T20 doesnt boot up after CPU downgrade

[junknstuff]

so i was reformatting my T20 when the system kept hanging up and would not install. i removed the 1ghz CPU, popped the 700mhz one back in and it installed fine.

i went back to upgrade to the 1ghz cpu and now the cylindrical icon w/the arrows pointing left/right (i call it the "processing/working" led) stays on and the computer doesnt boot up.

i popped the 700mhz back in but same thing. i did not use the proper terms to come up with any useable info through the search. if anyone has any ideas of what i can do or what this indicates, please shed light.

upgrades are in my sig. TIA

[junknstuff]

also, there is a very faint but constant beep. i barely hear it, shouldnt be my TV as i walked away and still heard it.

also, when inserting the power connecter i hear a small 'popping' sound like when you turn on/off your laptops...

*edit*
just took off the internal cell battery and waiting a couple min before reinstalling it to try to reset the mobo...still no good.

[tgb1300]

try removing the secondary battery . this clears the cmos you will have to reenter the time date etc. after you boot by entering f1 Good Luck

[rkawakami]

Howdy neighbor!

Halting in the middle of an OS install can be a symptom of a bad ethernet card. But as a switch in processors "fixed" that problem, you might have something else going on. Still, it won't hurt to try to remove the card and re-boot.

The sound your hear... is it a high-pitched whistle or whine? And is it only present when the laptop is powered up?

The cylindrical icon you mentioned is the hard disk drive activity light. It's possible that the drive went dead/is not properly connected. The whine you hear may simply be the hard drive spinning (or worse, bad bearings or a head crash). Any chance you have a spare drive you can try?

The whine could also be a vibrating inductor in the power supply, which could indicate a general system power problem. Hard to determine from the facts presented so far.

[JBUK]

Can you go into the bios ?? If so have you tried to boot from a floppy or CD. If you can get this far then you could run PC Doctor to try and give you a feel for what is actually failing.

If these tests all pass then you probably have a HDD failing. You can access the smart data to verify this using IBMs DFT disk fitness tool and do a surface scan in PC Doctor too.

[junknstuff]

thanks for the reply guys! i've been swamped at school and work so my free time to jump on the forums has slimmed.

i have left the cmos, battery, power supply unplugged for ~3-4days thinking it would do the trick, but no go. i put everything back together today and plugged in the power supply and the HD activity light does not come on until i press the power button. now even after i remove the batt, cmos, power supply and try it again, the HD activity light will stay on solid, no flickering.

as for the high pitched sound, its more of a extremely high/faint (hard to distinguish which) sound. i dont have a spare HD to try it with so thats out of the question....

rkawakami i notice youre in the area. any chance i could meet up with you and try to solve this? ibm's are so versatile i would hate to pay someone to do what someone else could just show me

if so, could you email me @ please since this forum doesnt send out updated thread subscriptions

anyone else have a clue? sounds like i've done about what i can. i have faith that the laptop is fine though, just something stupid i didnt do probably but because i am not too familiar with laptops in general i dont know where else to look.

[vlyne]

Excuse my ignorance, but is a T20 meant to handle a 1GHz CPU "upgrade"?

From what little I've seen, the 700MHz runs at about 80C and the 1GHz at about 70C so not much difference there. But the 700MHz sucks about 18W and the 1GHz about 26W. Assuming you reused the heatsink from the original 700MHz, and with a bit of elementary maths and some basic assumptions on heat tranfer, your transplanted 1GHz could be running at a not so cool 115C. Ouch! I'm guessing you've cooked something.

Hey Ray, I've got that hat on, but it ain't working as I thought - a mite bit warmer under the hat. There's a problem with heat transfer from the inside now... and I think the Gamma Rays are still getting through...gotta get a liquid cooler going, and a metal shield...

[rkawakami]

Ouch! I'm guessing you've cooked something.

Hopefully we'll know a little bit more later in the week. I've arranged to take a look at the system since we're fairly close to each other.

...gotta get a liquid cooler going, and a metal shield...

Something with a "VB" or "XXXX" on the outside? Not sure what you guys use "off the mainland" .

[rkawakami]

Update: I had a quick look at the system tonight: interesting symptom. When powered off of a known good AC adapter, pressing the power button causes the hard disk drive activity light to turn on solidly. In other words, no blinking or flashing. It just stays on. Even with the hard drive removed. Even with the main battery and CMOS battery removed. And it doesn't turn off. Not by pressing the power button down for at least 10 or 15 seconds. Only thing that makes the disk drive LED go out is removing the AC adapter. junknstuff's battery was dead so I tried one of mine--same thing. Using only battery power, the laptop would respond to the power button the same way.

CPU fan was not spinning, nor did the hard drive sound like it was spinning up when it was installed. I did not check to see if the Ultrabay drive eject button was working or not (forgot to do that!). No screen activity either; no backlight and I assume no video signal. I was not able to detect any of the whining/whistling sounds related earlier. From the past history related to me, it doesn't sound like either processor is bad since the system was running fine up until the day it died. I'm not sure which was in the system tonight (the original 700Mhz or the 1Ghz).

Based on this, my only suspect at the moment is the motherboard. A cursory look at the top side of the board revealed no obviously missing or loose part. My recommendation was to remove the board and look for any large parts which tend to dislodge themselves as a result of board flexing.

[vlyne]

Yes, it looks like there somekind of a short that's keeping the disk light on and not letting the rest of the system power up. Did you check the pins in the disk drive bay? Nice of you to take the time and effort!

[rkawakami]

Hmm.. good point! No, I tried to power up with the hard drive in place first. Got the steady HD LED, powered off, pulled the drive and then went from there. I had brought along a drive formatted in a T21 but since the laptop did not power up without the drive I didn't think it was necessary to try mine. If/when junknstuff reads this thread, I hope he will inspect those pins.

This is sort of like the "blink of death" in that NOTHING physical happens when the power button is pressed. No fan, no hard disk spin up (that I could detect in a not-too-quite restaurant), no beeps, no backlight, just a solidly lit HD LED.

<snip>...time and effort!

...was not a problem. I scheduled the meeting place and time so that it was on my way home from work. If and when you have a problem, I can only hope you will pay for my round-trip ticket Down Under (my wintertime would be perfect for such a trip). I'll provide all of the tools for the repair (but no guarantee) .

(aagghhh... got to get to bed... )

[vlyne]

If and when you have a problem, I can only hope you will pay for my round-trip ticket Down Under (my wintertime would be perfect for such a trip). I'll provide all of the tools for the repair (but no guarantee) .

No problems but I might need you to carry some thinkpads in your excess baggage If you were paid a small sum for each problem you've helped solve on this forum you'd be laughing all the way here.

(aagghhh... got to get to bed... )

Take care of yourself!!