T60 Boot up problems

[kaliste]

Hello everyone,

I'm trying to resolve a dear friend's t60 issues.

It is just does not proceed past the Initial screen message of

"To interrupt normal startup press the blue thinkvantage button"

neither does pressing the blue think vantage button have any effect.

All led lights do indicate activity.

What would be exact cause of this would it be a hardware or would it OS corruption.

can not even access the Bios.

could this a Motherboard issue.

it is out of warranty do not even have a usb floppy drive...

The jackass would never it shutdown 'cos of few system messages that he received prior to shutdown !, consequently would only hibernate it, then lug it around.

would appreciate any pointers.

regards

[Harryc]

My advice would be to burn a PC-Doctor disc, boot it up , and run all diagnostics. Start with the hard drive and RAM.
http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... migr-56222

[kaliste]

thank you for the help, but it does not even get to the bios option, no response to any key,

have checked the harddisk for bad sectors, there are none. it is perfectly fine.

have also disassembled the keyboard, now putting it back.

What else could this be ?

[Harryc]

"To interrupt normal startup press the blue thinkvantage button"

If you see that, you should be able to get into bios by holding down F1 on boot. I don't see what that has to do with booting a CD though. The boot order is probably correct by default. Put in the CD...boot. (period). If the boot order is not correct,, and you cannot get into BIOS, then there is an issue...possibly circumvented by removing the CMOS battery for a bit.

[kaliste]

did try to boot via Cd, there is absolutely no response it stays stuck at the same screen.

it definitely does not respond to F1, there is absolutely no response whatsoever, neither to any key or to the boot cd

looking into the cmos bit right now

[kaliste]

am'i supposed to boot without the CMOS or is it removal for few minutes ?

as i have removed it for about 15 mins then reattached it.

[Harryc]

Boot with the battery in. What happens if you remove the hard drive. Can you now get into BIOS?

[kaliste]

no, still no joy

"drive in use" indicator does not light up during initilization sequence as against when drive is in,
suppose this means the board harddrive connector is ok.

should i open up the motherboard ? if yes are there support manuals for it as have been through video manuals none exist for board removal, as i have never done this before on a laptop.

thank you once again for the help harry.

[laboye]

Hi kaliste and welcome to ThinkPads.com. It appears your ThinkPad will not finish POSTing (Power On Self-Test) and therefore can't proceed to the boot process or get into the CMOS utility. First, I would like you to try a "full power cycle"; this trick has solved a few non-starting machines of mine, Including ThinkPads:

1. Turn off the machine if it is on.
2. Remove the battery and remove AC Power
3. Press and hold the power button for 30 seconds
4. Plug in the AC adapter and insert the battery -- wait until the LEDs reflect your activity
5. Power it up!

Most modern computers will not lose any settings stored in CMOS with this method, but it does seem to drain remaining electricity from the motherboard, to some extent. I have also seen strange or different LED patterns when powering up a PC after doing it, but sometimes it works its magic and boots up. Good luck.

[kaliste]

thanks laboye

that indeed did the trick, albeit it still did not boot into windows,
it allowed me into bios post "0271 - Check Date and Time Settings", did not allow any changes as it froze again, redid the whole process for pc doctor boot cd same thing happened,

I understand that error has to do with faulty CMOS battery, will be replacing it later today, hopefully that should resolve it.