Thinkpads Forum

Hello:

I own a old thinkpad 600 win 98se.

I have a little here problem with my ibm 600, heck it's old but it is good enough for what I am doing.

the usb port was working great. Then all the sudden it stopped working. I use it for my (Palm, Digital camera, printer, and exterinal cdr drive)

Now all the sudden it is not working, there are no conflicts

Has anyone else had this problem and if so what was the fix????

Thanks in advance..

Paul, Raleigh nc

Does it still appear in Device Manager?

papollonia says he can not reply so i am doing it for him..
(he probably has an OS issue which is stopping his ability to reply)

he also says that the USB port DOES appear in device manager..

my thought is if it WAS working and now is NOT working and all is as before OS-wise it sure points to a hardware problem..

so a USB port test seems to be in order..

I think I am now able to post a reply!!!!!

Ok now back to the subject at hand...

SO how do i test the usb port??

Do I need a special plug to do so???

thanks

So how do I test the usb port?????

Any help on this one guys????

I removed the drivers and reinstalled them and still no usb port..

The only thing I can remember is that the usb port was working fine, until after I removed some programs from the start up in msconfig. I activated all teh programs in the startup and still no usb port....

So how do I test the usb port?????

Isn't there a USB test in the Easy Setup system tests (F1)?. I don't think you need a plug to do the test.

Not much help for you, unfortunately, but two testing ideas and one long shot.

I don't know the best way to go about testing your USB port.

One idea is to go into your BIOS "Easy Setup" by pressing and holding F1 while you turn the power switch on and continuing to hold F1 until you get into your BIOS screen. From there you should be able to click "Test" and (hopefully) there is a test for your USB port (?).

Another idea (maybe you've tried this?) is to plug in a device that you have never installed before, just to see if the new device is recognized and the "Add New Hardware" screen shows up. If so, then the problem is probably your OS/software configuration and not the USB hardware. If not, then you are no further ahead or behind.


And one long shot

I removed the drivers and reinstalled them and still no usb port..

I don't know exactly what you mean by this. The drivers for your USB port should be built into your Windows 98SE system. You can remove the USB port and then try to have Windows 98SE recognize it again freshly, but that isn't the same as removing and installing the drivers alone.

If you in fact removed the USB port from your Device Manager and then tried to get Windows 98SE to recognize it again, then it may be that Windows 98SE just screwed up and didn't quite figure out how to set it up properly, or that Windows 98SE found the settings for an old, incorrect configuration of your USB port and is using those now instead of the correct version you had working before.

Running with one of these theories, you could try re-applying one of the registry fixes that is part of the Windows 98 Supplemental File disk: apm2apm.reg. That particular registry patch normally fixes up an unrecognized (exclamation makr) "PCI Device" in your Device Manager and marks it as part of your USB device system. I don't really think that it will have any effect on a system where there is no exclamation mark in your Device Manager or where your USB device is actually listed as present, but it is practically the only patch I can think of from IBM that relates to the USB port in any way, and you cannot harm your system by re-applying it and rebooting.

Good luck,

Phil.

Phil:

Thank you very much for the reply. I will try your ideas and get back to you.

Again Thanks alot....

you may have an irq confict in w98 because it does not support acpi
but rather is plug and play,go to ibms config manager,locate the irq should be at 10 see what else shares that irq and shift it to another location
vica versa ,usually disabling the shared device does the trick
or you may upgrade to win me which is acpi compliant os

serverbook:

Thanks, I still have not had a chance to try any of the ideas given, but now that I think about, I had this same problem several years ago and remember it being the irq conflict.....

I'll play with it this weekend..


Thanks alot..

i usually disable items i don't use such as infra red,dock station etc
sometimes thats all you gotta do.
looks messy afterwards in device manager(red xs)
but heck the laptop then runs beaut in w98

serverbook:

Thanks and that is what I am in the process of doing...

It seems that all the usb devices are using irq 11 along with the usb driver too...

Help!!!

I am at a lose here again.

Been playing around with the irq's.

The usb is set to irq 11, but there are also a whole bunch of other things that are assigned to irq 11 too. (PCI CardBus controller, NeoMagic MagicGraphic, Wireless G network card, PCI Device Setup)

I am unable to change the irq setting on any of the above....

Any ideas on what I can do?????


Thanks

Some IRQ settings are fixed so that you cannot change them. The ones that you can change you should be able to change through the Properties listed in the Device Manager for the particular item. You cannot change them through the "Allocated Resources" view of ThinkPad Configuration Manager if that is where you are trying to work from. The Wireless G Network card in particular should allow you to use various IRQs instead of IRQ 11.

You can see what the default IRQ setup under Windows 98 should look like in a 600 by checking the Default system resources for Windows 98 - ThinkPad 600 from IBM/Lenovo.

The item "PCI Device Setup" will show up no matter what else you have installed -- all this means is that your Thinkpad has set aside IRQ 11 for PCI Devices. Some of the other items listed under IRQ 11 actually take up zero resources and should not cause any conflict with your system.

You can sometimes control how many IRQs are set aside for "PCI Device Setup" (aka "PCI Steering") by changing the Docking Station menu in Thinkpad Configuration Manager, but I have only used this option in conjunction with a Docking Station and I don't know if you can change these settings without a Docking Station present. You don't have a docking station do you?

Returning to your PCI devices again, however, you might look at your PCMCIA/CardBus cards. These are PCI devices and Windows 98SE mixes them up together with USB devices as they all run through your "PCI bus". If you have one or more PCMCIA cards installed, then I would pull them all out and try to get your USB working without them inserted in your machine -- i.e. shut down, remove these cards, and then boot up, and see if you can get your USB port working without any cards installed. If your PCMCIA/CardBus cards and drivers have been designed properly, they should be able to dynamically select available IRQs and memory ranges if you insert them later, after you get your USB port working.

Also, just so I understand for sure, you are saying that your USB port shows up currently when you look in your Device Manager (and I mean the Windows 98SE Device Manager, not your IBM ThinkPad Configuration menu), and it does not have a red X through it, and when you look into the Properties for this device, it says "This device is working properly" or something similar. And your problem is not that the USB port is not showing up correctly, but that it seems to be dead or unresponsive, right?

Phil.

Phil:

WOW!! thanks for the great reply..

Yes the usb device has no red x's when I look at it in device manager. Not the Ibm config. Yes I know I can only change irq's in the device manager.

Let me try what you said to do and I'll get back to you..

Thanks again.

good read,conversely have you tested the usb port in the bios test page?
worse come to worse pcmcia usb 1.1-2.0 add on card may fit the bill.

serverbook:

Yes I have and it tests ok.

I did look at what pkiff said to look at. the irq's look good, I took the wi-fi card and tried to access the usb port and nothing..

Was wondering if there was a card that had usb on it. I guess soo.

Does it work with win 98se???

Just real confused here, becuase it was working fine until I un-selected some programs in the system trye. I have since selected everything and still no usb......

I want to thank everyone for helping me with issue.

I decide to just get the pcmcia usb card.

I am luckly to live in raleigh and stopped by tigerdirect store. I bought the card for 18.77 it has two usb port and they it istalled without anty problem.

All the devices are working now...

Thanks again guys..