Thinkpads Forum

Hello friends

So I have a T400 that's been working dandy for a few months. I was using it on battery life once and it died as normal, I went to plug it in and it didn't turn on once plugged in (With and without the battery in), no matter what outlet I put it in. So I let it charge for about 30 minutes and tried to turn it on, and it goes straight to the thinkpad/thinkvantage boot screen, pauses for a second, blanks and then reloads indefinitely.

someone suggested it may be a windows boot issue, but I'm quite unfamiliar with what that could be exactly and how to resolve it. I have a video to better show you what happens exactly.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5IRZhqhAOzU

Many appreciations

bios: http://i.imgur.com/tPConzq.jpg

I have a T400 that does a similar thing, but I have yet to find a solution. Also, I can't read the text on the video after the Lenovo splash...can you punch "Pause" and let us know what the text is on the screen when it reboots?

Neil wrote:I have a T400 that does a similar thing, but I have yet to find a solution. Also, I can't read the text on the video after the Lenovo splash...can you punch "Pause" and let us know what the text is on the screen when it reboots?

Intel(r) Management Engine BIOS Extension v4.0.4.0006
copyright(c) 2003-00 Intel corporation All Rights Reserved

Intel(R) ME Firmware version 4.0.3.1124

OK thanks. I still don't have a clue, but hopefully someone else will offer some possibilities.

Mine actually goes a little further. I get the normal boot splash until the last line reads "booting from...", then it reboots. If I press F1, it will go until the last line read "Entering Setup"....then reboot. If I press F12, mine goes until the last line reads something about boot device list...then reboots. So things are a bit different between our machines, but it still could be a similar issue, so I'm hoping to ride along with you until one or the other of use finds a solution.

@OP. Have you tried quickly pressing F1 or F12 as soon as the 'Thinkpad' BIOS splash screen appears? Have you also tried disconnecting and reconnecting the CMOS battery? If you can at least get F12 to take you to the 'boot menu' then I would suggest burning a Linux LiveCD or Linux LiveDVD (some linux OS exceed the capacity of a CD these days) and test to see if that will take you to the Linux LiveCD or Linux LiveDVD desktop. If the Linux Live media works fine then your problem could be with either (a)the hard drive or (b) the windows install.

If you are not familiar with a Live session of Linux read this short wiki-article.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Live_CD

Good luck

I recently fixed boot issues on a T500 by simply entering BIOS and selecting "Reset BIOS settings to default". I am not sure, but this may be the same as disconnecting the CMOS battery.

It had a very peculiar problem - 4 times out of 5, it would not load Windows from disc, just sit there with a blinking cursor. Even worse, it could not restart properly, hanging on reboot. All now fixed.

I suppose there is some CMOS memory corruption going on with the T400\T500 series.

Also, if you are able to load Windows, update Intel AMT Firmware from Lenovo's site. This has a lot to do with the boot process and is not downloaded automatically by System Update, for some reason.