Thinkpads Forum

Hi all,
I'm new here! I have a Thinkpad 600 (2645-450) which has a strange problem. Of the 6 or so laptop hard disks I have available to me, the machine only recognises two of them, one is 6.4 GB and the other is a 20GB. All the others, including another 20GB from the same manufacturer, are apparently not detected by the system at all. The strange thing is, though, that I can hear the disk spinning up when I switch the machine on. I thought initially that maybe the 600 couldn't handle a larger (40GB) disk, but then dismissed that idea when I found the problem with the second 20GB.

Does anyone have any ideas? Incidentally, I have verified that all the disks I tried work and can boot in my T22.

Any thoughts would be welcome.

D.

First, BIOS upgrade. ^_^

OldManClayton wrote:First, BIOS upgrade. ^_^

Sorry, I should have said in my original message. It's already running the latest BIOS (1.22?). I did notice, however, that the slave controller is at version 1.15, but (a) I don't think that's causing the problem, and (b) I can't figure out how, or if, I can upgrade it.

In an effort to diagnose the problem, I installed the Thinkpad Configuration utility and produced the following result. I don't know if it will help or not (doubt it, though...)

File Path: My Documents
Modified: 2008-10-19 13:09:44

******************************* SYSTEM SUMMARY *******************************
OS information: Microsoft Windows 2000
OS version: 5.00.2195 Service Pack 4
Processor: x86 Family 6 Model 5 Stepping 2
Memory: 228,720 kb
BIOS version: 99-09-18 - IBET54WW
Machine type-Model: 2645450

****************************** BIOS INFORMATION ******************************
BIOS version: 99-09-18 - IBET54WW
Machine type-Model: 2645450
System unit serial number: *******
System board serial number: ***********
Slave controller version: 99-07-16 - EVET12WW

***************************** DRIVE INFORMATION ******************************
Logical drive: A:\
Drive type: Removable drive
Drive size: 0 kb
Drive free space: 0 kb

Logical drive: C:\
Drive type: Fixed drive
Drive size: 19,527,448 kb
Drive free space: 15,246,646 kb

Logical drive: D:\
Drive type: CD-ROM drive
Drive size: 0 kb
Drive free space: 0 kb


***************************** OTHER INFORMATION ******************************


Power scheme: Portable/Laptop
********** AC settings **********
Turn off monitor: After 15 minutes
Turn off hard disks: After 30 minutes
System standby: After 20 minutes
********** Battery settings **********
Turn off monitor: After 5 minutes
Turn off hard disks: After 5 minutes
System standby: After 5 minutes


************************* SYSTEM DEVICE INFORMATION **************************
Device class: Accessibility options
Device status: Disabled
No resources used

Device class: Serial port
Device description: Communications Port (COM1)
Driver provider: Microsoft
Driver date: 11-14-1999
Driver version: 5.0.2183.1
Device status: Enabled
Resource
I/O address: [02F8 - 02FF]
IRQ: 3

Device class: Parallel port
Device description: Printer Port (LPT1)
Driver provider: Microsoft
Driver date: 11-14-1999
Driver version: 5.0.2183.1
Device status: Enabled
Resource
I/O address: [03BC - 03BF]

Device class: TrackPoint
Device status: Enabled
Resource
IRQ: 12

Device class: Audio
Device description: Crystal WDM Audio Codec
Driver provider: Microsoft
Driver date: 11-18-1999
Driver version: 5.0.2184.1
Device status: Enabled
Resource
I/O address: [0530 - 0537]
I/O address: [0388 - 038B]
I/O address: [0220 - 0233]
DMA: 1
DMA: 0
IRQ: 5

Device class: Infrared
Device description: IBM ThinkPad Fast Infrared Port
Driver provider: National Semiconductor
Driver date: 8-9-1999
Driver version: 1.0.0.0
Device status: Enabled
Resource
I/O address: [03F8 - 03FF]
DMA: 3
IRQ: 4

Device class: MIDI / Joystick port
Device description: Crystal WDM MPU-401 Compatible
Driver provider: Microsoft
Driver date: 11-18-1999
Driver version: 5.0.2184.1
Device status: Enabled
Resource
I/O address: [0330 - 0333]

Device class: Joystick port
Device description: Crystal WDM Game Port
Driver provider: Microsoft
Driver date: 9-23-1998
Driver version: 5.0.0.0
Device status: Enabled
Resource
I/O address: [0200 - 0207]

Device class: Internal modem
Device description: ThinkPad Digital Signal Processor
Driver provider: IBM Corporation
Driver date: 11-8-1999
Driver version: 5.0.2177.1
Device status: Enabled
Resource
I/O address: [0130 - 013F]
DMA: 6
IRQ: 11

Device class: PCI Device Setup
Device status: Enabled
Resource
IRQ: 11

Device class: Device Bay
Device status: Enabled
Resource
I/O address: [0170 - 0177]
IRQ: 15

Device class: Docking station
Device status: Disabled
No resources used

Device class: Net
Device description: Wireless-B Notebook Adapter
Driver provider: Cisco-Linksys, LLC.
Driver date: 10-1-2003
Driver version: 5.158.1001.2003
Device status: Enabled
Resource
Memory address: [FFBFEE00 - FFBFEFFF]
I/O address: [FD00 - FDFF]
IRQ: 9

donalr wrote:Any thoughts would be welcome.

When you say that the drives are not recognized, do you mean that they are not recognized as system disks or that they are not recognized under Win2000, or that they are not recognized as blank disks? It can sometimes occur that system disks (ones with an OS installed) are not recognized by a Thinkpad if the drive was not originally partitioned in that same model of Thinkpad. It can also happen that a drive with an OS on it is not recognized by a Thinkpad if the OS is configured for another machine.

How are you installing these other drives? In the main hard drive slot or in a Secondary HDD Adapter?

Phil.

Hi Phil,

Thanks for the reply. I'm afraid it's much more fundamental than that. The computer doesn't recognise that there is a disk plugged in at all! It's at a BIOS level. I can boot with a variety of boot floppies and CDs and they all tell me the same thing - that there is no hard disk installed.

I can hear some of them spinning when I turn the machine on, so I know that some sort of power is getting to them. On some of them, I can hear a click as the power is withdrawn when I turn it off.

To answer your second question, I attempt to connect each disk in the main drive bay. I do have a USB caddy and I will try each of these in it this evening. It didn't occur to me to try it with that. However, if the system recognises the disks, it leave me with more questions than answers!

Donal.

Update:

I reformatted my 20GB (recognised) disk and installed KUbuntu. I then attached the 40GB disk, which previously hadn't been recognised by the system, via my USB caddy through the USB 1.1 port. Result: the disk was detected and recognised for what it was. I could access the partitions and read the files. I then created a single 40GB FAT32 partition on the disk, formatted it through Linux and wrote a test file to it. All so far, so good.

I shut down the system and replaced the 20GB disk with the 40GB one. Result: it wasn't detected. I booted with a Windows 98 CD and ran fdisk, and the message came back 'No fixed disks detected'.

Where do I go from here??????

A further update: I connected my 80GB 5400 rpm disk, which is normally in my USB caddy, and that was detected! I connected the 40GB which is normally in my T22 and it was not detected!

At this stage, I just don't know what to do!

Just my $.02.

I would install the (any) drive and boot Dukes' boot and nuke (or your favorite format tool), before trying anything on that drive. I like to have a "clean" drive to start with to rule out that drive as being the culprit to any other/future problems.

vanaya wrote:Just my $.02.

I would install the (any) drive and boot Dukes' boot and nuke (or your favorite format tool), before trying anything on that drive. I like to have a "clean" drive to start with to rule out that drive as being the culprit to any other/future problems.

Yes, I see what you mean, but before that or any other formatting tool can be used, the computer has to be able to detect the drive at a BIOS level!

Hello all,
Almost exactly a year later, I thought I would re-visit this problem, which is still with me. I decided to boot my venerable 600 and the usual problem appeared. I swapped in a few different disks and none of them were detected by the machine. I re-inserted my original disk and that booted. I then decided to re-install Windows 2000 and all was going well until the point in the installation arrived when the machine had to reboot. The disk wasn't detected.

Does anyone have any thoughts in 2009? A quick recap is that my 2645-450 TP600 will (used to?) only physically detect some hard disks, but not all. As I describe above, this seems to have got worse. I'm not really willing to spend any money on the machine at this stage, e.g. new system board, but it would be a pity to have to junk it or split it for parts.

Are you putting the disks in sleds? I found if I didn't put the disk in a sled it might not plug into the hard disk connector properly. If I was careful I could do it, but not always.

I have used 30 GB disks in a 600X. I don't have a 600 any more (I do have a 600E, but it needs a keyboard) so I don't know if your problem is related specifically to the 600.

Secondary question: do all these disks work on other machines?

Reading this thread got me to thinking about when I pulled the 4.5GB drive out of my 600 (2645-45U) for a 60GB replacement. I had both drives in and out of the machine a couple of times (with the little bracket thingy on them) because I had some issues with it not recognizing the new drive on a BIOS level a couple of times.

All I can think of is that either the connector pins in the computer might have been a bit dirty and all the mating/demating cleaned them up, or even though I thought I was putting the thing in all the way, maybe I wasn't getting it inserted right.

Consider this, as well as the other suggestion to check the drives in another machine/USB enclosure to verify that they are functional.

Rob