Thinkpads Forum

Hi,
I have a thinkpad 600, and have had some trouble with it. First off, I bought a new 5gig hard drive and installed windows 98 on it. The monitor drivers were missing, so that is one problem. The other problem is that the battery will not charge. i have tried using different batteries, and it always shows "0% Charging" but it never charges, and will not run off the battery at all. Basic operation sucks. it is extremely slow and often freezes. Any suggestions? Thanks!

You have 2 problems- the lack of drivers for your LCD and your battery doesn't work, possibly because it doesn't charge or because it's bad. This second problem could be that your DC/DC card (this is a small board that connects to the motherboard from the AC socket inside your thinkpad) is broken or you have a completely dead battery (not uncommon). You may also have more than the above 2 problems (slow and freezing) such as some type of sypware/adware or virus or just bad or lack of memory but without being in front of your computer or without you telling us more, it would be very difficult to diagnose.

The first problem is simple to fix. You need to go to http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... BOD-3HHRYY to download them. By the way, here is the site for all of the drivers for the 600 series Thinkpad: http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... SHY-3TLQ2L

Now for your second problem, download the hardware maitenance manual here: ftp://ftp.software.ibm.com/pc/pccbbs/mo ... 9n1033.pdf and it will tell you how to open up your thinkpad. If your battery is not dead then it's probably the DC/DC card or internal connector where the barrel adapter inserts...sometimes the solder points inside the laptop come loose. You can check that from inside the laptop if you feel inclined (of course if the battery is dead this may not be the problem at all...test your battery with a known working 600 series Thinkpad first).

If you are technically savy, and you've decided that it's the DC/DC board you can buy a DC/DC board from the internet (even ebay) and replace it yourself, if that's the problem (no broken solder points, the barrel adapter fits snug and the battery is still good). Otherwise, you would have to find a good repair person to fix this problem for you.

Good luck

The other thing is: I get an error message that says: 192 and 174. Any ideas? THanks for the information! Joe

Error 174 is a device configuration error: Make sure your Hard Drive is connected properly.
Error 194 is a cooling fan error. The 600 service manual says to have the thinkpad serviced. If you find that the cooling fan is not coming on at all, then this part can be bought on ebay or elsewhere and the bad one replaced by the good one. You can download the owner's manual here: http://www.usanotebook.com/manual_list_page.php#

Here's another thought - check your CMOS battery (in the RAM compartment, the service manual will show you where).

When my CMOS battery died, it caused an Error 194 to appear. It went away when I replaced it.

Rob

Yep, 192 is a fan error. Don't ask why, just replace your CMOS battery.