Hello there, I am hoping someone can help me! My IBM Thinkpad R30 laptop will not boot, after going through several bizarre crashes in the past few days. A few days ago, i was working on it and the entire LCD "bled up" from the bottom of the screen a myriad of rainbow lines until it reached the top of the screen. The LCD is a 14.1 XGA(1024x768) TFT LCD. The entire LCD was flooded with this strange coloration, (the laptop was very heated yet had plenty of space for the fan to cool). Tiny lines like a test pattern but smaller covered over the entire screen. The computer had to be turned off via the power button, it was frozen. Well, it would work fine for awhile for the next few days (booted properly and so on), having the screen flood with color and crashing maybe once a day, until it happened again the other night and now it won't power up at all. When I press the power button, it seems as though it wants to start but doesn't. There is only a faint hum detectable if I have my hear to the keyboard...nothing else. The AC adapter constantly blinks green, indicating that it is not fully charged. It has been plugged up to the AC power source for more than 48 hours. Upon turning it on, the screen remains black and there are no beeps and whirs. No screen whatsoever, the power button says it's on, but it's not, as far as I can tell. When the AC Adapter is unplugged, the charging light still remains on, yet it does not blink, and the sleep mode indicator is lit. The power on button remains lit whenever it is pressed. I have removed the battery, and then reinstalled to no effect. I feel it is a power problem, for it will not boot up at all, and startup has been incredibly slow the past few months. It might even be a dead CMOS battery, but I can't tell because it won't boot. What do you think about this? Have you ever heard anything at all like this before? Any thoughts would be great appreciated, I really don't know how to proceed!! What steps can I take to detect this problem? The laptop is roughly three years old, with a hard drive that is but one year old. Thank you!!!

--Brandi~:-)

P.s.--the battery is a Li-Ion battery.

Try this:

0. Take out the Li-Ion battery.
1. Unplug the Ac-adapter.
2. Push and hold the power button in for @ least 3 min (time it).
3. Connect the Ac-adapter back and reboot the laptop.

I had done this before you suggested it, per the advice of another poster to another person at this forum. It might've even been you. This procedure did not succeed in booting the computer upon restart, although it did stop the green charge light from blinking. I just tried it again to the same result--it does not boot, but the green light is no longer flashing. Any more suggestions, or ideas as to what is causing this? Why would the above procedure normally work...battery problems perhaps?

Thanks again,
Brandi~:-)

I am also experiencing this problem with the same type of machine.

1. The machine will boot-up in sleep mode, as if protecting itself.

2. Sometimes, I was able to "wake-up" the machine, by turning it on without battery and pressing [Function+F4] repeatedly. I was able to access the BIOS; the POST looked ok; WinXP would boot just fine (sound, video, mouse). Then, suddendly the screen will go black and the laptop will become unresponsive. When unplugging and plugging back, the machine will boot back in sleep mode.

3. I have yet to run a comprehensive memory test to rule out faulty RAM. The CPU fan was working, hard disk worked fine. No beep codes, no POST errors. I was unable to find useful info in the IBM website.

4. My take on this is: a)short circuit, b)heat dissipation problems, c)faulty RAM. Most of the laptop components were confirmed operational. There is a clear indication that a safety mechanism is being triggered at boot time (sleep mode booting).

5. Any help with this will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

Francisco