[ltp] Thinkpad T40 BIOS upgrade, how to update the ECP? (PXE boot)

[Oisin Feeley]

On 3/17/07, Daniel <skorka@gmx.net> wrote:
> On Sat, Mar 17, 2007 at 01:53:25PM -0400, Oisin Feeley wrote:
> > I have now observed that the freeze may be correlated with the
> > position that the screen is angled at, or the screen being moved. So I
> > now suspect that the ribbon cable is something that I should try to
> > replace.
>
> Is it possible that the freeze is correlated with applying pressure to
> the main case? If yes, that hints at a cracked mainboard.

Since I last wrote I went through all the steps suggested on p.118 of
the Hardware Maintenance Manual (which included removing and reseating
the keyboard, hd, palmrest, modem, keyboard bezel -- and finally the
LCD connector).

The machine now seems not to display the screen corruption and
freezing that I was observing previously while moving the screen to
different positions.  Of course, this is an intermittent and as yet
not fully diagnosed fault, so I can't know if it has really been
fixed, but the machine has now been up and functioning for approx 1
hour with no freeze, has been booted 5 times in a row with no
problems.  My fingers are crossed.

I've been applying some subtle pressure to the case since reading your
comment and I can't get it to freeze.  I don't want to try too hard ;)

>
> > Summary:  it does not seem to matter whether one uses
> > diskette/non-diskette BIOS/ECP update, it is possible to flash the
> > BIOS before the ECP(hardware controller) in accordance with what Intel
> > suggest and in disagreement with the current (Mar 2007) advice on
> > ThinkWiki.  Screen corruption problems may be due to the
>
> I cannot agree with that. While I managed to update first BIOS, then
> ECP, I had to go and get a USB floppy drive for the ECP update. Trying
> from within windoze just hung the system.

Well, I wasn't doing it within windoze.  I made two separate bootable
CDs and it seems to have worked nicely. I extracted the image file
from the ECP .exe and used that for the bootable CD.  I notice one
other comment on the ThinkWiki where someone says they followed the
order BIOS, ECP and it worked for them on a T23.  Unfortunately they
didn't leave an email for clarification:
http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Talk:BIOS_Upgrade#bios.2Fcontroller_update_sequence

Anyway, here's hoping this is now fixed.  I'm tempted to bring it
somewhere that can run a full set of diagnostic tests on it though.  I
don't like doing voodoo which merely involved reseating connectors.

Best wishes,
Oisin Feeley