What is the problem with dead IBM ThinkPads?

Does anyone know the official IBM explanation as to why some ThinkPads
go dead without warning and refuse to power on?

This just happened to my A21m Thinkpad after being unplugged and unused
for about 60 days. Plug it in, battery charge light goes on, hit the
power button, bank of 5 status LED's light, all go out except the power
on LED indicator... That's it. No display, no POST, nothing. Completely
dead.

After poking around with Google I find out this is far from an odd,
singular event. Some lines seem to be more plagued by this problem than
others, mostly the T20's and A2x's. But other models pop up with the
same problem as well.

Frustratingly, no one on the user end of things has yet found the real
source of the failure. (If IBM knew, the sure didn't let it get public.)
Some people replace the main board, some people replace an internal
power board... Lot's of speculation about the source of the problem. But
only speculation.

Any IBM insider's know what the problem is?

Rick

 

Hi Rick ,
Really weird problem indeed but it seems to me that it could also
be a battery shortcircuit problem or even a lcd monitor failure
if not as you already said most of time its a power supply or
motherboard failure.
Nic.

 

Hi

Take a look here for a whole pile of people with the same problem on
various models of ThinkPads. There's 100 posts at this site alone,
probably 90 or more reporting the same thing.:

http://www.windowsitpro.com/Windows/Article/ArticleID/19920/19920.html

Lot's of other sites with people reporting the same problem as well.

It seems to be pointing to a power management issue, as if the ThinkPads
get permanently stuck in a suspend/hibernation state. How this could be
as pervasive as it seems to be on IBM ThinkPads is just exasperating.

According to the status LED, power is on but the thing ain't dancin'.
Nothing powers up. I know what a lop top with a dead back light is like.
This ain't it. You can't even get to the BIOS, let alone get a BIOS POST
error message.

I've been recommending ThinkPads for years because I thought they were
rock solid. Apparently not. (Praying my sister's T20 doesn't die a
sudden death... And my friend Ron's TP. And... Oh crap, am I screwed!)

Rick

 

My IBM a21m is doing the same thing

I hit the power button, and everything starts for 1 second, then power
down. Sometimes, it starts right up but fails soon after.. It's reall
pissing me off

 

Thanks Rick for posting the link to windowsitpro.

I experienced the same problem with my T41, and got it sorted out using a tip from one comment:
- take out the battery
- keep the power button pressed now, and
- plug in the power adapter
- wait for the laptop to turn on (for me, I had to release the power button and press it again)