The Notebook Review forums were hosted by TechTarget, who shut down them down on January 31, 2022. This static read-only archive was pulled by NBR forum users between January 20 and January 31, 2022, in an effort to make sure that the valuable technical information that had been posted on the forums is preserved. For current discussions, many NBR forum users moved over to NotebookTalk.net after the shutdown.
Problems? See this thread at archive.org.

    Thinkpad T400 Screen Problem! Please help.

    Discussion in 'Lenovo' started by sagarghimire, Jan 30, 2010.

  1. sagarghimire

    sagarghimire Newbie

    Reputations:
    0
    Messages:
    9
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    5
    I had recently bought a thinkpad T400 laptop with Switchable Graphics Raedon 3400. I had to send it to TN EasyServ Repair Center twice during a month time, both the problems being with the screen display going grey/black.

    1. Battery was low and computer went to sleep/hibernation ( I guess) with critical low battery alarm and it never waked up despite I tried it several times connecting the power cable to the outlet. Finally, I had to sent it for the repair.

    2. Screen suddenly went black while the machine was idle and I pressed enter ket nothing happned,and when I restarted the machine ( of course, it was a hard boot), I got the Vista login screen and typed my password, I could see the desktop for a while( 4,5 sec) and then screen goes blank/grey again. Technical support told me to restore factory image ( F11) , which I did but it did not help. I was told to start the machine it safe mode(F1) and It worked and tried to install latest graphics driver but it did not allowed me to do so with some error message which I forgot. Then I sent it again to EasyServ and got it saying the following:

    "System Board/Planar" is just checked. I do not understand if my board is replaced or does this mean it was the same board that was repaired. They have not mentioned anything. Can anyone explain please? Is there anyway I can know if my planar was replaced recently?

    Also, What should I do to prevent such problems from happening from future?
    What could be the cause of this? Thanks for any information.

    Sagar
     
    sagarghimire, Jan 30, 2010
    #1
  2. lead_org

    lead_org Purveyor of Truth

    Reputations:
    1,571
    Messages:
    8,107
    Likes Received:
    126
    Trophy Points:
    231
    the depot don't have the facility to repair the motherboard, they only can check it or replace it with a different one.

    The motherboard should be quite reliable, so the frequency of failure like what you mentioned is quite rare. You can't prevent it, since it is not your fault.
     
    lead_org, Jan 30, 2010
    #2
  3. sagarghimire

    sagarghimire Newbie

    Reputations:
    0
    Messages:
    9
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    5
    Thank you for your response. So, what do you think might be the problem, is it with the switchable graphics? Any ideas?
     
    sagarghimire, Jan 31, 2010
    #3
  4. lead_org

    lead_org Purveyor of Truth

    Reputations:
    1,571
    Messages:
    8,107
    Likes Received:
    126
    Trophy Points:
    231
    no one can say for sure what the problem is, since there are many components on the motherboard that could fail to produce the problem you described, and it is pointless to dwell on such issues.
     
    lead_org, Jan 31, 2010
    #4