Member Avatar for viperman224

I have an IBM ThinkPad T22 It is about 2 - 3 years old I am not totaly sure because I received it as an x-mas present this year. Every time or just about every time I shut it off or put it into sleep mode or close the screen it locks up forcing me to take the battery out to shut it off because alt+ctl+del. does not work when its frozen nor does the power button. It is becoming a presistant problem. It will come up saying "hard-drive not found please re-install hard-drive" or operating system not found. I believe it is the cmos battery. I re-set the time and sometimes it works other times it doesn't sometimes I have to plug it in for a few minutes then it boots up into windows just like I pulled it out of the box. It is still under warrenty untill september of '04. My dad had to re-install IE6 because it got messed up when it forgot the hard drive. can someone help me? This laptop was really expensive and I appreciate any and all help thanks.

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The symptoms described by (freezes on lid close, intermittent “hard‑drive not found” errors and occasional BIOS/time resets) can come from different places: a failing CMOS/RTC battery, a loose or dirty hard‑drive connector, or a dying drive/OS corruption. The fact that removing and reseating the drive resolved the problem for a while strongly points to an intermittent connection rather than an RTC battery as the root cause — loose contacts are a common cause of “drive not detected” messages and are worth checking first. (gillware.com)

How to tell the two apart: a bad CMOS battery typically shows up as the system losing the clock and BIOS settings (you’ll see time/date wrong or CMOS checksum/RTC messages on POST), whereas a hard‑drive problem usually appears as the BIOS not listing the drive, unusual noises from the disk, or failed SMART values. If the clock and BIOS defaults keep returning after power is removed, the RTC battery is suspect; if the BIOS sometimes lists the disk and sometimes does not, suspect the connector or the drive itself. (lifewire.com)

Practical next steps, in order: back up important data first; check the BIOS/POST to see whether the drive is detected; run the notebook’s pre‑boot/hardware tests (the T20/T21/T22 service docs show the diagnostics and FRUs); examine and clean/reseat the drive and its contacts (if still under warranty, contact IBM/Lenovo before opening the case); run a SMART test or vendor diagnostic to confirm drive health and replace the drive if SMART shows reallocated sectors/clicking/grinding. If CMOS/RTC errors persist after those checks, replace the CMOS battery per the service manual. (opweb.de)

Regarding sleep/transport: ’s warning and ’s experience are valid — moving a laptop while a mechanical HDD is spinning or during a spin‑up can increase the chance of head‑platter contact. Modern drives park heads, but it’s safest to avoid putting a system with an HDD into a state where it might spin up while being jostled; consider hibernate or power off when carrying the machine. If warranty applies, call IBM/Lenovo support before performing repairs. (scribd.com)

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Member Avatar for brujo

We use T-21,22,23,30, and 40 at my job. Rule of thumb here is never to put a laptop into sleep mode. Microsoft doesn't even recommend this. As far as having to disconnect the battery, have you tried just holding down the power button for 10+ seconds?

Member Avatar for viperman224

I think my dad fixed it. he went to IBM's webpage and found some trouble shooting tips or something like that. He pulled the hard drive out and cleaned the contacts and it's been working fine since. thanks for your help

Member Avatar for viperman224

.....Rule of thumb here is never to put a laptop into sleep mode. Microsoft doesn't even recommend this.

why don't you put it in sleep mode? My laptop did that but I have since changed the settings because it was a pain in the neck everytime you closed the screen.

Member Avatar for brujo

When a laptop is in sleep mode, the hard drive does 'lock' itself. Thus, when the laptop is moved the hard drive and it's controller arms are moving. This could cause serious physical hard drive damage.

Member Avatar for floris

I once killed the data on my laptop after dropping it while it was spinning up .. OOPS :(

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