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Problem description: I'd like a second opinion. After a few months of odd behavior - a program crash about once a week, but never the same program; Windows updates that seemed to apply but would show up again in the Windows Update list after rebooting - my laptop BSOD'd during normal use (web browser and office apps) and the boot SSD didn't show up any more. The SSD (an Intel 320) bricked into an "report self as 8 MB," no-access mode. This mode was a common bug in earlier firmwares, but as I had the latest firmware and the bug triggered when the system was full-on rather than when changing power state, Intel accepted the SSD as faulty for RMA without any further question. I am currently running Ubuntu 14.04 off a USB stick with a persistence file. It's a known-good USB 3.0 stick. The problem is that I am still getting weird problems. Every time the system boots, I get between one and three errors that the OS wants to send a crash report for, never the same errors. About 50% of times I resume from suspend, the system has a complex crash starting as soon as I click something. Elements of the UI disappear one by one - over the course of two or three minutes, first the running program disappears, then the WiFi disconnects and enters a reconnect attempt loop, then the top notifications/menu bar and the left program quick-launch bar disappear, then the screen goes black, then the system reboots. For the entire life of the system, the WiFi card failing to resume after suspend until power-cycled (reboot, disable/re-enable in device manager, flick of hardware radio switch), but I wrote it off as a quirk. When the "odd behavior" started, once or twice I needed a full reboot to get WiFi working again. Usually these problems didn't crop up until after the system had an uptime of at least ten days and at least as many suspend/resume cycles. Otherwise, the WiFi worked nominally. So, the problem I am considering here: Was the SSD an isolated incident? So many problems seeming to crop up relating to suspend/resume across two OSes (including one Windows reinstall) suggest a problem with the PCH and/or the WiFi card. On the other hand, my Ubuntu LiveUSB is just an install image with a persistence file, and it would be a bit weird if it were 100% bug-free maybe? A fixed-disk install might work better. Attempted fixes: I've run tons of diagnostics to make sure it's nothing simple like RAM or CPU problems - multiple passes of Lenovo's in-Windows and boot-time diagnostics, Prime95, Windows Memory Diagnostic, and Memtest86+. I tried multiple MSKB "update fixers" that tried to manually install broken updates and/or strip out and redo updates; I was actually about to wipe the machine this weekend until the SSD conked out. I had monitored SMART for the SSD or the secondary drive throwing errors, but no pre-fail indicators showed for either drive. Write endurance indicator was still at 99%. No problems with temperature (other than normal thermal throttling at extra-high load). Checked for malware using MalwareBytes, checked for crazy processes with HiJack This!. Nada. Active antivirus was Avast!. Recent changes: When the odd crashes started ca. last December, I reinstalled Windows 7, but the odd crashes never really went away. The Windows Update problems suggested that the system was getting worse. Most recently, I started playing some Steam games (whatever would work on HD 3000 graphics) - within the past couple weeks. They were installed to the secondary hard drive rather than the SSD. Busted-rear end Windows Updates from late June. I cannot look them up, but they were four Important-tier updates and Internet Explorer 11 (the latter of which failed not for "unknown" reasons, but because I already had IE11 installed - didn't stop the update from appearing, though). No hardware changes. -- Operating system: Windows 7 Professional System specs: Lenovo ThinkPad T420i 4177CTO Core i5-2410M 8 GB RAM (4 stock, 4 aftermarket) Intel 320 SSD 120 GB (drive bay) Seagate 500 GB 7200 RPM hard drive (Ultrabay) Kingston DT Ultimate G3 32 GB USB 3.0 memory key Intel Wireless-N 6205 dual-band NIC Location: United States I have Googled and read the FAQ: Yes
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Jul 18, 2014 10:36
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I don't really know but if I was in the situation I'd probably try taking some of the RAM out (diagnostic tests can't detect errors with 100% certainty) and disconnecting any HDs temporarily and see if the odd behavior continued. This would isolate it a little more.
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Jul 20, 2014 22:47
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I moved to a full install of Linux to the hard drive, and I'm still getting weird-rear end problems related to power management. Mostly it's just one program stopping working at random after coming out of suspend (e.g. Flash stopping working within Chrome until a reboot), but I did have a few loving nuts things unrelated to suspend. Like the system stopped detecting being plugged in correctly and telling me I had was on battery with 18 hours of use (when the battery wasn't in use and this drat thing does well to give me four). Oh, and this: Linux became convinced that there was no processor activity to speak of, so the CPU locked itself to idle regardless of use. Even trying to manually force a turbo state resulted in an immediate reversion to idle. And this wasn't just a reporting thing - performance was as dogshit as could be. Reboot fixed it, returned SpeedStep/Turbo behavior to normal. Suspend problems persist regardless of which DIMMs I have in or where, and live USB with the hard drive removed doesn't change the liveUSB problems I was having. Where is the problem? Is this just not a Linux-friendly laptop, or is Ubuntu 14.04 some kind of poop? Or does it seem like my laptop is boned?
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Jul 24, 2014 19:19
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