think this thinkpad is dead =/ (T40)

[dogon]

updated the ram from 256MB to 1GB PC2700 for a friends old laptop.. tested and it ran fine , screwed everything back in and now will no longer boot.

took everything apart piece by piece and still nothing , the only sign of life this machine gives is when you plug a power chord ( or the battery ) out and then back in . Machine makes a power on noise for approx 2 seconds and the hdd begins power up and then everything just turns off.

also the LED (about four of them) go green then turn off, and the LED for battery/power flickers on for a split second then goes away when plugging in.

I have taken out ram , hdd and cdrom .. ran another test .. same thing .. not even beeping .. and from reading many other threads on this forum , i guess it has died.. though no idea what was damaged or how, as the board seems fine *shrug*

any suggestions ?( apart from the hold power button x times approach as i have attempted this ) .

thanks

[tim S]

The T40 supports PC2700 ram but is happiest with PC2100 (266Mhz).
I took this from IBM's site:
•If the memory modules are mixed (for example, using both PC 2100 and PC 2700) or the system supports only PC2100 memory, then the system memory will run at 266MHz.

You seem to have done many things to try and get the machine up and running but if you haven't already done this, I'd take the second stick out from under the keyboard and just work with whatever stick you want installed in the back.
If there isn't a second stick under the keyboard, I'd remove the battery, put the 256 in the back and try again.
After that put it down to gremlins!

Good luck
Tim S

[dogon]

thank you for your reply

yes i had done this right away, after thinking that it could of been a problem with the RAM .. but alas .. it may indeed be gremlins

[sktn77a]

You may have awakened the T4x sleeping giant...... - GPU chip came unsoldered. I don't think it takes much tinkering inside to wake this one up.

[dogon]

well i have solved the riddle .. but i am greatly disappointed with the result...


i guess there might not of been a great deal of "foresight" when designing the motherboard layout..

thinking back to when i installed the new RAM , when i was piecing everything back together there was a strange moment that involved a large cracking noise . This was on the back panel for RAM (nothing was in there , just putting the panel back on) .. i must of been tired or not paying attention , but i had a longer screw than required to lock it in place , and as i was slowly turning the screwdriver the loud crack suddenly thundered through the air . There was absolutely NO give at all .. no resistance before this happened .. it were as if the screw was only just in the thread.

While inspecting the motherboard , i decided to scan over that area of the motherboard ... and when i did there was large chunk .. yes a chunk!!! .. missing and it was the size of the screw point !! .. i cannot believe that there would be access to the motherboard / mainframe direct from a point in which the screws are drilled into !! ... so i understand that i was not using the correct screw at the time .. but the fact that i had no resistance followed by the life of this computer ending is quite upsetting to me ( and the owner ) .. all i can do now is possibly replace with a second hand board from somewhere out my pocket .. or at least contribute to a new laptop ... thanks for responses of all .. just wrote this so i could vent =/

[RealBlackStuff]

Expensive lesson learned...
Always mark down from where the screws go.
There's a diagram available also for what goes where: http://nickpaton.fireflyinternet.co.uk/ ... 0links.pdf

[tim S]

What a pain! It almost sounds like a component was shorted out and blew off or out.
Luckily, at least here in the US, used boards are readily available on eBay, however
many of these boards are NG, so it might prove difficult to return one from downunder.
So a used laptop might be the way to go.

Tim S

[Neil]

NG? Is that New Game, Nearly Good, Not Good, Not Great, or something entirely different, like No Guarantee?

[tim S]

NG = No good, at least it does here.

Tim S

[dogon]

well i just nabbed one from ebay .. a used t40 with no HDD .. ( is mean to be working ) and located in Melbourne .. all up was 78 (AUD) and possibly another 20 for P&P ... not too bad i guess .. i can always sell of the spare parts to get back some of costs as i will have x2 256mb , cpu , monitor etc .. will update if used one all works ok etc .. i think i might replace the back panel of it with some kind of steel plate =S ...

[RealBlackStuff]

If you haven't got it yet, I suggest you download the HMM: http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... 46464.html
V useful!