Thinkpads Forum

Good Day everyone,

My apologies if this has been addressed multiple times. I spent about 1/2 hr looking through the board to find something similar to this.

As I was installing the latest version of the BIOS, I thought it locked up an apparently reset it before it finished. So, needless to say, I toasted the BIOS. I have seen multiple places to purchase just the BIOS chip, and was trying to figure out which one it was (Chip Manufacturer / Model #) as well as the location of it on the motherboard. I do realized that it is a SMD and I will need a hot air soldering station, but rather than purchase a new motherboard, or toss the laptop, I figured I would give it a shot.

If anyone has any insight they could impart, I would be greatly appreciative.

Best Regards,

Ken

Although there are several different T61 boards pictured here, there is a T61p down the page with an arrow pointing to the chip.

MOD edit: link removed

Thank you very much for the website. This is perfect. Just to confirm as I have seen so many different posts. This is the chip that holds the ROM, not the HW password, correct?

Thank you all again!

Ken

I always assumed it held both but that might not be correct - I do know it holds the passwords.

I will have to do a little more research. I want to actually find the one without the password, just the bios. If they are both on there, than I am not sure how I will fix it. I was hoping to burn a new chip for it to replace it.

Thank you!

Ken

It's cheaper and easier to replace the whole motherboard, rather than try and find/replace the BIOS-chip.

The 'RF08 chip as indicated in the link referenced above is NOT the BIOS. That device can only store 1KBytes (8192 bits). Here's some info from the archives:

http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=80971

edit: U49 part numbers to look for are 25VF016B and MX25L1605A.