RE: [Thinkpad] The Amazing Shrinking 600X Display!

> From: Jonathan Byrne
> Some of you who also follow the ibm.ibmpc.thinkpad
> newsgroup may recall my saga of the LCD that, when
> transplanted from one 600X to another, causes
> Windows to be unbootable on said machine. It gets as
> far as the splash screen and hard locks, requiring use
> of the reset button. Along with this behavior, sound
> does not work at all on said machine while that display
> is installed. Not even the "humming bird chirps" you
> normally here when changing options in the BIOS.
> However, any Linux CD I've tried will boot right up,
> as will Linux installed on the same disk. Swap a
> different display on the machine and Windows will
> boot right up, too.

In your followup you mentioned that you've never used the Fn key. There is a
hardware volume control that uses Fn+PgUp/PgDn. If sound doesn't work at
all, the first thing to try is Fn+PgUp to turn the volume up. This control
is separate from any software volume control.

I don't know why changing the LCD would affect this (or cause the other
problems you mentioned), but Fn+PgUp is always something to try.

This also lets you control the volume of the power-on and
return-from-standby beep. The default setting is very loud. I like to hit
Fn+PgDn repeatedly until the sound goes off, and then hit Fn+PgUp just once
or twice. Then I turn up the software volume control in the OS higher to
compensate.

Take a look around your keyboard and find every key that has a blue marking
on it (the same blue as the Fn key). Those are the keys that do special
things with Fn.

> And the screen has shrunk. The memory size from the POST is
> just=20 above and to the left of center...

This is a BIOS setting stored in CMOS, like the hardware volume control. In
addition to the Fn+F8, this setting (and many others) can be changed by
software. The ThinkPad Configuration Utility has an option to set it, both
in the Windows and DOS versions. If you're running Linux, you can make a
bootable DOS floppy or CD and put the DOS version of the configuration
program on it (PS2.EXE and some associated files). The PS2 option that
controls this is:

PS2 HVEXP ON
PS2 HVEXP OFF

-Mike

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Received on Wed May 5 12:31:20 2004