Thinkpad Edge E530 stuck in a loop while booting up

[tsouftsaf]

Hello all,

I have an issue with my sister's Thinkpad Edge E530:

When I power-on the machine, it starts booting up, until it reaches the "Thinkpad intro screen", where it displays the Thinkpad Logo, and it also says "To interrupt normal startup, press Enter" underneath it.

It then goes into a loop, as the laptop continuously reboots, and then it reaches this screen again, it then reboots, etc, etc, etc.

I pressed Enter, and I went into the BIOS settings. There, I selected the laptop's DVD-ROM as the primary booting option, and I was able to boot using the Windows 7 installation disc (laptop is using windows 7 btw).

When I booted from the Windows 7 installation disc, it detected the Windows 7 installatio on the hard drive. I selected the "auto-repair" option, and it could not find any errors.

Then, I rebooted the laptop.,.and it worked fine (it booted normally from the hard drive, without the windows 7 disc being present in the DVD drive).

Then, after a few days, the same issue appeared again.

I did the same thing, using the windows 7 installation disc, and the results where the same - the laptop started working normally for a few days, then it stopped, I fixed it again, etc (another loop )

I asked 2 technicians to take a look, and see if they can determine what is causing this, one of them told me it's the hard drive, and the other one told me it's the motherboard.

I honestly don't know who and what to believe - do you have any suggestions?

PS: Forgot to mention that I tried a hard disk test, and a memory test from the BIOS utilities - no errors. Also tried hard disk sentinel, it showed no errors on the hard disc drive

Thanks for the help!

[RealBlackStuff]

Welcome to the Forum.
Do you have any other HD/SSD to try?
What happens if you immediately press F12 when you boot up?
You should then be able to select the HD/SSD to boot from.
Have you tried to go into BIOS (F1 at bootup) and then press F9 to set all defaults, followed by F10 to save and reboot?
Which version of BIOS is in there? Latest is 2.59.

[tsouftsaf]

Welcome to the Forum.
Do you have any other HD/SSD to try?
What happens if you immediately press F12 when you boot up?
You should then be able to select the HD/SSD to boot from.
Have you tried to go into BIOS (F1 at bootup) and then press F9 to set all defaults, followed by F10 to save and reboot?
Which version of BIOS is in there? Latest is 2.59.

Thank you for the suggestions.

I do not have a spare HDD/SSD drive to try - laptop only has one HDD and one DVD drive.

I tried to reset the BIOS in its default settings, to see if that will make a difference.

For now, the laptop is working OK after this change, but, as I mentioned earlier, this is its "typical behavior" - it always works OK for a few days after I fix it, then it starts doing the same thing again, etc.

I will monitor it, and see what happens.

The bad thing is that I have to go on a trip for 2 months, so even if it breaks down again, I won't be able to try upgrading the BIOS. Right now, it is using BIOS version H0ET30WW (1.12), with was released on 2012-05-08

EDIT: I decided to try updating the BIOS to its latest version - it is now running BIOS version 2.59. Let's see if that will make a difference or not.

Thanks again for the help!

[RealBlackStuff]

I suggest to update BIOS to at least V2.50 before you leave.
https://pcsupport.lenovo.com/us/en/downloads/ds033265
Scroll down to see the different versions.
You can make bootable CDs from those ISOs, using e.g. ImgBurn from www.imgburn.com

[tsouftsaf]

I suggest to update BIOS to at least V2.50 before you leave.
https://pcsupport.lenovo.com/us/en/downloads/ds033265
Scroll down to see the different versions.
You can make bootable CDs from those ISOs, using e.g. ImgBurn from www.imgburn.com

Tried it already, it's now running BIOS version 2.59

[MikalE]

I had an E530 that did this too. The hard drive had failed. Replaced and reloaded from a backup and all was well.

[tsouftsaf]

I had an E530 that did this too. The hard drive had failed. Replaced and reloaded from a backup and all was well.

Well, I was thinking of trying that as a last reserve (especially since I don't have a spare HDD to use).

If I need to try a new HDD, does the E530 have a spare slot for a second HDD/SSD, or do I need to remove the existing HDD, and use the new one in its place?

[axur-delmeria]

^ Laptops having two HDD bays are rare. Generally you remove the existing HDD.

[thinkpadcollection]

Use external USB box with old hard drive to collect data only. I also use USB drive sticks to place your data onto. Install new OS and software on a new hard drive in the notebook. No need to clone, you cannot afford to wait long time during clone process which takes hours via external USB with old hard drive and hard drive may fail completely.

What you need to back up are work file created, not the software. Also export all your browsers' bookmarks.

This notebook should say OS not found and stay there but if this looping, this is sign of programming in firmware is lazy design.

Cheers, thinkpadcollection