T61 does not boot

[Sydney]

Hi there, I was wondering if anyone could kindly help out:
I bought a new T61 around 3 wks ago, installed most things I needed right-away, and a few missing programs well over a week ago. Everything has been running fine - until yesterday.
I worked on the computer most of the day, and sometime during the day, I received a notification about a Firefox-download that I installed. Used FF afterwards - running as usual. Also, there were some new Windows-updates available which I downloaded but did NOT install.
I continued to work with the computer without any problems. As I went to turn it off, instead of choosing "install windows update and shut down", I opted just to shut it down - without installing the updates. When I returned to the computer 10 minutes later, I found it sitting there with a blue screen, not moving. So I went to shut it down manually (by holding the on/off button). But as I went to turn it on again, it wouldn't boot. It starts with the Thinkpad-Welcome, then the Windows XP start screen appears (the black one with the windows flag), then I get that window with "loading preferences" and it does show my dinosaur (that I use instead of the sand-clock), but that's as far as it gets. It then just shows a blue screen with nothing on it, except my mouse. So no desktop icons, no "Start"-button, no task-bar. Nothing.
I let it sit for up to 45 minutes to see if anything was moving - ithout luck. I can get into BIOS o.k., but did not see anything unusual (that's with my rudimentary IT knowledge). I tried starting it in safe mode, but failed. Either I don't know how to do it, or it won't let me. I thought I had to press F8 at startup, but if I do that, I just get the error message that a key got stuck - that would be me, holding it down
I went into the Rescue&Recovery section and ran a full system test. Everything was fine (apart from the not-applicable bits such as network and the bits I bypassed: USB-ports and DVD-drive). BUT the last test : SMBIOS FAILED.
I was wondering what exactly that means and what I can do about it.
I tried phoning the Lenovo-helpline and the guy on the phone (very nice), said "SMBIOS ? Never heard of it, let me just do a search in our database..." Then came back to me and said that he didn't know what was wrong but that I had to reinstall the whole system

Now before I do that (and I wouldn't know how to do it anyhow) - so before I send the computer off somewhere to have it checked and the problem dealt with, I was wondering if anyone here would be able to offer a comment, please ???
I also have some Acronis-backups including a bootable CD that I made when I got the computer, so that might be another option. But if I could get around it, that would be great - since my last backup is over a week old. It's one that I've done before I installed those few programs beg. of last week. I was going to do the next backup on the week-end, once I made sure everything was running the way I wanted it. Well, it's always like that, isn't it ??
So if anyone could help, that would be tops. Thanks a lot. Sydney

T61, 2.4 GHz, 3 GB, Windows XP SP3 (downgraded from Vista)

[Sydney]

Doing some more reading after I posted, and found this on another (not Lenovo./Thinkpad-related) site:

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How does incorrect SMBIOS affect my system?

Usually, it has no impact on functionality or performance. SMBIOS data is intended for use by inventory and diagnostic programs. Microsoft Windows does not depend on SMBIOS information to be able to run properly. However, incorrect SMBIOS data can be a sign that the system maker did not do some basic quality control. If they did not get the SMBIOS data right, there is certainly a chance that they made other mistakes.

Can I fix problems with incorrect SMBIOS data?

BIOS and system makers have utilities that can write to the SMBIOS data areas, but they do not usually make them available to end users. Sometimes the problems with SMBIOS are fixed through BIOS updates that will be made available by your system vendor or the manufacturer of the system board. If you cannot get a copy of the vendor's SMBIOS utility and a BIOS reflash does not solve the problem, then you will have to live with the data being wrong.
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So now I'm wondering if the SMBIOS is even the problem ?????

[jdhurst]

I don't think I can help much.

The T61 hardware manual mentions SMBIOS as something PC Doctor can test for. Unfortunately that is the only mention in the whole manual.

SMBIOS popped in my VMware manual:
It said: "The UUID is stored in the SMBIOS system information descriptor. It can be accessed by standard SMBIOS scanning software — for example SiSoftware Sandra or the IBM utility smbios2 — and used for system management in the same way you use the UUID of a physical computer."

Then I saw: " - (Fix) Change processor family value in SMBIOS for Intel Pentium M processor" in the BIOS update instructions for a T41.

So (1) that is consistent with your second post and (2) I don't think it is the cause of your problem.

I saw another similar post in a different forum with similar symptoms and the OP said it resulted from a WinAntiVirus2008 infection. That person eventually wound up re-installing the OS.

... JDH

[Sydney]

Thanks for your reply. As suggested, I went ahead and restored through Acronis - with some difficulty, but staff at Acronis were very helpful.
Thanks again for your input and sorry for the delay in replying, but the difficulties with restoring the system have totally distracted me from my post here.... Sydney.

[basketb]

Hope your system it up and running again. One more tip on starting in safe mode. Rather than pressing and holding down the F8 key, which leads to the system complaining about a stuck key, just press it once and release it right away. That should bring up a menu in which you can choose how to boot (safe mode, safe mode + network, etc.).

[Sydney]

Hi, thanks so much for the advice re: F8/safe mode.
The comp. is still down - this indeed seems to be a viral infection like jdhurst suggested. I wound up installing older backups (the ones I created throughout the process of installing the notebook over the past 3 weeks) and it must be something I caught first-off. - Although I still wonder how. But that's a different story. I'll see if I can fix it over the w/e with help from the Avast!-guys. But I fear I might have to start from scratch, just like the other guy. .... and I am absolutely dreading it. Not so much for installing and customizing my software, but because I'll have to figure out how to de-activate all those stupid Thinkpad-functions again that get in the way and just make life difficult. I can see this is far from over yet. But thanks again for your advice. You guys were spot-on !! Syd.