| -This Thinkpad is No More |
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I killed my favourite laptop some months ago now, stupidly banging
the desk in frustration when Windows 98 file copying went into another
fit of the sulks. It looks as though I broke the hard disk. It was a
lovely machine, 96M of memory, Celeron processor, running Windows 98 and
Linux.
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As I couldn't afford to repair it, I lived without it, until I got the
chance to get my hands on June's Laptop. She bought an IBM Thinkpad a
few years ago, hated it almost immediately, and never used it. So, what
else could I do but try Linux on it? Mandrake 8.1 to be precise, which
installed perfectly, and ran much faster than Windows did. I partitioned
the disk just as I had done on my much-missed Mitac, and could boot into Linux
("into the Blue again..."), or Windows ("This is a Formica
table, green is it's colour..."), from which you'll gather I tend to accept the default
desktops, and love quotes.
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Let me just set the record straight for a moment - I don't dislike
Microsoft products; I actually like Windows 95 and 98, and I'm growing
to like XP Pro as we speak. (Should I say as you read, or as I write?
Beats me). But Windows 98 can be fickle if you ask it to do long
operations such as copying 600M of files across a network ready to burn
onto a CD, and it often decides it would much rather sulk than shutdown,
and occasionally it would rather boot in safe mode for some
unexplained reason. But, that aside, it works, and I can work with it.
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Shortly after I got the Thinkpad running I realised why June disliked it
so much. That joystick mouse control is awful. Oh, how I miss my Mitac,
that lovely touchpad, that smooth keyboard (except where I lifted one of
the kittens up and four key tops came up with her claws and had to be
bluetack'ed back into place).
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Also, I found out just how useful the internal battery was - two minutes only.
Well, let's be honest here, the Mitac would only run for ten minutes. Would you
excuse me for just one second while I deal with this growing crisis? Just let me
get this one last wail out - Oh, how I miss my Mitac!
There, I've done sitting by the Rivers of Babylon weeping for the past.
I got to grips with the Thinkpad, finding that a normal mouse was the
best way to use it, and finding that it was best left plugged into the
mains all day long.
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So it sat in our sitting room (that's the parlour to anyone looking in from the other
side of the big pond), on the bottom shelf of the tea-trolley. And then, today, when
I decided to install the software for my Kodak cameras
onto it, I found it dead. Deceased. It was no more. It wouldn't Voom.
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A more technical description of the problem follows, for those poor Thinkpad
owners out there desperately Googling to try and find an answer to their
problem - the IBM Thinkpad would not power up. The IBM Thinkpad would not startup.
When I pressed the power-on button, nothing happened. When I operated the
CD-power switch, nothing happened. The light was on, but nobody moaned.
The laptop power supply was plugged into
the mains, and also plugged into the Thinkpad (If you were to contact IBM or
some similar support body that would be the first thing they'd ask you, Duh!)
The power led on the Thinkpad had changed from orange to green, but the power
switch was inoperative. (There, that's enough search-bait laid around for now :)
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So, with the manual for the Thinkpad buried deep in our boxes of stuff, I went
online and Googled my predicament. Out of every 10 hits that Google showed,
nine were offering deals on batteries for the machine. There might be a clue
there. I refined my search slightly, and suddenly found a forum where one of
the posts seemed to be describing exactly my problem, and there was a healthy
body of replies beneath it, so one would assume that the thread contained an
answer. Well, one would, wouldn't one?
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What I found was an initial thread, describing my problem; a machine which
wouldn't respond to the power key; and a string of replies such as "Me too!",
"Let me know when you find the answer, my machine's stuck". Not a single reply
saying how to fix the problem. What, I ask you, is the point of all this
parroting? What does it contribute to the world's knowledge? Nothing. Not an
iota. Zero. It is a dead-end, it has ceased to have any useful meaning,
bereft of sense it rests in peace.
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There was one clue in amongst all of these echoing threads. A woman said her
machine had exactly the symptoms; she had taken it to a computer shop, where
the staff could find nothing wrong with it, it actually starting worked there; so she
took it home and it behaved itself for two months, and then once more had gone
into the sulk stage.
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Time for a little deductive reasoning. What had happened when the woman had carried a dead machine in her car
(it was America, only Indians walk), to the repair shop?
She must have unplugged the machine from the mains (that's the outlet to
you USA-ers)
The machine and power pack must have travelled for some period of time
disconnected from the mains supply. (American roads are much better
maintained than ours, so it would not have had any major jolting, but
might have had a gentle rhythmic massage).
So, I tried pulling the plug out of the mains, and rocking the machine
gently in my arms, singing to it as I made another cup of coffee. After a waltz around the house
I plugged it in again. No joy. Further reasoning was required.
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What had the repair shop done to it, (bearing in mind they had found no
fault)?
The lady arrives, and starts the "This Thinkpad is no more, it has ceased
to boot, it is a dead Thinkpad, it is defunct, ..." dialogue.
The first thing any staff member would do is to plug it in and see for
themselves. Let's assume it didn't work, just as my experiment failed to
solve the problem.
The next thing they would do is probably just pull the battery out, and
put another in to see if it was a battery problem. But, the woman hadn't said
that a battery replacement was needed, and I can't see a repair shop handing
out free batteries, so supposing they had just removed and replaced the
battery?
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Yes, you've guessed it. Simply removing and then re-inserting the battery
obviously clears some setting held either in CMOS memory, or in the intelligent
battery itself. I had the Thinkpad up and running within 30 seconds of turning
it the right way up again.
So, I've solved a technical problem. And I've now got an ethical problem to
solve. What do I do about the forum with the dangling threads
"Me too - Tell me when you've got it fixed"? Do I tell them the awful truth - "Your machine is not dead,
it's resting", and for several months you've let it gather dust because of a trivial problem?
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The threads are all from last year. Have these people got these Thinkpads
running again, and just not bothered to reply to the thread? Or have they put
the things on the shelf and gone out and bought something slightly more
functional?
I think the best thing I can do is join in with them, and add a "Me too" parrot-post to the
thread. Later, when they all turn up on ebay:- no, that's not ethical.
Oh God, I wish I were a Lumberjack.
Postscript:
It's now four years since I let Ida loose on the keyboard, but in that time, I've had several emails from
Thinkpad owners thanking me for providing the answer to their problems, and. as two of them said,
without becoming mind-numbingly technical. To all of those who wrote to me - Thanks, I enjoyed the feedback.
And to all the technical types who wrote to me and said "Everybody knows that you have to do that to laptops", I
have this to say: "Why didn't they say so?"
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