Thinkpad hard disk trouble

August 23, 2008 11:26 AM

Is my thinkpad hard disk controller dead?

I recently bought an ibm thinkpad T41 from ebay, and have had some difficulty getting it to pick up any hard disks I insert. The first time I tried to install windows xp, the installer did see a hard disk there. However the install screwed up and I had to restart and try again. Now the thinkpad won't recognise any hard disk I put into it (I have tried unbuntu and suse live cds to see if they can recognise it). Is there somewhere in the thinkpad bios to do with IDE devices? I can't see one.

The hard disks I used were:
Hitachi travelstar 60GB
Hitachi travelstar 160GB
(these were just what I had to hand)

Both hard disks worked fine on other machines. The CD drive on the thinkpad also still works. So, any suggestions as to what's wrong or any further steps I could take? Is the hd controller busted?

Any help is much appreciated. If the hd controller is knackered, can anyone suggest a way to keep using the laptop (how easy is it to boot from usb, or can i install a second hard in the cd bay)? Thanks

posted by theyexpectresults to computers & internet (5 comments total)

If you have another computer to use that supports USB external drives, drop the $15 - $45 on a USB external enclosure, put the drives in there and make sure they're not the problem. You may even be able to use SMART tools on them via the enclosure (I can't remember).

It does sound like either a bad connection or a bad controller, though. I don't know how to test for that in particular, though.

I would look to the manufacturer's site to answer your question about installing a second hd in the CD bay. Or to Internet forums filled with geeks like you (us?)

Whatever happens, good luck with it!
posted by kalessin at 11:45 AM on August 23, 2008

Cheers, I have checked both the disks in other machines with an external enclosure.

My googling hasn't turned up anything yet, hopefully someone might be able to point me in the right direction!
posted by theyexpectresults at 11:53 AM on August 23, 2008

I suggest searching, then asking on forums.thinkpads.com.
posted by grouse at 12:04 PM on August 23, 2008

Oh. Looks like you already did that.
posted by grouse at 12:05 PM on August 23, 2008

It could be your disc drive. My old laptop had a disc drive that would spin everything just fine - except an OS install... It seemed like it spun fast enough but not hard enough, if that makes sense? Either way - whatever it's problem was - no other disc drive I swapped it with, so I could format, seemed to have it! Meh?
posted by mu~ha~ha~ha~har at 11:23 PM on August 24, 2008