T61 boot problem

[brrmax]

Starting this am, my T61 will not boot. It is in the Lenovo dock. The battery low light is flashing even tho it was plugged in all night. Windows says the boot device is not recognized. About 1 week ago I installed Vipre AV and have it set to run a full scan each morning at 6:30am. No viruses have been found. I leave the T61 in sleep mode at night and have the AV wake it up to do the scan.

I created recovery disks soon after I received the T61 back in June 07. Windows says to put in the installation CD, reboot and choose the repair option. Since I don't have the install CD, just the created recovery CDs, what is the best procedure here? I put in the recovery CD and rebooted, but the Lenovo message says that the disk will be put back to the factory installed software. I did not proceed. Is there a repair option?

Thanks for any help.

[jdhurst]

I think before I tried a repair option, I would ask myself what might have happened (T61's are reliable boxes) and for sure, I would power it down, remove it from the dock and then attach a separate AC adapter and see if it starts.

If not, remove the battery and AC adapter, and press the power button for about 10 seconds and then repeat this about 10 time. Insert the battery, plug it in, wait 15 minutes and see if it starts.

If not, your hard drive may have died, but I would want to be certain first. ... JDH

[brrmax]

Thanks for the quick reply JDH. I will give this a try and reply with the results.

[brrmax]

Well... I wonder if this is my problem:

http://supportforums.sunbeltsoftware.co ... erthread=y

[jdhurst]

That was an ominous thread you posted. I had an early 7200-rpm drive in my (now retired) T41. It died because Hitachi and the Thinikpad HD Active Protection system. The drive died never to restart again. There has been nothing like that since to the best of my knowledge.

If your Vipre AV is interfering with the Thinkvantage APS, you may be in for bad new. Let us hope not and that simply by uninstalling Vipre as a test that you may find the drive/machine is OK.
... JDH

[brrmax]

Do you agree with these comments on that forum post about how to recover:

We have successfully recovered one system by using the Access IBM/Thinkvantage Blue Key and doing a system restore. If a recent restore point exists, it's very successful. Boot up, then un-install Vipre until the problem is resolved. Unfortunately, we have many models of Thinkpads so the process is not uniform.

[jdhurst]

The Blue Key is a machine restore (start over, so far as I know). Restore Points are a Windows feature. If either of these work (the first is vastly more harsh than the second), then you are probably OK. If not, you could be looking at a hard drive. The question here is who is liable. In my case some years ago, Hitachi admitted liability and replaced the drive free (months later). ... JDH

[brrmax]

OK, I am confused. I was able to obtain an official Vista reinstallation DVD. I did the repair and it said the bootmgr was not valid or not found (can't remember which). It repaired and rebooted. Windows would still not boot with a BSOD. I booted from the DVD again and did a system restore. Windows will now boot properly and I am back up with Vipre still running.

According to the system event log, the problem began after the Vipre full scan. I have it set to wakeup my laptop at 6:30am and do a full scan. The Vipre scan history shows that the scan finished and took 55 minutes, but no risks were cleaned.

Not sure what the heck went wrong...

[jdhurst]

I am curious. I read the thread you posted, and I would not touch Vipre with a 10 foot pole. Why not remove it altogether if your machine is running. There are too many decent anti-virus suites out there to use one that cannot right from wrong or back from front. ... JDH