X20 Problem

[dalager]

Hi. I have a Thinkpad X20 (266235G)
The problem is that when I connect power, the Thinklight, the Battery led(orange) and the STBY(the green moon) goes ON - And thats it. I cant turn the machine on, or do nothing.

What I have done so far, testet - with no result
Removed battery, replaced CMOS battery, removed PCI modem, Removed RAM, Removed Harddrive. No result - same error.

Could anyone rescue my X20?

[dmdsoftware]

Hi. I have a Thinkpad X20 (266235G)
The problem is that when I connect power, the Thinklight, the Battery led(orange) and the STBY(the green moon) goes ON - And thats it. I cant turn the machine on, or do nothing.

What I have done so far, testet - with no result
Removed battery, replaced CMOS battery, removed PCI modem, Removed RAM, Removed Harddrive. No result - same error.

Could anyone rescue my X20?

Your motherboard was fried. Maybe someone plugged in the wrong AC adapter and/or there was a surge.

[flemmingdn]

Hi. I have a Thinkpad X20 (266235G)
The problem is that when I connect power, the Thinklight, the Battery led(orange) and the STBY(the green moon) goes ON - And thats it. I cant turn the machine on, or do nothing.

What I have done so far, testet - with no result
Removed battery, replaced CMOS battery, removed PCI modem, Removed RAM, Removed Harddrive. No result - same error.

Could anyone rescue my X20?

Your motherboard was fried. Maybe someone plugged in the wrong AC adapter and/or there was a surge.

OK: then I'm in the marked for at motherboard for this X20. Anyone for sale ?

[selvan777]

Your motherboard was fried. Maybe someone plugged in the wrong AC adapter and/or there was a surge.

OK: then I'm in the marked for at motherboard for this X20. Anyone for sale ?

Not me, anyone else?

[bhtooefr]

None here - I like having my X21 WORKING (and, AFAIK, the X20 case can take an X21 motherboard, so that's also an option for you)

[sbieg]

Hello --

Don't give up yet. I've seen a few laptops people thought were dead, live again. If you've really tried EVERYTHING, then yes, the Motherboard probably took a killer hit.

First, pull the hard drive and try it either in another PC or in an external holder with a USB plug. You might just have cooked the HD. You should do this anyway -- if the HD is good you can use it again, or pull the data from it for the new PC you'll be getting.

Second, if the HD is okay, try to borrow a working battery from somewhere that fits your X20, and try booting with the working HD re-installed. This may trip the circuit to get it running again. I've seen these lock out when a completely dead battery is used in them.

Third -- Did you try booting from the CD-ROM or from an old fashioned floppy disk? Get your hands on a boot CD or floppy, or make one, and try to get the X20 running. If this works then you have a corrupted operating system file on the HD, and may need to re-install the operating system. This will suck, but is still better than a new PC.

If you know how to use DOS or know someone who knows DOS, you can get a lot of the data off this hard drive to save it in a safe place. Once this is done, you can run any one of dozens disk checking programs that will repair errors, map the drive so data isn't stored on bad sectors, and give you a very useable hard drive for future use.

Next, if still no joy, look at the motherboard where the power connection feeds the circuit, looking for a burn mark. Motherboards are put together under a microscope, so don't even think about trying to solder in a new component at home. Unless you have the ability to shrink yourself down to the size of an ant, along with your soldering iron, you're out of luck. But at least you’ll probably know what is the problem.

I do not think you have a cooked motherboard. This is very rare – you almost have to try and do it on purpose, and even then it’s hard to do. Do you have a plug on hand with hgh voltage and a high amp feed that also fts into the power socket on your laptop? I don’t think so!!! These PCs will do a good job protecting them from such damage. There are diodes and resistors and circuit beakers throughout the system with the sole job of acting like a bodyguard to your PC.

If you really think it’s a dead motherboard, how much do you want for the wreckage? I can probably rebuild it for about $200 and give it to one of my poorer students. Where I teach there is a large Indian community with low income households. These kids could use a laptop to get them into college. I don’t mnd rebuilding these to give away to these students. I’m working on an X20 right now, which I need to put a wireless mini-PCI card into. I hope this goes well. I rebuilt this X20 from a pile of junked X20s, and it runs great. A normal PCMCIA card wireless card works well in it, but I want to use the internal setup.

Good luck. Let me know if you want to sell your X20.

Scott

[bhtooefr]

Actually, my old X21 will boot to BIOS (which'll be an improvement) with no HDD, no UltraBase, and no battery.

Try it.

[pschemo]

Hmm I just bought X20 on ebay, and I have the same problem=\\

But I`m using my T23 AC adaptor, and I think maybe that is the reason..
Honestly i hope so cause i really need it...=\\

Dalager have you sorted that problem with your X20??

-----------
Ok i found out whats going on=D
I thought that if it has built in RAM he should boot... But it turned on that he need to have some additional RAM.. I don`t have idea why it is like this...
But it works =DDD

[tom_k]

http://img115.imageshack.us/img115/4610 ... il8.th.jpg
This X20 motherboard lies upside down in its base cover.
You can see a blown part left from the harddisc connector.

I got 3 of these, all showing the same symptoms as mentioned above:
A:Thinklight ist on, impossible to switch it off by [Fn] + [PgUp] etc pp
B:standby led permanently green,
C:battery led permanently yellow(without battery!)

Also significant: the melted plastic in the base cover

A dear and highly regarded colleguae (works on flexed T4x, with success;)
managed to bring one motherboard back to life, the second was damaged too much by the heat.


I dont think the "wrong" ac adaptor can be the cause.
IBM mentions the Astec(FRU08K8205) can damage the X20 when used witout Battery.
I continouesly use exactly this ac adaptors 08k8205 with two X20, several times without battery and all goes well.
(The fried motherboards came all together from an ebay auction, besides: a good deal ;)

tom_k