Thinkpads Forum

I have a problem with my Thinkpad Edge 14 (0578-XF6) that is driving me nuts. I bought the machine from the Lenovo Outlet as a refurbished unit. It had Windows 7 32-bit, but since that couldn't access the full 4 GB of memory I wiped the drive and installed Windows 7 64-bit from a Windows 7 install disk. This was about 6 months ago when I bought the system.

Sometime in the past 2-3 months a problem cropped up. If I shutdown or restart, I have no video. The screen looks like it is cycling through video modes because the brightness changes, but no video at all - not even the BIOS POST. Yet the machine starts just fine. I can hear the Windows startup music, I can blindly login, and I can blindly shutdown. When I startup again - still no video.

I've found that if I unplug the laptop and yank the battery at just the right time in the boot cycle, that I can get the video back - until the next time I restart.

This problem is driving me nuts. I don't think it's a hardware problem because the video works fine for weeks at a time if I leave the laptop on or let it go to sleep or hibernate. It's only a Windows shutdown/restart that kills the video.

I know my way around a system (I was an A+ certified tech way back in '97), and this is the most bizarre problem I've experienced. Even yanking the hard drive and RAM won't bring the video back, you have to cause the Windows startup to fail at just the right time so that Windows will ask whether you want to try to fix the problem. Then the video comes back.

I've tried the latest Intel video drivers from the Lenovo site, along with the latest 'monitor' drive for the built-in display. No joy. Any suggestions?

When this happens I would suggest booting from a Ubuntu Live Cd http://www.ubuntu.com/desktop/get-ubuntu/download

If the screen is blank/black when you boot the LiveCD it would likely point towards a hardware issue. If you get output it would likely point to a Windows/Graphic Driver problem.

When this happens can you see the BIOS screen? The windows loading logo?

Pull the battery and run just on the AC adapter. Do the symptoms change?

Booting from a CD doesn't help, I don't even get the BIOS and post screens. I'm typing this from the laptop now using an external display which works.

I've gotten the built-in display to work a few times by deleting the monitor config before shutting down, but after a second shutdown I'm back to the same problem. I've noticed that Windows seems to be switching me from the Thinkpad display driver back to the Generic PnP driver, which I think is related to the issue.

This is the craziest problem I've faced in a long time.

Sounds like it is directing output to the external display. When this happens can you plug in an external monitor and see video?