Thinkpads Forum

I have my first Thinkpad (hurray!), a new T61p running Vista64 Business w/4GB RAM. I've set the machine to sleep when the lid is closed, but I've noticed that at random intervals (while the lid is closed) the machine will power up (the fan comes on) and run for several seconds, then go to sleep again.

Is there anything that would cause a sleeping machine to wake up randomly like this?

is it plugged into a WIRED network? Wake on LAN settings might be causing it to wake up and then go back to sleep. You can disable WOL anyways even if no wired networks are being used to test to see if it will still wake up.

It might be Windows Update waking up to check for update at the scheduled time. It will perform the update when connected to AC mains and network.

Does it happen when the ThinkPad is on battery power?

I think it is the lid switch. My T60 would refuse to go to sleep and I had to use Fn+F4 or close it a 2nd time.

Had the same problem on mine. It was both windows update scheduled at times when the machine was off (3:00 a.m) and also the wake on lan thing. To shut that off, go to device manager, wireless network card, properties, and one of the tabs has a field that enables you to disable wake on lan.

For windows update, just go to WU and change the scheduled time to a time when your machine will be likely to be on.

Also, one other thing to check. In control panel, power options, for whatever power plans you are using, check the "change advanced settings" and check under the "sleep" setting, check the "hibernate after" setting and make sure that the machine is not set to hibernate on AC after some period of time because, if it is, it will wake up from sleep to go into hibernation after the specified period to hibernate has elapsed. So on AC hibernate should be set to "never."

On the other hand, when on battery power, the "hibernate after" setting is useful because you can have the machine go to sleep and waking up fast via closing and opening the lid, but still protect against battery drain caused by extended periods of sleep because you can set the machine to hibernate after, e.g., one hour of sleep when on battery. Being able to separately set these specific parameters for AC and battery is just one of the many little advantages of Vista (or can you set something like this on XP now?)

No windows updates scheduled, so I'm going to try disabling the Wake on lan. perhaps our company network is broadcasting wakeup calls.

Hoping this turns out the be the issue....

Also don't forget to check out the power options, power plan, advanced settings, sleep/hibernate settings as described in my previous post above.