Thinkpads Forum

My T530 was running fine until recently when it started to 'stall' occasionally with the HD running for long periods. It's got 8Gb RAM and 300Gb, 7k HD with 32Gb Crucial mSATA and Win 7 Pro (64b).

I suspected an impending HD failure, but read that similar problems could result from a bad mSATA card. I removed the mSATA card and related software. It seemed a little better until..... it stopped booting off the HD entirely. The unit will run the BIOS and just get to the "breathing" Windows logo, then flash a BSOD for a split second and then restart the boot cycle. It WILL boot off the CD drive. I ran every diagnostic that the bios and repair disk could run. None came back with any problems. Here's what else I tried:

> Ran Windows repair CD - no effect.
> Switched hard drives with an almost identical W530 that had been used
in the W530 before getting an SSD - no effect
> Restored an image backup to a new HD using repair CD - no effect

Now I'm seriously stumped. Any suggestions or diagnostics for me to try? Thanks in advance.

Run Memtest86+ to see if your RAM throws any errors.

Neil wrote:Run Memtest86+ to see if your RAM throws any errors.

Good idea. Ran it, but results were good.

I also tried all the usual fixmbr stuff too but no effect. I also swapped the HD into a W530 and it worked fine. Conversely, the W530 HD in the T530 wouldn't boot either. I'm thinking it's a hardware problem. Has anybody ever fixed ThinkPad by reflashing the BIOS or other firmware?

Have you checked temperatures and the CMOS battery?
Don't know much about UEFI BIOS, but they might be susceptible to low battery voltage.
If you want to remove that CMOS, be sure to first remove any BIOS passwords you may have?
And the heatsink might want its thermal paste renewed plus the fan cleaned.