X61 Docking Station / UltraBase is not detected

[Ed_mba]

Hi forum,

I am on X61 (Windows Vista) and my docking station is not detected any more. When I plug the notebook in the docking, the eject light stays 'Green'. The DVD drive gets the power and I can eject, insert CDs/DVDs, however, nothing shows up the OS. If I boot my notebook while on the docking station, the display will not appear. 

I was hoping to reimage the system (Using ThinkVantage - F11 option), but I get the mising BOOT MGR error.

Any ideas what could be causing this or how to resolve this.

Thanks !

[mjparrott]

I have the exact same problem. I have a X61 thinkpad running windows 7 professional, and have a problem connecting to my x6 ultrabase.

The docking station worked flawlessly for 9 months, but a few weeks ago stopped working. There were no major software/hardware changes that I know of to cause this change.

I booted ubuntu from a USB and it also could not recognize any devices of the ultrabase. I ran the lenovo bios update utility successfully, but it did nothing to help the problem.

UPDATE: Still having the same problem now in April, with no news on the lenovo forums. I assume now that the ultrabase is faulty/broken.

[alharris]

I posted the same problem on this forum some time ago - I still have the situation of not being able to use the docking station without the battery installed in the computer (to allow start/ reboot/awake), which I would like to do since the machine runs cooler with the battery out.

 I have a hard time believing there is something wrong with the dock, given my experience and the posts here. Is there any way to check this other than with someone else's X61? I have not tried disassembling the dock to look inside .

Actually I would appreciate just knowing *what* the prob lem is. Has anyone tried to contactLenovo directly about this?

[ufoq]

I just bought X6 UltraBase for my X61 and find out the same problem: unable to boot from docking station.

It passed 3 years, some new ideas, solutions?

[alharris]

nope - no solution that I have found. I have stopped using the docking station because I found it so frustrating. I remain convinced that it is some sort of software/handshaking bug. I never contacted Lenovo directly about it.....