Thinkpads Forum

Having googled the life out of this one, I am appealing to the collective sagacity of thinkpads.com. It's a dumb little problem. My system clock - fine while the system is fully awake - does not track time while the system is in sleep, hibernate, or power off modes. It awakes to the setting extant when it nodded off.

The problem seems to be a power interruption I perpetrated on myself as I swapped out a battery; I'd thought the Tpad was plugged in; it was, but not to the wall. On reboot, Norton GoBack alerted me that the clock was incorrect, and asked about correcting timestamps. Did multiple reboots - problem remained. I blamed Symantec - always an easy target - and rather than using this software to go to a restore point - disabled and reenabled the thing. Of course, no luck.

Reset the clock in BIOS and via internet clock multiple times. No luck.

System restore could not ... effect a restore.

I don't think it's the CMOS battery.

AVG spyware and Norton AV reported nothing amiss; tried to run these in Safe Mode, but had trouble navigating - it seems that the Thinkvantage button menu differs from the regular F8 menu? In any case, felt quite stupid when I couldn't figure out how to do this.

Help?
Help!

And Thanks!

My recommendation would be to download a copy of the DOS version of PC Doctor for your system. Begin here:

http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... ATRIX.html

and select your model and then scroll down to the Diagnostics section. If you have a CD burner then use the Bootable CD link to download the .ISO file. If not, then you're left with making a set of diskettes (got floppy?). I don't have a T6x but for all of the PC Doctor versions I've used so far (up to T4x), there's a system board diagnostic in the program. One of the tests looks at the real-time clock. Run it and see what is does (passed or failed). Is the system still under warranty?

rkawakami wrote:My recommendation would be to download a copy of the DOS version of PC Doctor for your system. Begin here:

http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... ATRIX.html

and select your model and then scroll down to the Diagnostics section. If you have a CD burner then use the Bootable CD link to download the .ISO file. If not, then you're left with making a set of diskettes (got floppy?). I don't have a T6x but for all of the PC Doctor versions I've used so far (up to T4x), there's a system board diagnostic in the program. One of the tests looks at the real-time clock. Run it and see what is does (passed or failed). Is the system still under warranty?

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Thanks for the speedy reply; will try this and report. I do have a CD burner. And yes, the Tpad is still under warranty.

Are you saying that 'regular' PC Doctor for Windows XP will not include the system clock in diagnostics? I'm sort of a newbie here; I just want to make sure I know what I'm doing.

Thanks!

Not sure if it does but I don't have any experience with running PC Doctor's Windows version. I do all of my troubleshooting with the DOS version as that way Windows isn't involved (or needed). You can certainly try running the Windows version. Just be sure that somewhere in the diagnostic description/results you see an entry for the real-time clock (RTC).

It's now semi-clear - hope I'm wrong - that I can't burn an ISO image. I do have Nero 7 Essentials (as well as the usual Windows Media Player), but I've had trouble copying as an ISO with the Nero 7. Do I need something like Alex Feinman's ISO recorder?

Thanks,

Anddrea

Are you getting an error message or it just fails? CDBurnerXP is free and can burn .iso files if you'd like to try some different software.

Also ImageBurn is free and highly recommended.

Thank you, rkawakami, pae77, and Fred Garvin.

All I needed was to leave the fug in the room, generated by the smoke escaping my ears, for about 3 minutes. Returned clearheaded, and used Nero 7 to copy ISO and run PC Doctor. Which was an entertainment.

I particularly loved the Parallax View thing it does while checking the graphics card (test 25). (If you have not seen that film, do!) Believing my Tpad was going insane or - worse - trying to suborn me into a cult, I aborted the first try; the second try, I just relaxed and enjoyed it.

The RTC indeed failed, and on reboot, is working fine.

I am so grateful to these forums - again, thanks!

For anyone who finds this thread later on... the RTC tests are available in the preload PC Doctor (at least as of March 2008 on a T61p)... look in System and Device Tests / System / System Board.

It is amazing how many problems can be resolved by a simple reboot.

Well, not exactly simple - I'd already rebooted over a dozen times, gone into BIOS, and all that. It seems it was rebooting from PC Doctor / DOS that did it. Or something. Who knows? Maybe the CMOS battery will blow out in a day or so.

My experience with an RTC failure in PC Doctor was traced back to the motherboard. A crystal was not properly soldered; there were microcracks in the junction. So I heated the two pins with a soldering iron and it fixed the problem.

@andrea b: I would suggest slightly flexing the system around a little bit and see if the problem returns. If it does, then I'd sent it back in for repair seeing as it's still under warranty.

Actually, in your case, it does sound like a hardware problem that is likely to reoccur unless properly repaired.

Thanks for the suggestions. - Ray - by flexing the system, what do you mean, exactly? (And I will keep a CMOS battery around just in case it does blow).

Ray - just saw the link in your post. I can try the maneuvers. Thanks.

Small uninteresting update. As per advice, tried flexing the left front corner of the chassis - seemed to make no difference. However, I'd forgotten to include in the PC Doctor results that the parallel port interface had failed (that is 'wrote 00H...01H, 02H...etc., read, in all cases, FFH). I've never had cause to use the port, and don't know how to proceed on this one. As the Tpad is still under warranty, I think it's time to contact Lenovo and discuss. Your account of hairline cracks in the T23's motherboard solder joint was quite informative.

Thanks!

The left front corner was in regard to a T23; don't know if the same area would be stressing the motherboard in the same way on a T6x. In any event, if you have verified that the RTC test failed, that should be good enough for the techs. If you can, take a picture or screenshot of the failure and include it with the laptop when you send it in. Also, be sure to remove all unnecessary components, especially the hard drive, prior to turning the laptop over to the repair depot. No sense taking chances that it will be damaged in shipping or lost somewhere.

If the parallel port tests were done without needing a "loopback plug", then it sounds like that there is a problem with it. That is a special parallel port plug which has some of the pins shorted together so that a diagnostic which sends signals out the parallel port can be read back into the parallel port at the same time. In the DOS version of PC Doctor, the "external" parallel port test is normally disabled (since you need to attach that plug for the test to work properly). I would assume that the Windows version does the same.

Ive been having this problem recently. It started after I uninstalled a few security apps, but this problem even affects my linux install.

Tests with PC Doc 5 in windows gives a pass to the RTC tests. I'll give the bootable dos version a go and see what happens.


EDIT: Finally got around to doing it, and the RTC test failed...initially. All subsequent tests have passed, so maybe I'll just call up and ask for a CMOS battery replacement since its still under warranty.

Well called IBM/Lenovo up and they've decided its a CMOS problem. Got the CMOS replaced, but I can't confirm if it was the issue. Coz just after I got off the phone to tech support I did some more googling, found a script and ran it (which I probably shouldn't have)... it appeared to fix my problem however I'm pretty sure it just masked it since Linux Mint still reported incorrect times. Tried to undo the "damage" of the script and everything seemed to work, even Mint reported correct times.

Of course I didn't cancel the CMOS battery replacement just incase the problem decided to come back, and hey who doesn't want a new CMOS battery