T60 will not turn on with adapter [ Edited ]

[Kaz]

Took me forever to run across a post with my exact same issue and was wondering if the OP ever tracked down root cause. 

Same issue here - have fairly new Lenovo 9 -cell battery and also a 2 year old battery and have tried 3 different 90W adapters with same results.  I experience this issues after long periods of non-use time with the adapter plugged in and laptop in standy/sleep mode or hibernate.  So tyically, this will be next morning.  I've had this issue with battery only and no AC connected.  I come up to my T60 in morning and see the power, bat, and standby/sleep lights on, press the power button, lights blink and then everything shuts down.  From then on, pressing the power button has zero effect.  I found that only way to start the laptop back up is to pull AC power, pull battery, press power button for 10 sec or more, then re-insert battery only, power up laptop, then re-insert AC.  Laptop will not power up with AC/Bat combo or AC only - it will shutdown and I have to reset using above process to get it going again.  There are no beeps associated with this issue.

To troubleshoot a glitch in my XP OS, progs, and registry, I recently started with new HD and performed a clean install of Win 7 Ultimate.  Balanced Power Profile was setup as default, which has Hibernate set for 360 min. as default.  The very next morning, I pressed the power button and laptop shutdown.  Had to use same reset process described above.

I am using latest BIOS for my T60 widescreen - 1.19.  Had this same BIOS when laptop was working fine.  Been fighting this issue for about 1 month now.  Seems like likely candidates are:

1. Motherboard

2. BIOS

3. CMOS battery - on T60, what are the symptoms of bad CMOS battery in this model?

4. Other

Believe I successfully ruled out AC power adapters (all putting out 19-20 V) and batteries (tested with both new and old).

When on XP, I reseated RAM, performed extensive RAM tests without any issues noted, pulled CMOS battery for minutes, then put back in, re-installed BIOS 1.19, reseated DVD drive, and wireless card.  Ran laptop without DVD drive installed and had same issue.  Heat does not appear to be an issue: CPU @ 45-50C, GPU at 60-70C.

Any thoughts?  Works great other than this unfortunate issue.  Concerned that I'm going to wake up one day, fire up laptop and it will be dead without ability to power-up no matter what I try.  I back up daily so not concerned about data loss.  Need reliable laptop at this time.

[Kaz]

Per this thread I just found, I may indeed have a motherboard issue....

http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/T61-and-prior-T-series-ThinkPad/T60-Start-Up-Problem/m-p/150749#M38625

[Mornsgrans]

...or damaged battery/ies.

Try to borrow annother main battery and test it again. A damaged battery which still has power can lead to those symptoms described above.

[Kaz]

Mornsgrans, thanks for taking the time to provide feedback.  I am not able to borrow a battery, but would you agree that I can rule out battery by simply running on AC-only for a period of time?  I thought that I tried this in my testing, but can easily try this again.  Last, on my new 9-cell battery, I easily get 3+ hours of use with it before charging required.  If I had a bad battery, bad cell(s), etc., wouldn't you agree that I would not be able to achieve these results?  Lenovo's power manager also shows the correct charge capacity, voltage, low temperature (19-23 C), etc.

[TuuS]

There is a lot that can go wrong with a battery besides bad cells, there is advanced logic circuits in them that interact with your system board, so even if it's unlikely that the battery could be the cause, it's usually a good idea to try replacing before you replace the system board.

However, if the system won't boot up without a battery installed even while a good AC power source is present, then it does sound like you have some type of hardware failure going on. I would definitely try a different AC adapter just to be sure before you consider replacing parts, but if we rule out battery and ac adapter, then I'd say the system board is the most likely cause. The inverter is only really invloved in this because it's where the LED lights are located, but I don't think it's likely a failed inverter would cause such symptopms, but you can try it. 

My opinion is you have some failure in the DC power circuits on your system board but, try removing battery, ac power, and cmos battery and cycling the power button ten times slowly, holding it in for a few seconds each time, then finally holding it for 30 seconds in the end, then reinstall the cmos, main battery, ac power and see if the problem still exists. If it does, the system board is the most likely cause, assuming you've ruled out a bad batter and/or ac adapter.

[TuuS]

One additional thought... please disable all power saving options and set everything to maximum performance. If it works properly like this then you may have a software problem only. Also note that it can get very confusing when you request support in another members topic. The original post may be an unrelated issue and it gets quite confusing because you've assumed you have the exact same problem, so we're working under that assumption, but that may not be the case.

[andyP Community SuperMod]

Post split away from original thread as theme seems to be different

[TuuS]

Kaz, can you fully describe your problem including what you have to do to get the problem to surface, and also when does the unit start normally. I think it's important to get as much detail as possible, if this is only a problem that occurs when you shut down and unplug ac power, it may be just a setting, but if this problem persists and it fails to boot consistently unless you unplug AC power, then you do most likely have a hardware failure.

[Kaz]

Tuus, thanks for input.

I wish to minimize any additional investment in this laptop so purchase of another battery, when I just received a new one (Lenovo OEM) 1-2 months ago, is not an option.  Removing the battery for testing is certainly an option and my results are below.  New battery provides 3+ hours of life.  When issue occurs, a residual charge discharge is required, and battery is the ONLY option for firing the laptop back up.  AC adaptor (all 3 of them) will not fire up laptop when this issue occurs even without battery in place.  Purchase of a replacement system board not an option at $160 US or more as seen online for a used one.  How much faith am I going to have in the long term reliability of a used board?  Rather take money and put it into a new laptop.  I need the reliability and don't want to spend more money on a 5 year old unit unless it's something like a CMOS battery, etc.  I simply wanted to perform the proper testing to prove to myself that I am down to the system board as root cause. 

Note: you mentioned that I should turn off all power management and set to max performance to rule out software issues.  Three (3) days ago, I recently installed a new HD with clean Win 7 Ultimate OS (was on XP Pro) and issue still exists, does this not help rule out software issues?  Running on default balanced profile, but without hibernation activated.

Yesterday, I ran with battery removed the whole day.  After leaving the laptop for a few hours to run an errand, I returnd to find power and sleep light on, pressed power button, lights went off, and typical issue where I could not power it on.  Went through typical residual charge discharge process and got it started again with battery.  Plugged in AC and removed battery and ran again in this fashion.  This morning, same issue - power/sleep lights on, pressed power button, lights went out, and could not power back on.  Discharged, tried to start from AC only and could not - this has been a consistent issue.  That is, when this issue occurs, AC adapter is not an option.  Once AC adapter plugged in and lights go out, I must remove adapter, perform discharge process, then start the laptop up first with battery only.  After that, AC adapter can be plugged in and used.

Observations/Actions:

• Appears to be an issue requiring hours of non-use - time for residual charge to build up?
• Have turned off hibernate in my testing to rule this out and issue stll exists
• 3 different AC adapters used and issue exists with all.  All adapter 90W and putting out 19.2-20 V
• 2 different batteries used and issue exists with both.  One battery is 1-2 months old and Lenovo OEM
• Two diiferent operating systems tried (original Win XP Pro SP3 and recently Win 7 Ultimate, SP1 - each on their own hard drive.  Win 7 on brand new drive and was a clean install 3 days agoi) - issue still exists.  Rules out a software issue?
• Battery, Adapter, and CMOS Battery removed multiple times with use of reset process you described - multiple 1 sec presses followed by long 30 sec press - issue still exists
• Although my 4GB of RAM (2x2GB) only provides 3GB usable, is anyone aware of 4GB being an issue in my T60 model.  Recall now that I installed the 2x2GB many months ago and do not recall having this issue then, but easy to pull a still and run with 2GB for a while to see if there is any contribution here.
• Have run extended memory testing on RAM with Memtest86 with no issues detected
• Have not measured voltage on CMOS battery - read where it should be between 2.8-3.2 VDC, but not sure how this would contribute to my issue with AC adapter in place.
• As stated above, have turned off hibernate, but cannot recall turning off standby/sleep in past so this can easily be tested.  Uncomfortable not having a screen saver, even if blank one, come on to protect screen.  However, even if laptop continues to work without sleep/hibernate, the laptop becomes unsuable for me as I travel in-town during work day and depend on these power features to get me back up and running in reasonable time and/or to extend my battery life.

[TuuS]

It does sound to me like your system board is bad. This behavior is typical of a liquid spill, or one used in high humidity for prolonged time. I'm not implying your system was abused in any way, only that the symptoms are similar. If you do want to replace your board, they are available in the $100 price range from a reliable source. Buying a remanufactured one from Lenovo would probably cost close to $600, but the beauty of thinkpads is the vast number of used parts so you can fix these old computers cheaply. You'd never be able to fix a 4-5yo dept store laptop. They price the replacement parts at more then the laptop costs so they won't have to worry about stocking the parts once the warranty expires, but thinkpads have developed an entire used part infrastructure world wide, so you can get nearly any part for any model. Good luck