In real trouble with my Thinkpad X40...

[rogerdean]

Good morning everyone

Right, I need some really smart suggestions to get me out of trouble!

My lenovo thinkpad X40 (no cd-rom or floppy) died the other day. It powers up and shows the IBM splash, and that`s all. there`s no hard drive access (except very briefly when I power down. It`s dual boot Ubuntu gutsy and XP, but I can`t get to either.

Unfortunately I don`t have access to my ubuntu cd or my external cd drive, as i live in the congo and the airline lost my bags. Also, congo again, i probably can`t find a net cafe with a connection fast enough to download the cd, even overnight. Good start huh? I do have access to another windows machine and a flashdisk

Here`s what I`ve tried so far

1) thought it might be a bust HD
removed it and, with an external ide cable, plugged it into a windows machine. the two windows partitions showed up and were fine, the ubuntu partitions did not. this is what i expected of a healthy drive

2) corrupt bios?
removed main and bios batteries and left it for 24 hours. the bios reset (i now get a message telling me to check my system clock) but no other change. still not booting

3) corrupt mbr or grub?
no idea how to tackle this given all the tools i don`t have. can anyone suggest a way to make a bootable usb stick on a windows machine? if downloads are required, i can only do really small ones

any other ideas what the problem might be?

Many thanks to everyone
Roger

[Thomcat]

hm...if you can boot from a USB key, you could have someone install a live linux distro to a large enough USB key and FedEx or DHL it to you in the Congo.

[tehchu]

download [censored] small linux

you won't need a hard drive and the download's 50 mb. it might even detect your wired lan card automatically!

[rogerdean]

many thanks to you both. i reckon DSL might be the answer, although when it boots i will still need to figure out how to repair or reinstall grub, right? any tips?

trying to download 50mb now. not helped by a 2 day city wide power failure following a bit of rain...

allbest
roger

[phool@round]

http://linuxhelp.blogspot.com/2005/11/h ... -boot.html

This should help you once your into DSL. Seems hibernation can overwrite the MBR if in Windows, hmmm. I didn't know that, good to know.

[rogerdean]

well guys, i think i'm coming to the end of the line with this one. here's the latest -

1) downloaded DSL to a flashdisk, but it wouldn't boot. tried both methods described on DSL page

2) stuck hard drive into another laptop and Ubuntu came up perfectly, so was able to save my data. relieved, but shows the HD isn't the problem

3) still can't even get into the bios, the 'press whatever to enter setup' prompt doesn't appear on the IBM splash

4) have managed to download ubuntu CD but not got my bags back yet so no external cd-rom. no reason to think it'd boot when nothing else does, but of course will try when i can

am reluctantly coming to conclusion that the MB or something else is terminally fried and it's time to go shopping again. if anyone thinks this is premature and has another bright idea do please let me know!

really appreciate everyone's thoughts on this. the windows MBR thing in the above post is scary...

very best
Roger