5 Big Problems with my Thinkpad T43 - Please Help

[antimony]

Hi,

I seem to have some serious issues with my laptop IBM Thinkpad T43. The following are the issues I face:

i. My comp is unable to hibernate. Everytime I ask it to hibernate, it hangs with the screen, "Preparing to hibernate" and I have to force shut it down.

ii. Everytime I force shut it down this way, the next time my comp does not boot up the next time. Again, I am have to force shut down by pressing the power button. This cycle repeats for atleast half a dozen times.

iii. Everytime I shift my comp slightly, the hard-disk freezes. Although, this is part of the protection software by IBM, it does not unfreeze in a short while. It takes nearly eternity to unfreeze.

iv. My usb ports seem to have gone bust. Everytime I try to connect the mouse, I am lucky if I can get it to work for 5 minutes. After which, I get power surge indications and there is no power to the mouse. This power surge alert comes both before and after plugging in and removing the mouse. However, if I connect an external hard-disk (with separate power source) to the usb port, it works perfectly.

v. To try and overcome these problems, I tried to reformat my comp. But somehow my rescue and recovery cds have also gone bust. It quickly says it is done in cd 1 itself and asks me to restart the comp again. It does not ask for the remaining cds and nor does it format the comp.

Could anyone please help me tackle these problems? The tragedy of the whole thing is that my warranty ran out last month. So if I will need to get it repaired, I suppose it is going to cost me quite a bit, unless I can solve it with your help somehow.

Thanks and apologies for such a long thread.

Antimony

[Maccess]

Let's hope that it's because you have a non-canonical install of XP and that the problem can be fixed by a proper re-install of IBM's customized XP from your Rescue and Recovery disks.

IMPORTANT STEPS:

1) Reformat the hard drive WITH NO PARTITIONS. Use the FREE "Ultimate Boot CD" for this. Google it, download the iso and burn it.

2) Go to the system BIOS and select the CD-ROM drive as your startup device. Simply selecting the CD-ROM during the boot process will cause the symptom you've described--the install stops at the first CD because the next boot will be from the hard drive.

The CD-Rom drive must be selected as the boot device in the BIOS.

It is when the system reboots from the CD and it finds the partial install that it asks for the second CD.

Do these steps and post the results.

[antimony]

Hi,

Just a couple of concerns before I try the suggestion.

i. My copy of windows xp is genuine. It came pre-loaded with the laptop itself and I have been updating regularly and is now in SP3. So, I don't think the problem is because of that.

ii. If I use the 'ultimate boot' program to reformat the comp, and if my rescue and recovery cds which were provided by IBM are not working, wouldn't I lose my existing OS also? In that case, I would be left with only the hard-disk right?

If you could clarify these for me, then I will go ahead with the suggestion you have given.

[SteveS]

Unless someone has changed the BIOS settings to access and erase the hidden partition, you can restore your operating system from the rescue routine already on the drive, which eliminates the need for external recovery CDs. To access it, press Access IBM button at the start of boot, then follow the instructions for Restore to Factory Shipped state.

It is always good practice to back up your hard drive prior to attempting a restore, in case you find that you need to access a file you forgot to save, or the restore fails for some reason. Acronis True Image can be used to back up to an external drive.

For the USB issue, have you tried another mouse? If you are lucky, the mouse is the issue. I had a T43 that would randomly issue the USB Power Surge detected error message, even with nothing plugged into the USB connectors. Note that there are components in the computer, which interface using internal USB ports. The Ultranav touch pad, Trackpoint joystick, and fingerprint reader, on models that have them all interface through USB. I eliminated these as suspects by removing the palm rest and swapping it with a known good one from another PC. I still got the random power surge messages, and ended up needing to swap the system board.

[sparta.rising]

iii If you think APS is to blame, disable it. It could be a problem with the hard drive itself. If its a Hitachi drive, run the drive fitness test.

[davidspalding]

Hi,

I seem to have some serious issues with my laptop IBM Thinkpad T43. The following are the issues I face:

i. My comp is unable to hibernate. Everytime I ask it to hibernate, it hangs with the screen, "Preparing to hibernate" and I have to force shut it down....

I have had this problem for years, occurred after trying Omega alternate video drivers. Standby from a logged in session sometimes fails too ... after doing a forced shutdown, the next boot up takes interminably long, ... because Windows is still trying to hibernate/standby. My solution ... log out, then hibernate.

[antimony]

Hi,

Thanks for all the suggestions that I got on this forum

I tried a couple of things and here is what happened. I tried to use the built-in rescue and recovery tool that I was told I could access when the comp is booting up via the Access IBM button. For some reason, the comp kept telling me that I had uninstalled the Rescue and Recovery package, when I have no recollection of doing so.

So I just asked the system to restore back to a point in time. So far it is handling ok, atleast loads better than what I had to deal with for the past couple of days. Need to see whether this temporary fix can be improved.

One funny thing during my hard-disk freezing was that every time I touched/applied pressure to the trackpoint, I could see the cpu working. The moment I removed the force, it would stop. So you can imagine the kind of situation I was in when I had to continually press the trackpoint in order to get things done.

Regarding the usb ports, I don't think it is because of the mouse. Initially I also suspected the mouse and so tried connecting a hub port that I have. It also gave pretty much the same result. And since the day before, my external hard-disk is also not being detected. So yeah.

Anyways, thank you folks for all the wonderful advice that I have gotten regarding my problems.

Antimony

[sparta.rising]

This sounds like its a GPU problem and not a hard drive problem. See the numerous related posts. The GPU is almost directly below the trackpoint, and pressing it would temporarily reconnect the solder joints.