Thinkpads Forum

Alright, just for a pre-notification, here's what my T60p has:
http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... ry=200784U
(yeah it's an older one with a non-IPS screen: I prefer the 14" however which never came in IPS). It's upgraded to 2 GB RAM I should add.

When I first got it, it ran great. A year or so later, one day, it froze, to my surprise.
So I would crash it and restart -- but it seemed to be whenever it would get too warm, it would just freeze back up again. So I would have to stop using it for awhile to cool down. This wasn't an issue as I wouldn't use it very much, and usually in cool areas. So no more worries.

Finally a few weeks ago, while visiting at my uncle's, his house was fairly hot, and while browsing through a PDF (with scanned pages), the screen flickered, went black, and the computer just hung there (HDD, fan, and everything were still spinning mindlessly). I knew it was fairly warm, but didn't think it could seriously kill the thinkpad. Maybe another "freeze" at the most.

Now, whenever I reboot it, the processor doesn't do anything once the basic boot chip gives it full authority. I tried with different amounts of RAM, putting pressure on the GPU, and even northbridge for the heck of it.

Is there any possible way to fix it? Buying a new system board is not realistic as it costs as much as a T60 themselves these days (not to mention, I won't settle for anything LESS than the board I had, and finding one like that would be very difficult). I could go and throw it out at the ecostation, but that's sure a waste of material...

I'm a little mad about the situation... it wasn't cheap... and four years isn't a long time. Yeah... a year after the warranty expires, it breaks. I heard rumours about that before (questioning Lenovo's quality), but never believed it. A computer breaking shortly a year after the warranty expires is sketchy.

My first thoughts: overheating.
Take the keyboard off, get a small brush (like from a child's paint box), position the laptop on its short left side where the fan sits. Hold the fan itself (gently) with one finger, while cleaning the fan blades with the brush. When done, lift it up, hold it over a waste bin (or outside), again hold the fan with your finger, and blow hard into the fan, so that the loose dust can go out at the side. If necessary repeat this with a can of compressed air, make sure to hold the fan before you blast off!
Only attach the keyboard and boot it with the keyboard lifted up, to see if the fan spins up or not.
If not, you may need a new fan.
In any case, the thermal paste between CPU and fan should be renewed with e.g. Arctic Silver 5 [@Radio Shack]), probably dried out by now.

If the LCD does not work, hook up an external monitor, to see if that gets a signal.

If not, remove all RAM and try to boot. You should get 1-3-3-1 beeps.
If not, also remove hard drive, CD/DVD, WWAN/wifi/BT/modem cards and try again. Beeping now 1-3-3-1?
If not, do you get other beeps?

RealBlackStuff wrote:My first thoughts: overheating.
Take the keyboard off, get a small brush (like from a child's paint box), position the laptop on its short left side where the fan sits. Hold the fan itself (gently) with one finger, while cleaning the fan blades with the brush. When done, lift it up, hold it over a waste bin (or outside), again hold the fan with your finger, and blow hard into the fan, so that the loose dust can go out at the side. If necessary repeat this with a can of compressed air, make sure to hold the fan before you blast off!
Only attach the keyboard and boot it with the keyboard lifted up, to see if the fan spins up or not.
If not, you may need a new fan.
In any case, the thermal paste between CPU and fan should be renewed with e.g. Arctic Silver 5 [@Radio Shack]), probably dried out by now.

If the LCD does not work, hook up an external monitor, to see if that gets a signal.

If not, remove all RAM and try to boot. You should get 1-3-3-1 beeps.
If not, also remove hard drive, CD/DVD, WWAN/wifi/BT/modem cards and try again. Beeping now 1-3-3-1?
If not, do you get other beeps?

The fan does still spin when you initially boot it up (and it is completely dust free -- I take care of all my computers). The thermal paste should be fine, I got 30 celsius through minimal use, and 80 max. I toned the CPU usage down a bit too, to control the heating issue.
I did hook up an external monitor prior to booting, got nothing.

I did remove all the RAM, no beeps at all. But then again, I muted the speakers, so I probably wouldn't hear anything anyways.

Removed the CD drive and even the HDD, no beeps. Just cold as a doorknob.

You need to "un-mute" the speakers, to find out if anything goes or not.
But it sounds rather dead to me...

RealBlackStuff wrote:You need to "un-mute" the speakers, to find out if anything goes or not.
But it sounds rather dead to me...

Yes I tried -- but can't really do much when it doesn't process anything.

Muting the speakers in Windows itself does not influence their function at boot up.
Just press the Volume >> immediately when you boot, and you should hear something/anything if there is still life in it.
Those GPUs are known to be very hot, and could well have killed your mobo.

Your current mobo with ATI Firegl V5200 = 41W1370
The newer version with ATI Firegl V5250 = 44C3716
There's another mobo with ATI 256MB GPU-RAM = 41W1407
There's also a 44C3973 floating about, but I can't get definite data on that.

There are boards like these on eBay for ca. $120.-, but you could also try our Marketforum.
At least what you get there is reliable.

You wrote "I could go and throw it out at the ecostation", if you get to that stage, I'd be happy to cover your mailing costs for sending it to me.

RealBlackStuff wrote:Muting the speakers in Windows itself does not influence their function at boot up.
Just press the Volume >> immediately when you boot, and you should hear something/anything if there is still life in it.
Those GPUs are known to be very hot, and could well have killed your mobo.

Your current mobo with ATI Firegl V5200 = 41W1370
The newer version with ATI Firegl V5250 = 44C3716
There's another mobo with ATI 256MB GPU-RAM = 41W1407
There's also a 44C3973 floating about, but I can't get definite data on that.

There are boards like these on eBay for ca. $120.-, but you could also try our Marketforum.
At least what you get there is reliable.

You wrote "I could go and throw it out at the ecostation", if you get to that stage, I'd be happy to cover your mailing costs for sending it to me.

Yeah I pressed the volume button quickly, nothing happened.
I'm assmue the best solution is just to wait for motherboards to get cheaper or something.
Are they the same for 15"/14" models?

Yes. You'll find all the info you need in the HMM: http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... MIGR-62733