Is my T61 a lemon or are crashes due to Vista?

Message

wondercow · #1 Post by **wondercow** » Mon Sep 03, 2007 11:13 am

Hello, all! I just got my new T61 on Thursday, and unfortunately it has crashed several times a day since. This is my first Vista machine, so I don't know if the problems are related to Vista (and my lack of experience using it) or whether this sort of behavior is indicative of problems with the machine itself. So far, all I have installed on it are Firefox and Thunderbird--everything else is the base Lenovo installation (I ran the Lenovo and Microsoft update tools).

So, here's the problem: Frequently, the computer locks up. The touchpad stops responding, and no keyboard keys will do anything. However, if I switch to the TrackPoint (I prefer the touchpad), the mouse moves! Unfortunately, I still can't get the computer to respond when I click or press anything, and I always have to shut the laptop off by holding down the power button. Even after I get the TrackPoint to move the cursor, the touchpad will no longer work.

I have noticed that this happens when I am running Firefox, probably because that is the main application I use, but the other day when I was watching a DVD, I attempted to pause the movie in full-screen mode. The movie was still playing smoothly, but the computer refused to respond to anything I pressed, and the mouse (auto-hides during DVD play) wouldn't reappear. I am assuming that this was the same type of crash as I see in Firefox--Vista seems to get so focused on one task that it refuses to respond to anything I press. Has anyone else seen any symptoms like this, or should I be calling tech support? I'm at my wits' end...I'm almost ready to downgrade to XP!

My system:
T61 15" (6465-CTO)
Vista Home Premium
Core 2 Duo 2GHz
1 GB memory (getting more asap)
Intel graphics
Turbo Memory
Wireless 4965 AGN

#2 Post by **ryengineer** » Mon Sep 03, 2007 11:58 am

Sir, IMHO Windows Vista is to blame. I also hear people talking about lock-ups with Firefox usuage. I suggest you uninstall Firefox and see how your machine behaves without it.

As far as Thinkpad T61 is concerned, it's one of the most stable machine present in the market toady. Since I saw you also have Turbo memory so please make sure you have the latest drivers installed for it.

Please also look into this page.

Also keep in mind Windows Vista takes some time to settle. Lenovo posted some tips to enhance Windows Vista Performance for new users.

SHoTTa35 · #3 Post by **SHoTTa35** » Mon Sep 03, 2007 12:07 pm

i don't blame Vista as i have it running without any problems at all as well as lots of other people. If it was that big of a failure then yeah MS would be hiding in their redmond base and never leave.

For the most part what i see are software conflicts or poorly written apps rushed out the door to get a Vista compatible version. People will say Vista was rushed also but i have no problems here with the OS itself and my laptop runs for days before i reboot (update or something that requires it)

As for your problem tho, did this always happen or did you notice it more after something else installed or what? Check the event viewer to see what's causing the lock ups.

wondercow · #4 Post by **wondercow** » Mon Sep 03, 2007 2:39 pm

Thank you both for your tips. I followed some of the optimization tips from Lenovo, and I checked out the log file. There are two errors I see from when I think the last crash occurred (since it is a random crash I just have to wait for it to happen again to be sure). One is WerSvc error 5007, which I googled to find out is an error in a Windows Update. The other is Service Control Manager error 7000, which says:

The Parallel port driver service failed to start due to the following error:
The service cannot be started, either because it is disabled or because it has no enabled devices associated with it.

Does the T61 even have a parallel port? Could this be the problem?

SHoTTa35: I can't say whether the problem started after I installed Firefox or any other software because I have only had the laptop since Thursday and installed Firefox right away, as I don't like IE7 very much.

I would like to try uninstalling Firefox, but for some reason, IE7 won't work anymore! Firefox works just fine for any webpage, but for some reason IE gives me the old "Internet Explorer cannot display the webpage" error. I tried resetting IE to factory defaults in the tools menu, but that didn't fix it. There is no proxy server being used. Anybody have any idea what this problem is from or how to fix it? I would like to try removing Firefox now, but I don't want to be stranded with no working internet browser...

dmitrio · #5 Post by **dmitrio** » Mon Sep 03, 2007 3:37 pm

I would try to bootup something different and harmless like knoppix which does not touch you harddrive unless you intentionally command to do so.
and you will be able to differentiate most of hardware vs vista issues

mrbjr · #6 Post by **mrbjr** » Mon Sep 03, 2007 3:46 pm

I hesitate to mention this but, but just push the Blue ThinkVantage button and get back to the factory settings.( you did create recovery disks?) Since it is so new you haven't got much time invested. Then get all the critical updates from MS and then whatever Lenovo has to offer that you feel are necessary to you.. I am running Thunderbird with no problems, but did had issues with Firefox and have since uninstalled it. Other than self inflicted issues am running Vista Ultimate with minimal problems on a T60P.

wondercow · #7 Post by **wondercow** » Mon Sep 03, 2007 4:00 pm

dmitrio: That's a good idea--I will try that and see how long the laptop lives without crashing.

mrbjr: I will probably do that soon--I have fiddled with so many settings now that I'm not really sure what I have even done anymore. That's too bad you had to give up on Firefox--can you elaborate more on what kinds of problems you had?

mrbjr · #8 Post by **mrbjr** » Mon Sep 03, 2007 4:40 pm

Random freezes and rapid uncontrolled scrolling...

wondercow · #9 Post by **wondercow** » Mon Sep 03, 2007 5:18 pm

How unfortunate--those seem to be the same symptoms I am experiencing with Firefox (I thought the scrolling issue was just me having the sensitivity too high...). Perhaps that is the root of my problems after all.

IE7 problem fixed...apparently Windows Firewall blacklisted it.

Thank you all for your help! It sounds like I might just need to either dump my beloved Firefox or nurse it along until some more updates come out.

dmitrio · #10 Post by **dmitrio** » Mon Sep 03, 2007 5:35 pm

I'm a long time Opera user and it works for me very well.

wondercow · #11 Post by **wondercow** » Mon Sep 10, 2007 11:11 am

I wanted to follow up on my post and let you know that I resolved my bluescreens. After digging through other posts on this forum, I identified that my computer was most unstable when on battery and, upon the recommendations of others, took these steps to stop my T61 from freezing:

1) Install the 1.1.0.1010 Turbo Memory drivers from the Intel site, ignoring the warning that they were installing an older version of TM than I already had.

2) Then, after rebooting from step 1, install the 7.6.0.1011 Matrix Storage drivers from the Intel site and reboot. This install failed once for an unknown reason but the second time it worked.

(Also, I uninstalled Client Security Solutions before installing either of these drivers, but that didn't fix my problem at the time and I don't think it was related to my final fix. However, I'm not willing to format my drive now to test whether the solution works again!) Now my laptop has been running for over 24 hours straight alternating between battery and AC power, hibernating and waking up, running Firefox and Thunderbird, etc. The turbo memory also seems to be functioning properly because it wakes up from hibernation and seems to be running faster than before, as well!

I hope this solution will be helpful to anyone else who is frustrated with their T61's freezing on battery, and I hope someone will be able to replicate my success!

eyecon82 · #12 Post by **eyecon82** » Fri Sep 21, 2007 5:42 pm

wondercow wrote:I wanted to follow up on my post and let you know that I resolved my bluescreens. After digging through other posts on this forum, I identified that my computer was most unstable when on battery and, upon the recommendations of others, took these steps to stop my T61 from freezing:

1) Install the 1.1.0.1010 Turbo Memory drivers from the Intel site, ignoring the warning that they were installing an older version of TM than I already had.

2) Then, after rebooting from step 1, install the 7.6.0.1011 Matrix Storage drivers from the Intel site and reboot. This install failed once for an unknown reason but the second time it worked.

(Also, I uninstalled Client Security Solutions before installing either of these drivers, but that didn't fix my problem at the time and I don't think it was related to my final fix. However, I'm not willing to format my drive now to test whether the solution works again!) Now my laptop has been running for over 24 hours straight alternating between battery and AC power, hibernating and waking up, running Firefox and Thunderbird, etc. The turbo memory also seems to be functioning properly because it wakes up from hibernation and seems to be running faster than before, as well!

I hope this solution will be helpful to anyone else who is frustrated with their T61's freezing on battery, and I hope someone will be able to replicate my success!

thank you!

#13 Post by **bill bolton** » Fri Sep 21, 2007 8:08 pm

SHoTTa35 wrote:running without any problems at all as well as lots of other people.

There are a very great number of reported issues with Vista which have not been satisfactorily addressed by Microsoft.

It very certainly has many remaining "problems" and there are very significant and continuing user reports about them, both here and on many other place on the web.

Vista is workable, but it is definitely not without any problems at all!

Cheers,

Bill B.

noetus · #14 Post by **noetus** » Sat Sep 22, 2007 1:38 am

SHoTTa35 wrote:For the most part what i see are software conflicts or poorly written apps rushed out the door to get a Vista compatible version. People will say Vista was rushed also but i have no problems here with the OS itself and my laptop runs for days before i reboot (update or something that requires it)

So, you have the technical knowledge to tell when a problem is due to a poorly written program versus a poorly written OS? That seems unlikely.

#15 Post by **BillMorrow** » Sat Sep 22, 2007 3:15 am

one needs little technical knowledge to come to the conclusion that apps like firefox (or others) do not behave properly with vista when vista runs fine alone and crashes with firefox..

emperical evidence..

and

lets keep it civil when remarking on someones "technical knowledge level"..

nxman · #16 Post by **nxman** » Sat Sep 22, 2007 5:00 pm

Same thing with my T61 after upgrading to XP problem is gone!

Tailic · #17 Post by **Tailic** » Sat Sep 22, 2007 6:01 pm

Its best to do a clean install after you buy your T61, even if things are running fine. The Lenovo image of Vista is horrible, to many Thinkvantage tools installed along with out dated drivers. After doing the clean you'll want to use their updating tool to install the rest of the drivers.

Theres nothing wrong with Firefox in Vista, no reason not to use it. If you're having problems with Firefox in Vista then something is wrong with your machine.

matthauger · #18 Post by **matthauger** » Sat Sep 22, 2007 6:09 pm

I had similar issues, even after a clean install of Vista Home Premium on my T61.

Things seemed to clear up when I removed some of the ThinkVantage software that I didn't need. The uninstallation of the Productivity Center, especially, ended my frequent lock-ups.

egalvan · #19 Post by **egalvan** » Sat Sep 22, 2007 6:11 pm

BillMorrow wrote:...vista runs fine alone and crashes with firefox..
...

Which means what exactly?

That:
Vista has a problem?
FireFox has a problem?
Both have a problem?
Neither have a problem?
(It's the hardware!! yeah, that's it! Let's blame the hardware!!:))

FireFox is stable on Unix, Linux & BSD, and fairly so on XP.

At this point, putting the blame on Vista or FireFox may be premature. I'm waiting on the Mozilla team/FOSS community to do more testing.

Disclosure: I don't run Vista, and I don't support any Vista machines. I stopped at XP. That cost me customers, but eased my workload.

ErnestG
Designing, verifying, testing, building & selling hardware and software since 1969.

alpineguy · #20 Post by **alpineguy** » Mon Oct 01, 2007 4:38 pm

Wondercow's nicely described solution needed some tweaking before it worked on my T61. My freeze/lock problem only occurred when on battery power, not AC and was especially common when using IE7. Updating to the two latest drivers still did not correct the problem as it did for Wondercow.

But, disabling both Ready Drive and Ready Boost in the Turbo Memory console immediately gave me a stable system. No freeze after the disabling.

Now I have enabled Ready Drive, but have left Ready Boost disabled. No freezes and a solid system on both AC and battery.

Next I will try enabling Ready Boost, but I suspect that was at the heart of my problem.

eyecon82 · #21 Post by **eyecon82** » Fri Nov 02, 2007 4:49 pm

guys...the fix for this is very easy; go into power management, under hard disc, disable the hybrid power saving option.... wallah!! problems solved

btw this is related to turbo memory

Is my T61 a lemon or are crashes due to Vista?

Is my T61 a lemon or are crashes due to Vista?

:. knoppix

:. opera

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