Lenovo X220 Complete Loss of Power/No Boot Up

I have a two month old X220 with SSD i7, and to my shock, the laptop 2 days ago after the lid was closed in the bag and I pulled it out, there was only a flsh of light and the figerprint sensor that turn on but nothing boots up on the screen. After leaving it on the power adapter for an hour it booted up fine. But the unexpected happened today and the latptop no longer even boots up or lights up anyore. Completely dead!!
The main question I have is did anyone experience the same and what was done to fix this? But more importantly to Lenovo what kind of image and reputation are you building for yourself in trying to produce such laptops with such incredible fault that seems to be a major hardware issue for the most expensive lineup of your Thinkpads??

Hello sweisr,
can you please tell us your modell number (not S/N) and used OS please.
Kind regards
Andreas
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Similar Messages

At a complete loss. Worried data is gone for good. Trying to fix disk by booting Disk Utility from installation DVD but disk ejects. Help!

Hello Comunity,
I'm at a complete loss and I hope you could help me.
The machine I have is I believe an early 2006 iMac model. (Model identifier 4,1 if I recall correctly).
Awhile ago I installed Snow Leopard on the machine but have since begun encountering serious problems (but I think it's due to the hardware and it's age rather than the software, Snow Leo was running smoothly) and now the computer won't start - I'm faced with a grey screen and a flashing folder with a question mark on it. I tried booting using the various key combinations and as I understood it, my last resort at fixing it myself would be using Disk Utility on the installation DVD.
This is what happens:
I boot the computer, insert the disk, press down and hold C (also tried Option). I hear the computer trying to read the disk, but after a considerable aount of time holding down the key and a grey screen, the disk ejects and the flashing folder returns.
Could anyone offer an insight or advice?
At this point I'm not even that interested in fixing the machine, but there are some extremely valuable files that I need to recover (the machine gave out just days before I got my extrenal HDD to back them up).
I'm worried about taking the machine down to the Genius Bar - I'm a completely self-supporting student and I imagine the recovery cost would be huge (if anyone could provide any information on the potential cost of the repair and/or recovery that would help).

One thing to try without needing the install disk: reboot holding down cmd-S. It should reboot to a black screen and text prompt. Type the following, with spacing exactly as shown, hit the return key after each line:
mount -uw /
fsck -fy
Then type
reboot
and see if that helps.
Do you have any other Macs in the household (or cna use a friend's) that you can try connecting to it with a Firewire cable? If so, reboot the iMac holding down T, you should see a large Firewire symbol moving across the screen. Connecting to another Mac with a FW cable will show you the iMac's hard drive mounted to the other Mac's desktop.
You can also try Diskwarrior, which fixes drive filestructure problems. It's around $100.
Professional data recovery cost would depend on a) whether the hard drive is actually at fault, b) if it's physically damaged or just has a filestructure problem. A physically damaged drive can go into the thousands of dollars for data recovery; a drive with filestructure issues usually costs a lot less to recover files.
Matt

U410 sudden loss of power

Hi,
I recently bought a U410 which was working fine apart from a random loss of power. The machine would switch off suddenly in a number of situations (both when being used fairly heavily and when idle) and both under battery and mains power. When it switched off the machine was not excessively hot. When turning it back on the machine booted fine, had adequate battery power and did not report anything in the event logs other than an unexpected shutdown. As the machine was only a couple of weeks old, I returned it to the store and (with a bit of convincing) managed to get a refund. Since this appears to be a fairly isolated issue I bought a new U410 but unfortunately within a couple of days this one was also experiencing the same issue. I would rather fix the issue than take this one back since the U410 is otherwise a very nice machine.
After a bit of research on these support boards I found a few threads referring to different potential causes, but no definitive cause. Everything tried so far (fully updating drivers, bios, windows etc) hasn't alleviated this issue. Did any definitive cause of this issue ever get found?

hi stevejefferies,
Welcome to the Lenovo Forums.
Most intermittent shut down / power loss issues that I've encounted is due to overheating or a faulty component inside of the PC.
Here's what I would do if I was in your case:
1. Monitor the temperature of the HDD,CPU,GPU by using HWMonitor.(the Core i-series CPU has a TJ max of 100 C before the unit shuts down)
2. If there's no sign of overheating, eliminate the OS and the preloaded apps as the issue by doing a fresh OS install. If you're running Windows 7, you can get a Windows 7 ISO on this website then install all the drivers (keep windows update disabled for the meantime) and observe.
If the issue reoccurs, I recommend you contact lenovo to report the issue and have it serviced.
Regards,
neokenchi
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I'm at a complete loss...

I'm using Windows 7. Recently installed 11 and seemed to have lost all my audiobooks and hated the new format. So, I decided to revert back to an older version. I unistalled itunes and reinstalled 10.7 but then all my books were gone. I called carbonite and they restored my books. Two days later, I was unable to restore them back given the instructions from carbonite. After a bit of effort I found I needed to "unhide" each and every book under "add folder to library" in the file menu. It seems to be working, but my books are not set up the way they the used to be. I used to have a nice three column block under my menu. It contained, "Spoken or audio" in the first column, Author/Artist in the second, and in the third each book the author wrote was listed. I could choose one book, put it into my play list and then to my ipod. Try as I might I can no longer sort like this and at a complete loss what to do. Right prior to downloading 11 everything was fine and grouped just the way I liked it. If anyone has any ideas, I would be grateful. I've tried the sorting by artist and that doesn't set it the way it used to be. Thank you in advance.

Hi someotherguy,
Can you help me with this problem?
I hit enter to stop the normal boot and then appear a window to select different options:
- F1: Enter BIOS
- Another one I don't remember
- F12: Select bootable device
Any of the menus I've tryied to enter I got a message afterwards saying:
"Intel Boot Agent GE v1.3.81
PXE 2.1 Build 091 WfM 2.0)"
And just stays there. Nothing happens.
After pressing F1 or F12 or other, I got a small message saying press CTRL+S to enter the setup menu. If I press it, I enter in a menu just to change the amount of time that message appear and if I want it or not.
Can you help me?
I need to activate the virtualization on the BIOS in order to setup virtual machines!

Lenovo x220 tablet pc with ubuntu 12.04 Shuts down and starts up unexpectedly

Hi
I bought a lenovo x220 tablet pc and installed ubuntu 12.04 with GNOME 3 a while ago.
It was working fine at first however recently:
1. the computer shutsdown unexpectedly, the shutdown dialog appears (the one that gives you the option of restart, cancel, or shutdown); I try to cancel it however the laptop would just power down (without going through the proper shutdown routine). Once it powers down it would try to reboot on its own but halfway during the reboot it would power down again.
2. At times when I do shutdown normally, I would just close the lid and the computer would start back up again, without my pressing the power button (just moving the monitor makes the computer startup)
In addition I dropped the computer on the battery side at one time and cracked the plastic casing a little. The above mentioned problems still exists when I use the laptop without the battery.
Does anyone have any suggestions on how to go about finding out what's wrong and how to fix it.
Thanks in advance for the help.

Hey mate,
sorry to here about that. Here may be a path to the clearing where a possible solution is waiting: Nowadays it is standard to let the pc (or more exactly the power manager of the OS) listen to the ACPI bus for messages like power button pressed and such things. If such a message surfaces and your power manager picks it up it is possible (if you have this configured as an action) that it shuts down you computer or restarts it. To eliminate this possibility you can try one of the following to things:
1. stop your power manager from working
2. get yourself superuser rights and use acpi_listen to listen to the acpi bus (if not working then install "acpid", shut down your power manager and start acpid as service)
3. open your system log (e.g. /var/log/messages) and search for things connected to your power manager or acpi
Please tell me if it worked! If not you could also post the content of your system log for analysis.
Using x230t (i5-3320M, 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD, 80GB mSata-SSD) and loving it!
"I may not own the world but I own my mind and therefore the world is at my feets." (me)

Can you point me to the setting that reopens all word documents on startup after the laptop shuts down due to loss of power? I'm a mac book pro user. Many thanks!

It'd be great if you could also advise on reopening safari windows on start up. I'm after the setting that helps us restore everything only after shutdown due to loss of power and not all the time! Thanks!

The option is in System Perferences on the General section (first Icone in Sys Perf) down near the bottom.
It's called "Restore windows when quitting and re-opening apps".
But that may not be the setting your are looking for.
There is also a setting on the Shut Down and Restart windows that says "Reopen windows when logging back in".
But is you computer shutting OFF, "I Mean Really Shutting OFF", or just going into Sleep mode.
If it is really turning complete off then that setting is not saved. For that to work the computer has to be shut down or re-started properly allowing the OS to save that App state.

[SOLVED] High temperature with lenovo x220

Hi there,
Since one month, I'm having problem with my lenovo x220, before that, everything was fine (I didn't know what have changed since then).
After ~3-4min of running (everytime), my laptop reach 96°C (even if I didn't log in) and the fan start working very fast (wich is annoying because of the sound, but my main problem is the temperature).
Here is the informations I have... Ask if you need more info:
acpid -tb:
Battery 0: Charging, 47%, 01:52:05 until charged
Thermal 0: ok, 96.0 degrees C
sensors:
acpitz-virtual-0
Adapter: Virtual device
temp1: +96.0°C (crit = +99.0°C)
thinkpad-isa-0000
Adapter: ISA adapter
fan1: 4530 RPM
coretemp-isa-0000
Adapter: ISA adapter
Physical id 0: +96.0°C (high = +86.0°C, crit = +100.0°C)
Core 0: +95.0°C (high = +86.0°C, crit = +100.0°C)
Core 1: +91.0°C (high = +86.0°C, crit = +100.0°C)
end of my dmesg:
[ 2380.080437] CPU0: Package temperature/speed normal
[ 2380.080438] CPU1: Package temperature/speed normal
[ 2380.080440] CPU2: Package temperature/speed normal
[ 2380.080441] CPU3: Package temperature/speed normal
[ 2446.629333] thinkpad_acpi: unknown possible thermal alarm or keyboard event received
[ 2446.629338] thinkpad_acpi: unhandled HKEY event 0x6040
[ 2446.629340] thinkpad_acpi: please report the conditions when this event happened to [email protected]
[ 2446.629833] thinkpad_acpi: EC reports that Thermal Table has changed
[ 2446.765427] NMI watchdog: enabled on all CPUs, permanently consumes one hw-PMU counter.
[ 2446.776900] EXT4-fs (sda3): re-mounted. Opts: data=ordered,commit=360
[ 2446.795757] EXT4-fs (sda1): re-mounted. Opts: data=ordered,commit=360
[ 2446.812242] EXT4-fs (sda4): re-mounted. Opts: data=ordered,commit=360
[ 2446.858672] ehci_hcd 0000:00:1a.0: power state changed by ACPI to D0
[ 2446.958744] ehci_hcd 0000:00:1a.0: setting latency timer to 64
[ 2447.037062] ehci_hcd 0000:00:1d.0: power state changed by ACPI to D0
[ 2447.138505] ehci_hcd 0000:00:1d.0: setting latency timer to 64
[ 2679.691436] CPU2: Package temperature/speed normal
[ 2679.691437] CPU3: Package temperature/speed normal
[ 2679.691461] CPU1: Package temperature/speed normal
[ 2679.691463] CPU0: Package temperature/speed normal
[ 2979.305525] CPU0: Package temperature above threshold, cpu clock throttled (total events = 258444)
[ 2979.305527] CPU1: Package temperature above threshold, cpu clock throttled (total events = 258444)
[ 2979.305529] CPU3: Package temperature above threshold, cpu clock throttled (total events = 258444)
[ 2979.305531] CPU2: Package temperature above threshold, cpu clock throttled (total events = 258444)
[ 2979.307523] CPU1: Package temperature/speed normal
[ 2979.307524] CPU0: Package temperature/speed normal
[ 2979.307526] CPU3: Package temperature/speed normal
[ 2979.307527] CPU2: Package temperature/speed normal
[ 3278.919582] CPU1: Package temperature above threshold, cpu clock throttled (total events = 318212)
[ 3278.919583] CPU0: Package temperature above threshold, cpu clock throttled (total events = 318212)
[ 3278.919586] CPU2: Package temperature above threshold, cpu clock throttled (total events = 318212)
[ 3278.919587] CPU3: Package temperature above threshold, cpu clock throttled (total events = 318212)
[ 3278.921581] CPU1: Package temperature/speed normal
[ 3278.921582] CPU0: Package temperature/speed normal
[ 3278.921585] CPU3: Package temperature/speed normal
[ 3278.921586] CPU2: Package temperature/speed normal
My rc.conf daemons arrays: DAEMONS=(syslog-ng @network crond dbus wicd acpid laptop-mode cpupower)
Do you have any idea of my problems?
Thx
Last edited by pyknite (2012-10-31 20:47:55)

@op wrote:
If you are using kernel 3.6.x then it's a known problem causing power regression which implies a higher temperature.
More details in this thread: https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=150743
I this case I'd recommend downgrading to 3.5.x or using one of the workarounds mentioned in the above thread.
Thx very much I'll read that
donniezazen wrote:
This might be related https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=150743
What kernel are you on?
Linux blup_laptop 3.6.4-1-ARCH #1 SMP PREEMPT Mon Oct 29 09:49:00 CET 2012 x86_64 GNU/Linux
Thx too...

HT3775 can a .mov file be recovered if the record was accidentally shut down from loss of power? i was recording from the AJA Pro Ki when we lost power, the file is there but it wont play and comes up with the message, "The document "SC1ATK63.mov" could n

Can a .mov file be recovered if the record was accidentally shut down from loss of power? i was recording from the AJA Pro Ki when we lost power, the file is there but it wont play and comes up with the message, "The document “SC1ATK63.mov” could not be opened. The movie is not in a format that QuickTime Player understands."

Hi,
Troubleshooting a start up script can be difficult. There are some third party programs that also keep logs of start up programs, however for Firefox this may be different.
Is Firefox a startup program? [http://www.winxptutor.com/msinfo32.htm]
Its also possible to check the Web developer tools for any scripts in a page: [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Tools/Debugger]
In the control panel there is also Administrative tools to view event logs, but this may be something a local technician can walk you through.

Lenovo X220 and low volume [specially in Linux]

Hi everybody,
i've googled this issue and found it affects other users, but didn't find any solution.
Problem is the audio level of my Lenovo X220 is very low, in the sense that there must be zero noise in the room to be able to hear the sound. I found the same happens in Windows, but in that case there's a workaround using some setting from the Control Panel.
I am on Chakra-Linux (but I had the same problem in Opensuse) and use pulseaudio (but the same occurred even before i switched to it).
Any suggestion? Thanks!
Paolo

I use VLC media player, which allows me to boost the volume beyond the 100% listed level. I believe that when I was using an Xseries, I had pulseaudio installed at the same time as VLC.
-JV474

Lenovo x220 webcam. How to install new webcam?

Hi, I bought Lenovo X220 Type 4290-B21 but it has no webcam. I have possiblity to buy geniune webcam for X220. It is possible to install webcam by myself. Could someone to help me solve my problem.
Thank you in advance,
Chris
Solved!
Go to Solution.

Hello and welcome,
Have a look at page 92 of the Hardware Maintenance Manual
Z.
The large print: please read the Community Participation Rules before posting. Include as much information as possible: model, machine type, operating system, and a descriptive subject line. Do not include personal information: serial number, telephone number, email address, etc. The fine print: I do not work for, nor do I speak for Lenovo. Unsolicited private messages will be ignored. ... GeezBlog
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Is it true that sleep consume less power than boot? (MacBook pro late 2011 model)

I have 3 questions here to ask:
1. Some say that sleep consume less power than boot, but some say it isn't. Which is true? and how it can be?
2. Is it true that charging your macbook pro until 100% then unplug it will make cycle count go faster than using AC power all day and ONLY using battery when we couldn't find AC outlet will make it slower?
3. i found that some macbook user leave their macbook charged all the time and some macbook user prefer use battery all the time. Which way is better? i have observed and looked at any apple help topics but couldn't get the answer without any experience from you guys...
I'm so conserned with these issues...
Thank you for your time though, i hope i can find the best solutions here....

Regarding question 1, that's a meaningless question. Boot uses a specific amount of power, dependent on how much stuff has to start up on your machine and what hardware you have, while sleep uses a trickle over time, so whether this is true depends on what interval of sleeping you're comparing to boot. There will be a break even point somewhere, but where that might be isn't clear.
Apple recommends sleep over shutdown unless you're going to be away from the computer for a couple days or more. Of course, I can't find a reference to that document now, but I know it was there at one point in time. I don't think that the entire issue is power-related, as boot will stress the hardware slightly more (lots of reading from and writing to the hard drive, etc) than sleep.
As to questions 2 and 3, the answer is the same for both. Your battery lasts for a finite number of cycles before losing capacity. (How many cycles is a good question, and not an easy one to answer.) A cycle is defined as going from full to empty, but can be broken up as well. For example, if you start from full, drain halfway, charge to full again and drain to halfway again, that's one cycle. So, the more times you charge your battery, the faster it will wear out, but how you do it doesn't matter much.
There are a couple gotchas, though. First, a battery can wear out prematurely if you never let the electrons "turn over." You need to use it on battery power sometimes, though it doesn't have to be daily by any means. Second, if you drain the battery fully, that's not very good for modern batteries. I wouldn't worry about it now and then, but don't make it a habit of draining it fully. (Some people erroneously recommend frequently draining the battery fully and then charging it back up to "condition" the battery, but that is not actually good practice. All Mac portables with built-in batteries do not need conditioning.)
Finally, all this is fairly irrelevant if it interferes with the way you need to use the machine. Use the machine the way you need to use it, and don't worry so much about adjusting your needs to fit the battery's needs. If that means you have to replace the battery a little more frequently, so be it. They're not that expensive in the grand scheme of things.

Sudden loss of power, shutdown

I have a Imac 9.1, attached to a UPS and twice in the last month while doing the most trivial of things (today scrolling an internet page) the unit suddenly powered off? Just "Blink" screen black and power off. I'm not sure what it is.
My question is, is there a "systems event" log that the system captures when things like this happen which point to something that was going on right before the lights went out? Or is this merely a matter of waiting till it happens with some degree to repetitiveness that I take it in for an analysis at Apple. Any advice would be appreciated.

Hi, if you think it's the UPS! try going to the Website of the manufacturer, FAQ, Help, Contact Us...
The sudden loss of power may well damage your HD..My advice, don't use the UPS till you are sure of the reasons for the power outage..Use a good Anti Surge unit until then...L

Imac Power-up/Boot-up Problem

Had a power outage -- no lightning or storms. My new Intel iMac would not power-up/boot-up. It took three attempts. I even changed the outlet that I had the iMac plugged into. I am using a surge protector. The only ancillary device I have attached is an Epson printer. When I pushed the start-up button I got "nada". Just a black screen. Any suggestions?
Just shut down the computer and let it sit for a couple of minutes. Pushed the power button and the computer booted right up. What's up?
Tom
Message was edited by: tguild

Thanks for the quick response. I guess my question now is, "Should I have to do power management (SMC) reset whenever there is a power outage and the iMac is not shut down in a "proper manner"?" I didn't have to do this with my "classic" iMac.
Tom

Mac mini won't boot after accidental loss of power during firmware upgrade

i accidentally hit the power switch on the wall during an upgrade (might even have been a firmware upgrade, I didn't really look at what was going on). Anyway, now it hangs on the silver Apple logo screen with a spinny wheel on reboot. It's only 3 months old, it's the $599 model.
What to do? I see that you can download firmware restoration disks but they appear to be limited to earlier versions of the Mac mini.

I took it to the Mac store today and they fixed it for free by booting from an external drive and finishing the half-baked system update. Now that I know how to do that, I can fix it myself next time.
Thanks to Alan at the Salem, NH store!!

X220 complete fan failure

I've had my X220 for about a year now. At first, I didn't experience any problems with the fan, no revving up/down like some describe, and it was pretty quiet.
After about 9 months of usage, the fan started to get pretty noisy. As I also usually have a room fan always on, I didn't care much because the room fan overpowered the laptop fan.
Then, at about 10 months ago, one fine day CoreTemp pops up a message that my CPU temp is critical, I was just watching a movie with no background stuff going on. I've checked TPFanControl and the fan wasn't running. It was also not responding to TPFanControl's smart or manual modes.
I turned off the laptop, removed the keyboard and powered it on again. The fan would spin a few revs at pretty low speed, then just stop. I allowed the system to boot like that, and tried to start the fan with TPFanControl's manual mode. When I switched the fan from speed 0 to any other speed, I could see the fan blades to move just a little bit (maybe 1mm) and then stop again.
The laptop is on warranty, but I bought it in USA, and I live in Thailand now. Also this is my primary work computer and I didn't want any unnecessary downtime, so I decided to fix it myself.
I wrote quite a lot, those not interested in the disassembly story, just skip the next paragraph.
Well, luckily I decided not to sell my old Z61m, I booted it up to view the X220 Hardware Maintenance Manual: http://download.lenovo.com/ibmdl/pub/pc/pccbbs/mobiles_pdf/x220_x220i_hmm_0a60739_06.pdf
Using an old laptop, which one year ago didn't feel slow, after being accustomed to the new one, was really sluggish. Part of the reason might be that I recently installed Windows 7 on it (it's got 4Gb RAM in it, of which the chipset can only use 3Gb). By the way, one time I had my Z61m's fan become really noisy, too (but never fail completely), I did disassemble, clean and oil the fan - and getting to the fan was much easier than on X220.
On X220 to get to the underside of the fan, you have to remove the motherboard, the heatsink assembly is screwed to the motherboard from it's underside. That's wasn't hard for me, but I could easily see messing up some small component. To remove the motherboard, I had to remove the HDD, speakers, bluetooth module, WiFi module, mSATA SSD, disconnect a few flat-ribbon connectors, unclip a few regular connectors, free the wifi antenna cables, video cable from their grooves in the bezel, remove the bezel. And then the motherboad still wouldn't come off - the two nuts holding the VGA connector have to be removed. And when I moved to Thailand, I didn't bring my 5mm hex socket with me. So I had to drive around (I live in a small city), trying to find it. Tool shops, hardware shops, computer shops didn't have it! Well, a tool shop had a huge kit of 1/4" DR tools, I wasn't gonna spend so much money just to get one 5mm socket. In the end I could find a low quality 1/4" DR sockets set in a Tesco supermarket, for $2. But what do you know? The cheap sockets have thick walls, so the wall thickness doesn't allow it to fit around the nut (the laptop's case is in the way). Too bad I don't have a lathe... well here comes the drill to hold the socket and the angle grinder. Finally I was able to unscrew the nuts and take out the motherboard.
To get out the audio connector from it's hole in the case, I have to flex the motherboard quite a lot, I know it's fiberglass and strong, but it does feel quite scary (the narrowest part of the mainboard is just maybe an inch wide).
I then tilted the motherboard up disconnected the power cable (it's a bit tricky, but I think it's the most efficient way - some say to remove the LCD to do that! that's totally unnecessary), took the motherboard out and unscrewed the heatsink/fan assembly.
The fan would turn by hand or by blowing air into it, but wouldn't keep rotating as soon as I stop blowing. The blades are fortunately removable (just grab them and pull), I cleaned them and the insides with some methyl alcohol, let it dry, then put some TriFlow teflon oil in there and put the blades back on. I then put everything back together, and it worked fine. Assembly, as usual, is the reverse of disassembly. The fan works, and is pretty quiet again (I'd say about the same as it was new).
The fan is sleeve bearing. I think it's not a good practice to put sleeve bearing fans into laptops. When a ball bearing fan fails, it just rotates at reduced speed, with plenty of noise and vibration. Giving a lot of warning time that it should be replaced. A sleeve bearing fan can just stop turning completely, not making any noise to indicate failure. It's very fortunate that CPUs (and some other hardware) have automatic overheat protection (thermal throttling). I suppose Lenovo just had some temporary problem sourcing the necessary qty of ball bearing fans when they were producing X220, so they just put in an alternative they could find. I don't think they did this just to save $1 per laptop. In any case, my advices for X220 owners is, if your fan has become noisier than before, open it up and clean/oil it, better now than later. I would only advise this job to people who have straight hands growing from the right place, not from their ass (that's a saying we have in Russia). There is nothing really difficult about this job (first time will take 2-3 hours, with experience you can do the whole job in under 1 hour), but you have to be careful. There are a lot of small parts that can be dropped or damaged by static electricity. There are many screws of different sizes that can be mixed up (my advise is to use a small container with multiple compartments, and put the screws into different compartments, along with a piece of paper saying where does this group of screws go. Have to be very careful disconnecting the connectors, especially the flat ribbon type. No sharp or metal tools should be used for this task! Use only fingernails or something plastic. Also use care to properly align the flat ribbon cables when connecting (locking) them. It's good to take pictures of the whole process, especially things like cable routing. You'll thank yourself for this when putting it back together. The hardware maintenance manual is also pretty useful (might be not so easy to find the right info, though, have to read carefully). Print it or use another computer or a mobile device to access it when doing the job. As noted, you will need a 5mm thin-wall socket (any good quality 1/4" DR socket will be thin wall, while cheap nasty stuff will be thick wall) to unscrew the VGA connector. The nuts are not tight from the factory (at least mine were not), so you might be able to use another tool, but I think even the smallest needle-nose pliers won't fit there, there's really too little room between the nuts and the case. A sturdy tweezers with round ends (or cut off ends) might do the job, but I'm a believer in using a proper tool for a job, at least when talking about a $1000 computer (this is not very Russian of me, where a common tool for automotive repair is often a hammer and a block of wood; a saying goes: if you fail - use a bigger hammer). Obviously you also need a small-size electronics screwdriver.
A thing I had a problem with: the heatsink contacts both CPU and the chipset (which is common in notebooks), there was thermal compound on the CPU and a thermal pad on the chipset (I would say 0.5mm thick). Unfortunately I tore up the pad when removing the heatsink. If you're careful, usually you can reuse the pad. The pad is there for the reason that the CPU and the chipset surfaces are not on the same plane, so if assembled with just a super-thin layer of thermal compound (like you're supposed to for optimal heat conduction), the chipset wouldn't touch the heatsink and would overheat. Since I didn't have a spare thermal pad on hand, I used a thick layer of thermal compound (I used Arctic Silver 5, which is pretty thick consistency and not very likely to flow out of there) on the chipset. I also ordered some thermal pads on eBay, to have it just in case.
I haven't noticed any significant decrease in temperatures with the new thermal compound, even after 200 engine hours the AS5 needs for optimal performance. It might be cooler by a couple of degrees, but not by much.
I'm sorry I deleted the pics I took during disassembly.
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A .5mm layer of thermal paste will not do a very good job of heat conduction. There will be air bubbles. No matter how well you spread out the thermal paste on the CPU die, you will never get the kind of even, thin layer that you get with a new fan, which comes with lots of little dots. BTW, very small needle-nosed pliers work fine to start the VGA nuts. The first time I take a particular model apart, I tape the screws near the place the will go back using "painter's masking tape", which leaves no adhesive residue.

Lenovo X220 Complete Loss of Power/No Boot Up

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