Thinkpads Forum

Hello,
I have two Thinkpad T60s. One thinkpad has an ATI GPU and a slow processor. Meanhile, another one has a faster processor but not GPU. I tried putting the faster CPU into the one with the ATI graphics card. After swapping the CPU, neither computer would turn on anymore. When I connect them to AC, the AC lights glows green and the battery light glows orange. When I press the power button, I hear the fans and HDD spinning up briefly and then all the lights go out until I replug the AC adapter. I've swapped back the CPUs so that each computer now has the original CPU back in it, but they still won't boot.

Did I just somehow brick both of my machines? Or is there something else I should try out?

Welcome to the Forum.
Did you tighten the screw in the CPU socket?
Just in case, what are the CPU models you have?
Look like T2300, T5500, T7200 etc.

As RBS mentioned, make sure the black screw lock on the top of the CPU socket is turned clockwise with the tiny notch on the screw lock facing to the left, that's the CPU socket's lock position. If the socket is not locked, the pins won't make contact. Check the pins on both processors to make sure you haven't bent or damaged any of them. Even one pin missing can cause a CPU not to boot.

As long as both processors originally worked in both machines, and none of the pins were shorted with one another, there really shouldn't be any reason that a CPU swap would damage either motherboard. Take an opportunity to visually check over the board around where you've worked on it, to make sure nothing metal is left behind, that could possibly be shorting out two parts of the motherboard.

If one or the other T60 has a newer gen processor (T7200/7400/7600, versus the earlier T2300/T2500) then it's possible the T60 that was originally running the slower CPU, doesn't have an updated BIOS that would be needed for it to be able to boot with the newer gen CPUs. You'll have to swap the old CPU back into it and get it to boot, and perform the BIOS update before swapping the newer CPU into it.

Thanks for your answer. I got it.