T61 errors before booting help

[Maden]

Dear all,

recently I am getting error messages when I boot my T61 right after the start screen. See below for the message. Last time, it took me 2.5 months to obtain a warranty repair with lenovo (shipping over the Atlantic, etc.) (Lenovo itself fixed it within 5 days), so I am a bit concerned that it breaks again. I didn't do anything in my BIOS, so I am a bit stumped.
What could it be? And how can I fix it?

I would deeply appreciate any advice or help? I look forward to reading your answers

Cheers, Maden


ERROR
Resource Conflict - PCI on Motherboard
Bus: 15, Device: 00, Function: 00
ERROR
Resource Conflict - PCI Serial Bus Controller on Motherboard
Bus: 15, Device: 00, Function: 01
ERROR
Resource Conflict - PCI on Motherboard
Bus: 15, Device: 00, Function: 02
Press <ESC> to continue

if I remember correctly, the 'function: 00' is sometimes also '05'

[Maden]

nobody?

[hellosailor]

Only an educated guess. Either your hardware is bad, or the BIOS may be corrupted. Try opening the BIOS settings and restoring everything to default settings. If that solves the boot errors, make any changes that you might have wanted, one at a time, to see if any of them cause conflicts.

Then you might want to check your BIOS version, and consider updating it if it is not current. (If you do that, read the notes on the updates, some of them do nothing for any particular model, or they do something totally unrelated to your hardware or OS.)

If your computer is five years old, and especially if it has spent most of its life unplugged, the BIOS backup battery may simply be due for replacement. When that happens, the BIOS is likely to get corrupt anytime the machine is not plugged into AC power.

I always have mixed feelings about updating the BIOS. Usually there's a reason for it...sometimes, it does more harm than good.

If you have to ship it back to the US...using whatever your equivalent of "global priority mail" should give you a reasonable cost and delivery in under a week.

[Bob_McBob]

I am having the same issue with my T61, even the same bus, but Device 00 through 05. Firefox has been behaving oddly the last couple of weeks, and I had some lock-ups and periodic issues with this error on boot. Today Windows locked up, and I am now getting the error every time I turn on the computer. Windows starts just fine, but usually locks up when it shows the desktop. If it doesn't, Access Connections thinks there is no wireless adapter present and then Windows just locks up soon after. Safe Mode sort of works, but a lot of things don't load properly, and Access Connections just never starts even if I run it manually.

This T61 had its CPU and system board replaced at the end of the warranty period in December, so they are practically brand new parts. I've tried changing the PCI config in the BIOS setup as well as setting everything to default, but I still get the boot error. I even went as far as unplugging the wireless adapter.

Any idea what else I could try? Is it time to buy a new laptop? Why did a brand new motherboard fail so quickly?

[richk]

Don't buy a laptop. Can you burn an ISO? Send me a pm with your email address and I'll send you an ISO to reinitialize the PCI bus

[Bob_McBob]

Don't buy a laptop. Can you burn an ISO? Send me a pm with your email address and I'll send you an ISO to reinitialize the PCI bus

Sure, that's no problem. Sending a PM now.

[Bob_McBob]

Don't buy a laptop. Can you burn an ISO? Send me a pm with your email address and I'll send you an ISO to reinitialize the PCI bus

I burned the image and booted and ran option 2 (reset onboard ethernet). I rebooted and got the same list of PCI resource conflicts as before. Is there anything else I can try?

I didn't describe the error properly in my first post. All the conflicts are Bus 15, Device 00 as with the OP, but Function 00 through 05.

[Bob_McBob]

I can get into Safe Mode just fine, but all sorts of stuff is disabled or missing. The fingerprint reader, wireless adapter, audio support, etc.

In the device manager I see two conflicts:

Intel(R) ICH8 Family PCI Express Root Port 2 - 2841
Bus 0, Device 28, Function 1

Mobile Intel(R) PM965/GM965/GL960 Express PCI Express Root Port - 2A01
Bus 0, Device 1, function 0

Both say they cannot find enough resources to operate. No idea if this is useful information.

[RealBlackStuff]

Take out the RAM modules, use an eraser to properly rub the gold contacts on both sides, then clean off the debris before reinserting the RAM.
Those contacts should be bright and shiny.
You could also run Memtest on the RAM http://www.memtest.org/

[Bob_McBob]

I should have mentioned that I already ran memtest (separately) as well as all the Lenovo diagnostic tests.

[richk]

I am assuming you are not in a dock. If you are, undock. Usually, flashing the ethernet fixes this sort of problem. I would next try to disable as many devices as possible in the BIOS, like ethernet, wireless, modem, wwan, and turbo memory. Those are all on the bus. If that doesn't eliminate the message, I would try bluetooth, fingerprint, touchpad, trackpoint (USB devices). If this eliminates the message, enable them one at a time to see what is failing.

[Bob_McBob]

I'm back after a few months. I tried everything suggested in the thread so far, but none of it helped. I've also tried messing around with IRQ settings in the BIOS, setting it back to default, and flashing the BIOS to the latest version, but I still get the resource conflict errors.

I ended up running an Ubuntu Live CD for the last few months because I needed a working computer right away and didn't care about portability. This actually worked rather well, aside from the limitations imposed by the Live CD.

A couple weeks ago I decided to backup, reformat the drive, and install Windows 7. It boots and runs fine, but there are some significant issues. Every single device on bus 21 (the cardbus/expresscard controller, SD slot controller, etc.) shows as "device cannot find enough free resources that it can use". All of these devices are use IRQ 10 or 11, and the PCI Express Root Port on IRQ 11 (port 2) also has the same error.

I could live without any of the stuff mentioned above, but the biggest problem is that the computer refuses to recognize the wireless card. I know I have the correct drivers installed, and Everest (AIDA64...) recognizes that the card is present, but it is completely non-functional and does not show up in the device manager. The other issue I have is that if the system goes into standby, it BSODs with an IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL error when it wakes up.

I gather there has probably been some sort of hardware failure and Windows is not handling it very gracefully. I have tried everything I can to get wireless and standby to work, but I am at my wit's end now. I think I would have a more usable laptop if I installed Ubuntu, but it's not a particularly ideal solution. I was really hoping having most of the hardware replaced in December would extend the lifespan of the laptop for a year or two more, but it's now looking like I will have to buy a new one. I'd really appreciate any other suggestions before I go ahead with that, though.

[rumbero]

I was really hoping having most of the hardware replaced in December would extend the lifespan of the laptop for a year or two more, but it's now looking like I will have to buy a new one. I'd really appreciate any other suggestions before I go ahead with that, though.

Buying a new notebook is so much more expensive and repairing such a reasonably fast and sufficiently modern machine would be the most economic action. If i were you, i would have already replaced the mainboard with a cheap new/used one from eBay since very long time, giving your machine a whole new life. If you could tell us the exact model type, we could tell you which mainboard FRU to look after (according to the table at the bottom of thinkpad-wiki.org/T61).

On www.lenovoservicetraining.com/ion/R61_T61 you can find very well done instruction videos which and a very detailed hardware maintenance manual which both show how to properly replace the mainboard. If i could do it, everybody else can too.

If you are not up to do all the technical surgery involved with replacing the mainboard, you might want to opt for a compatible used machine of the same type, for which you could reuse your already existing parts and components as spares.

[rumbero]

This T61 had its CPU and system board replaced at the end of the warranty period in December, so they are practically brand new parts. [...] Why did a brand new motherboard fail so quickly?

Because the mainboard was already broken when it left the manufacturer's production site? Sometimes quality assurance might fail due to some very well hidden issue, which rears it's ugly head only later after some time of operation. This is just plain reality, and therefore strange unforeseen things are happening once in a while.

[Bob_McBob]

The FRU is 42W7652, which seems to be a $200 used part. It's questionable whether it's even worth replacing at this point, considering a nice T520 can be ordered for $700, the current year-old battery is at 50% capacity, and I could probably get a few dollars for the T61 to put towards the new laptop.

I'm not exactly sure what's gone wrong here and whether there is anything else I can do to work around it. I don't need any of the devices on the bus that appears to have failed (if that is the explanation), but I can't access wifi and standby mode in Windows like I can in Ubuntu. Is this definitely a hardware failure on the main board?