A20M works great except for "restart" on XP

Message

leasure98 · #1 Post by **leasure98** » Thu Oct 05, 2006 10:12 pm

Well, this is a new one for me. This is my 5th laptop and I now own 2 T20's, 1 T22 and now this A20M which looks brand new. Put hard drive in and installed XP. Works fine from power off then power on; or from suspend to on. BUT, if I do 'Start>turn off computer>restart, it always freezes at the Windows screen with the 3 scrolling lights. I have to do a hard turn off and turn on. Then I get to the screen that says Windows did not start normally.....where you select 'last known working configuration' or 'start windows normally', which is always highlighted. I hit 'start windows normally' and it never fails to start correctly. All my drivers are up to date, software installer up to date, pass the diagnostics OK, and no errors show up in the event log for applications, security, or system. I am stumped and wonder if anybody has seen this? I'm about ready to try Windows 2000 from scratch to see if it's something in XP. I even installed the XP configuration files from Lenovo site. Bios is latest version. 700Mhz, 256 ram. HELP! I know this is not a critical problem but nevertheless, it is bugging the crap out of me! Thanks!

dsigma6 · #2 Post by **dsigma6** » Fri Oct 06, 2006 7:50 am

I just did some google searching for you but the information seems limited. In one instance I found, a system restore fixed the problem- But I believe you said this is a new install that never could restart. Secondly, there was an issue with having two video cards (it was a desktop, but nonetheless), so maybe try starting windows with the bare minimum (HD, 1 stick of ram if you've got two 128's, no cd/floppy).

Might not make a difference, but you've got to start somewhere.

leasure98 · #3 Post by **leasure98** » Fri Oct 06, 2006 11:01 pm

dsigma6:
You were right.....I had to start somewhere. So I thought back to what I did. Turns out I bought this Dell 3Com mini combo card (modem + ethernet) and installed it. Windows found the driver and the modem worked OK, but I did not get a chance to try the network portion of the card. I put the original modem card in (Lucent winmodem) and it FIXED IT! What stumps me is the fact that it only acted up on "restart" and that device manager showed no problems. I also can't understand why I can't use a mini PCI combo card. Isn't a 3Com mini combo a 3Com mini combo? Thanks for your reply. I really was kind of lazy and really didn't want to mess with the computer and thought somebody may have run across this before.
Let this be a lesson.....a Dell is NOT an IBM......Duh!

leasure98 · #4 Post by **leasure98** » Sat Oct 07, 2006 12:27 am

BTW.....I just checked the 3Com site and it said to use the ME driver and that it should work with XP, but XP wasn't supported. They have a separate driver for W2K. My question is what is the correct fru for an A20M miniPCI combo? Would T20-T22 3Com work? Does anybody have one for sale....CHEAP?
Thanks again.

ctcheung · #5 Post by **ctcheung** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 12:49 pm

Download the 3Com mini pci card driver from the lenovo website and reinstall it under the safe mode first. It is the modem driver that incompatible with the Winxp. The driver of the 3Com modem that comes with WindowsXP is the problem that freeze the screen in the booting. I recently bought the 3Com mini-pci card from eBay for a cheap price (just $9.99) and have the program like you have. It is ok now after using the lenovo 3Com driver. The driver from ME is different for XP. Do check it before install.

leasure98 · #6 Post by **leasure98** » Thu Oct 12, 2006 9:16 pm

Thank you, ctcheung for the reply. These are the drivers I used from the Lenovo site.....
Modem: mdcb3cxp.exe

Ethernet: eftp3com.exe

My question is; why should I have to install in safe mode?
Thanks again.

leasure98 · #7 Post by **leasure98** » Thu Oct 12, 2006 9:20 pm

Sorry...I meant to add that I installed these drivers in the first place and my system stopped booting up. Still don't understand what safe mode will do. I put the original modem card back in. So, should I remove the modem, put in 3com combo then drivers? Or would it be better to install drivers (exe files) in safe mode then put in the hardware?

leasure98 · #8 Post by **leasure98** » Sun Nov 26, 2006 9:15 pm

Just in case someone else has this problem.....on both of my A20m's, I installed the Xircom mini-pci and XP recognizes them and they just work!

A20M works great except for "restart" on XP

A20M works great except for "restart" on XP

Who is online