T400 restarts on shutdown

[emress]

For the past week I've had an interesting problem with my T400.  Whenever I shut it down or put it to sleep, it waits about 2 seconds, and then restarts.  Even if I push the power button for a few seconds when it is restarting, it restarts again.  The only way to shut down the computer is to remove the battery.

I've run my virusware and malware, changed settings in my registry (PowerdownAfterShutdown), and tried System Restore (which failed). 

Anyone have any suggestions?  I've read a recommendation to update the BIOS, but I'm not sure how to do that, and if it would help?

I have a T400-2764, running Windows 7-64 bit.

Thanks!

[Maliha Community Moderator]

Hi emress,

I recommend using bootable CD version of the BIOS, the instructions are given on the support site:- http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site.wss/document.do?lndocid=MIGR-70351

Keep us informed on your issue.

[emress]

Thanks for the link, Maliha, the BIOS update went swimmingly.  I checked my system information and I now have the new version.  Unfortunately that didn't solve my problem.

'

This must be an issue outside of Windows, right, since pushing the power button off on startup still restarts it (and I just tried this again to check)?

This seems like such a trivial issue, but it is not!  Any further advice?

[ColonelONeill]

Try seeing if it's set to wake on something. I had an old desktop PC in which I changed a wake on setting that showed the same symptoms.

[emress]

Where would such a wake on setting be?  As far as I know I haven't altered any wake settings.

[Ideasmiths]

---

emress wrote:

Where would such a wake on setting be?  As far as I know I haven't altered any wake settings.

---

Go to Bios during startup, you might have set the "wake on connected to AC" setting

If that is not it, run only on battery and see if you can shutdown.

If that is not it too, disconnect any network cable and repeat, it might be "wake on magic packet" or something over your LAN cable.

[emress]

Wouldn't that be reset with my BIOS update though?  I'll check anyways, but I'm doubting that's it, since it restarts connected to AC power or battery (which is how I drained the battery completely twice while it sat in my backpack).

[ColonelONeill]

Yeah... Check your Wake settings. BIOS updates don't reset the settings to default; it preserves existing settings.

[Ideasmiths]

---

emress wrote:

Wouldn't that be reset with my BIOS update though?  I'll check anyways, but I'm doubting that's it, since it restarts connected to AC power or battery (which is how I drained the battery completely twice while it sat in my backpack).

---

If it is not the BIOS, it could be 2 source

1) Fingerprint, somehow it is initiating the startup. Try go bios, erase the fingerprint or disable the fingerprint device and see if it stops

2) If it is not, maybe something wrong with the power button.

If I have the time and resources, I would download window 7, setup a 30 to 40GB partition, install a window on that partiiton and boot into that partition to see if the restart problem recur.

[emress]

Okay, nothing is solving the problem.  I don't seem to have a "wake on connected to AC" setting in the BIOS (could it be called something else?).  I did disable the "wake on LAN" setting, I also disabled the fingerprint reader, even though I don't have one. And I unplugged the computer and tried to shut it down.  Still restarted.  I also updated the power manager driver. 

Short of reformatting or partitioning my drive and installing a second copy of Windows, any other recommendations?  (I can do those but its sort of last resort). Is it most likely a hardware problem, or are there other drivers I should be updating?  Could my boot order be off?

Two other things of note:

-One of my USB connections broke a couple weeks ago (cat knocked out the tab) and I tried to glue it back in and got the pins all bent.  Could this be the problem?  Can I disable just this port?

-One of the times when my computer completely drained the battery last week, when I restarted the computer had lost the date and time and needed to be reset.  Is this normal or could this be related?

Thanks for all the ideas everyone.  You're very helpful!