Standby mode not working

[sd]

Hi,

I have a 2 year old IBM R32 thinkpad. Of late, the standby mode of the laptop has been misbehaving. Whenever the machine goes to a standby mode, I necessarily have to hard reboot to come out of it (pressing the Fn key or anything else does not work). This started after I left the system on in standby mode and without the power chord for around 3 days during the which the battery drained completely.

Can someone please tell me what the problem might be? Is it likely to be a battery problem? I have currently turned off the standby mode, but thats not a good solution.

Thank you,
supratim