Thinkpads Forum

Hi,

I'm trying to figure out a booting problem I'm having with a TP 390X. When the laptop is started, the following occurs:

-standard beep
-the display turns on. it looks like only the backlight comes on. there is no image of any kind that is displayed.
-the floppy drive is cycled on
-the hard drive is accessed for about 10 seconds and then it stops

After this, the laptop will remain on with the backlight on but the hard drive is not accessed. Nothing else afterwards.

Any suggestions on where I can start? I've read a few posts about the CMOS battery but I'm not sure if this would be a symptom of a bad battery.

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks.

Try attaching an external monitor.

An update to this. The laptop boots up and works fine. The only issue is the LCD. The backlight works and it provides adequate light. Just there is no image on the screen. When connected to an external monitor, the external display show the images properly.

Would this be an inverter problem or motherboard problem?

About the only thing that the inverter does, is to generate the voltage that drives the backlight. And the backlight does work,
so that rules out the inverter.

It can be the LCD panel, the LCD cable or the motherboard.

Sometimes, with old electronics, it helps to take things apart and then assembling them again. That is, re-seating all the connections.
Also you can look for visible cracks in the LCD panel and check the fuses on the motherboard.

Besides from that, I cannot think of anything else to try, except from starting to replace the mentioned parts, one by one, until it works.