be the ATI chip anyways since after new HD, reinstall, patching etc. etc. the T40 ran fine for some hours. Then when I installed IBM's graphics drivers the computer crashed quickly after reboot. Right now I am trying to run without accelerated drivers...

[edit: spellings...]

[tintin]

Seems to be the graphics chip yes... With generic drivers only the laptop is stable. Unfortunately this means that I can not access the second head on the graphics either so the planar is bust. Bought one on ebay so in the weekend the T40 is hopefully fit for teaching duties again.