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Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

R30/R40, A30/A31, G40/G50 and Z60/Z61 Series. NOT for AMD-Ryzen.
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ibm thinkpadfan
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Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#1 Post by ibm thinkpadfan » Tue Oct 16, 2018 11:29 pm

I got 2 r40 thinkpads recently and neither of them power on. I tried the a.c. and battery and nothing happened. I tried the power button trick and nothing happened. The least I got from one is the battery charging and one indicator flashing 4 times to never be seen again. I also replaced the CMOS battery. Could it possibly be the hard drive or motherboard?

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#2 Post by ajkula66 » Wed Oct 17, 2018 12:53 am

Welcome to the forum!
ibm thinkpadfan wrote:
Tue Oct 16, 2018 11:29 pm
I got 2 r40 thinkpads recently and neither of them power on. I tried the a.c. and battery and nothing happened. I tried the power button trick and nothing happened. The least I got from one is the battery charging and one indicator flashing 4 times to never be seen again. I also replaced the CMOS battery. Could it possibly be the hard drive or motherboard?
Remove all the RAM and try to power on using the AC adapter only. Does the machine beep ?
...Knowledge is a deadly friend when no one sets the rules...(King Crimson)

Cheers,

George (your grouchy retired FlexView farmer)

One FlexView to rule them all: A31p

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#3 Post by BillMorrow » Wed Oct 17, 2018 2:21 am

you can also look at the hardware maintenance manuals (HMM in the banner above) for beep codes and the like BUT this might be a fatal issue you are experiencing..
Bill Morrow, kept by parrots :parrot: & cockatoos
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She was not what you would call refined,
She was not what you would call unrefined,
She was the type of person who kept a parrot.
~~~Mark Twain~~~

ibm thinkpadfan
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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#4 Post by ibm thinkpadfan » Wed Oct 17, 2018 9:37 am

I tried it without the ram and nothing happened. The only thing that happens is the battery charges. The only thing one of them ever did was one of the indicators blinked 4 times then nothing happened.

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#5 Post by RealBlackStuff » Wed Oct 17, 2018 9:47 am

I suggest not wasting any money on those R40.
They were made by Acer and then re-badged.
Reuse whatever parts for something better.
Lovely day for a Guinness! (The Real Black Stuff)
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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#6 Post by ajkula66 » Wed Oct 17, 2018 10:06 am

ibm thinkpadfan wrote:
Wed Oct 17, 2018 9:37 am
I tried it without the ram and nothing happened.
Not a good sign, I'm sorry to say. Motherboard gone south, most likely.

Given the age of the systems I'd just part them out or recycle them, but it's your call.
...Knowledge is a deadly friend when no one sets the rules...(King Crimson)

Cheers,

George (your grouchy retired FlexView farmer)

One FlexView to rule them all: A31p

Abused daily: T520, X200s


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ibm thinkpadfan
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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#7 Post by ibm thinkpadfan » Wed Oct 17, 2018 10:14 am

Yeah the motherboard either died or the hard drive did. I didn't think it would happen to both. Thereś some working motherboards for sale so I could try to get one unless Acer made every motherboard for them. I might just get rid of them..

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#8 Post by Screamer » Wed Oct 17, 2018 10:25 am

If you are getting a replacement motherboard to resurrect one of them or both, try to get a Pentium M motherboard with either a Mobility Radeon 7000 or a Mobility Radeon 7500. You could then easily max it out to a 1.7GHz Banias on that motherboard, it shouldn't be too expensive for that route.

Avoid the Mobile Pentium 4-M motherboards, I don't think you would want to deal with a 2.6GHz Northwood that produces a lot of heat.

EDIT: No, Acer did not make any of these motherboards for the R40. LG made them, and they are called 'Gryphon' as labeled nearby the hard drive area. If you did a search for LG Gryphon schematics, you would get a lot of results related to the R40.

I also believe that Acer did not make the entire R40, because there are a lot of stickers on the R40 that says 'Made in Korea' and even the machine type label has 'Made in Korea' on it.

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#9 Post by ibm thinkpadfan » Wed Oct 17, 2018 8:06 pm

Ill try to get one. I swapped parts and on one I only got clicking noises when plugged in..

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#10 Post by ibm thinkpadfan » Thu Oct 18, 2018 7:10 pm

After taking the motherboard out of the frame I plugged it in and found that this small area with some tiny chips at the AC power port burned and releases smoke when plugged in. Is it possible to fix the AC port or is the motherboard doomed for good?

Photos:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1fAJ ... p=drivesdk

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#11 Post by ibm thinkpadfan » Thu Oct 18, 2018 7:24 pm

Correction: its this part of the a.c. socket that connects to the board.

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#12 Post by Screamer » Fri Oct 19, 2018 8:58 am

That doesn't look good.

If you can find an exact replacement or at least a similar matching chip to replace the defective ones in the motherboard, I would suggest so. Though, if you are not comfortable with soldering chips of that size, I would not suggest you to perform the replacement.

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#13 Post by ibm thinkpadfan » Fri Oct 19, 2018 10:03 pm

Screamer wrote:
Fri Oct 19, 2018 8:58 am
That doesn't look good.

If you can find an exact replacement or at least a similar matching chip to replace the defective ones in the motherboard, I would suggest so. Though, if you are not comfortable with soldering chips of that size, I would not suggest you to perform the replacement.
The chip doesn't appear damaged but the pin for the AC is de-soldered and not connected to the board. I will re-solder it and hope it works.

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#14 Post by ibm thinkpadfan » Thu Oct 25, 2018 7:02 pm

Update: soldered board it was dead. Bought a new motherboard should be here this week. Will post another update soon.

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#15 Post by ibm thinkpadfan » Wed Oct 31, 2018 9:15 pm

So the new motherboard works but it doesn't boot just hard drive spins and power indicator.. It also charges.

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#16 Post by ajkula66 » Wed Oct 31, 2018 9:39 pm

ibm thinkpadfan wrote:
Wed Oct 31, 2018 9:15 pm
So the new motherboard works but it doesn't boot just hard drive spins and power indicator.. It also charges.
Nothing on the LCD ? Does it beep when you remove the RAM ?
...Knowledge is a deadly friend when no one sets the rules...(King Crimson)

Cheers,

George (your grouchy retired FlexView farmer)

One FlexView to rule them all: A31p

Abused daily: T520, X200s


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ibm thinkpadfan
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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#17 Post by ibm thinkpadfan » Wed Oct 31, 2018 10:07 pm

ajkula66 wrote:
Wed Oct 31, 2018 9:39 pm
ibm thinkpadfan wrote:
Wed Oct 31, 2018 9:15 pm
So the new motherboard works but it doesn't boot just hard drive spins and power indicator.. It also charges.
Nothing on the LCD ? Does it beep when you remove the RAM ?
It doesnt beep it only beeps when the battery is charging..

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#18 Post by ibm thinkpadfan » Wed Oct 31, 2018 10:49 pm

It just does 1 long beep when the battery is in or shortly after power off with battery in.

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#19 Post by ajkula66 » Wed Oct 31, 2018 11:08 pm

Have you tried that board in the other R40 ? If it exhibits the same symptoms you'll know its bad...
...Knowledge is a deadly friend when no one sets the rules...(King Crimson)

Cheers,

George (your grouchy retired FlexView farmer)

One FlexView to rule them all: A31p

Abused daily: T520, X200s


PMs requesting personal tech support will be ignored.

ibm thinkpadfan
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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#20 Post by ibm thinkpadfan » Wed Oct 31, 2018 11:12 pm

I tried the ram from it earlier with same result. Could be the hard drive because it also does other noises when running. The CMOS battery is replaced, it isn't the fan and I don't think its the ram. I could also swap CPUs.

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#21 Post by ajkula66 » Thu Nov 01, 2018 12:35 am

ibm thinkpadfan wrote:
Wed Oct 31, 2018 11:12 pm
I tried the ram from it earlier with same result. Could be the hard drive because it also does other noises when running.
Just pull the hard drive out. Makes everyone's life easier.

My previous question was in regards to you putting the "new" board in the "other" R40.
...Knowledge is a deadly friend when no one sets the rules...(King Crimson)

Cheers,

George (your grouchy retired FlexView farmer)

One FlexView to rule them all: A31p

Abused daily: T520, X200s


PMs requesting personal tech support will be ignored.

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#22 Post by ibm thinkpadfan » Thu Nov 01, 2018 7:59 pm

Yeah so both units have bad CPU... They looked burned after looking closely and 1 is missing 2 pins and 1 looks burned.

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#23 Post by ajkula66 » Thu Nov 01, 2018 8:32 pm

ibm thinkpadfan wrote:
Thu Nov 01, 2018 7:59 pm
Yeah so both units have bad CPU... They looked burned after looking closely and 1 is missing 2 pins and 1 looks burned.
Let's hope that nothing else is wrong with them.

Which CPUs are in them, BTW ?
...Knowledge is a deadly friend when no one sets the rules...(King Crimson)

Cheers,

George (your grouchy retired FlexView farmer)

One FlexView to rule them all: A31p

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ibm thinkpadfan
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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#24 Post by ibm thinkpadfan » Thu Nov 01, 2018 11:16 pm


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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#25 Post by Screamer » Fri Nov 02, 2018 2:03 am

According to the photo, this is an Intel Celeron M 350. More precisely, a B1 stepping variant.

Wait... why is there a Dothan installed in the R40? That must be the reason why the R40 did not start up, it is incompatible with any Dothan and only works with a Banias installed.

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#26 Post by ibm thinkpadfan » Fri Nov 02, 2018 7:25 am

They came with so I have no idea. I'm gonna get a pentium M soon.

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#27 Post by Screamer » Fri Nov 02, 2018 9:36 am

Must have been some sort of a mismatch, then.

By the way, if you are going to get a Pentium M, get a Banias. Dothan Pentium M processors do not work in the R40, so pick any one of these under this list:

Code: Select all

Intel Pentium M 1.3GHz - SL6N4
Intel Pentium M 1.4GHz - SL6F8 or SL7BX
Intel Pentium M 1.5GHz - SL6F9 or SL7M8
Intel Pentium M 1.6GHz - SL6FA
Intel Pentium M 1.7GHz - SL6N5
Intel Penitum M 1.8GHz - SL7FT
SL7BX or SL7M8 or SL7FT may or may not work in the R40, but I believe that they should work without a problem.

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#28 Post by ibm thinkpadfan » Fri Nov 02, 2018 4:06 pm

I'm going with the 1.7ghz SL6N5 on eBay..

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#29 Post by ibm thinkpadfan » Mon Nov 05, 2018 5:21 pm

I put new processor in, same thing happens.

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Re: Thinkpad r40 Power On Problems

#30 Post by ajkula66 » Mon Nov 05, 2018 7:14 pm

ibm thinkpadfan wrote:
Mon Nov 05, 2018 5:21 pm
I put new processor in, same thing happens.
Time to cut your losses and send these oldies to be recycled, IMO.

Good luck.
...Knowledge is a deadly friend when no one sets the rules...(King Crimson)

Cheers,

George (your grouchy retired FlexView farmer)

One FlexView to rule them all: A31p

Abused daily: T520, X200s


PMs requesting personal tech support will be ignored.

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