The temporary solution I found was to tap the bottom of the laptop, near the fan exhaustion area and keep the laptop in the horizontal position. Once I did that I was able to reboot the laptop successfully.
It looks like the fan is stuck somewhere inside of the unit or the thermal adhesive is not sticking to the CPU, or the fan might not be screwed in properly.
Since the T410 is not that old, try to call Lenovo Support (in the US call 800-887-7435) and check if it is still under warranty. If it is, they will send you an empty box, so you can ship to them and have the laptop repaired
Apttech's Blog 
February 11, 2011 at 9:53 am |
Thanks so much! You saved my life!!!
Have had my machine less than 3 weeks. Shame that Lenovo don’t seem to give a shit and say I need to send it away for a week for repair rather than sending me a new one :(.
Thanks again.
February 21, 2011 at 8:53 am |
Had my T410 about 5 weeks before getting the ‘Fan Error’. Seems to be a growing problem for this machine: http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/T400-T500-and-newer-T-series/T410-CPU-fan-failures/m-p/372453
Thanks to apptech for a simple solution/workaround…
May 4, 2011 at 4:42 am |
Thanks so much,
I was terrified with the loss of data that I might have to go through, and of course the time i would have to spend getting help from support,
This solution worked.
thanks
May 7, 2011 at 4:25 pm |
with your solution I fixed the problem.
Do you think I’ll have to call for warranty repair ?
thanks
July 7, 2011 at 10:48 pm |
Always call for repair, if you have a in-warranty product. That the way manufacturers find out how they made a big mistake like this
Good luck!
JP
July 18, 2011 at 9:55 pm |
I thought that it looks like a bios software problem. A few years ago I’ve faced this kind of bug with a ASUS desktop mother-board. There was an option In bios setting that let’s to set min CPU temp to start the FAN. And actualy fan didn’t start until it’s temp reached 30C.
But on the POST I saw a stuck with fan error message and “press F1” I’ve just turned of that stoping sequance thing in bios and thats all. Later ASUS have released an update< that include fix for fan chek.
Is any body sure that fan is realy stuck? Course my t410i starts normaly after 5-8 tries with fan error message. never less. It looks like it finaly warms up and switches on.
But still i didn't try the method mentioned above. I'll try it, thanks.
I've bought it abroad, and I'm afraid that waranty will not work where I live. So if any one will figure out a permanent solution and share it here that would be nice.
July 18, 2011 at 10:52 pm |
Zeroin
Thank you for sharing. I am sure it is a hardware problem otherwise the tapping underneath the exhaustion area would not make any difference.
You might be out of luck if the warranty on the geographical area you live in is not covered by the warranty
You may want to try on this link:
http://www.lenovo.com/ru/ru/index.html
and enter your Lenovo model number. It should tell you if the laptop is covered under the warranty
Good luck and thanks for sharing your thoughts
JP
July 18, 2011 at 11:22 pm |
Thanks.
As I thoght.. That’s my warranty check result page: http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site.wss/warrantyLookup.do?type=2518&serial=r8-33wl4&warrantySubmit22.x=0&warrantySubmit22.y=0&country=897&iws=off&sitestyle=lenovo
– no IWS.
July 19, 2011 at 12:18 am |
The major discussion for this problem with Lenovo officials is here http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/T400-T500-and-newer-T-series/T410-CPU-fan-failures/m-p/444191#M44430
The thing is a fan replacement.
October 3, 2011 at 3:25 am |
Hi you are the best! I am traveling in New York when my Lenovo suddenly refuse to boot up! I was scared as I am all alone traveling but your tips actually worked! Thanks so much, you save my vocation!
October 3, 2011 at 4:05 am |
I am glad I could help
That is the beauty of the Internet!
Cheers!
JP
October 12, 2011 at 10:35 pm |
thank you very much!
I strugled in the begining but it did work out! thanks again!
November 28, 2011 at 10:10 am |
Just to let you know how I fixed mine, I just used an air can and used it on the exhaustion area, I suppose the fan was dusty and it helped removing it.
Cheers!
Alex
January 3, 2012 at 10:12 am |
Glad it worked … Tnx for the solution..
January 15, 2012 at 11:21 am |
This worked for me too – brilliant.
t’interweb is ace.
cheers apttech!
February 6, 2012 at 4:21 pm |
Works for me too. WOW!
February 11, 2012 at 7:17 pm |
Thank you!
February 22, 2012 at 6:49 am |
just a little persuasion (tapping) my T410, it booted up again. first time to encounter this fan error for my unit. Its still under the 3 yr warranty.
March 5, 2012 at 3:20 am |
My wife was on her way to Mexico City’s airport on a business trip to Santiago de Chile, her machine had the fan error, could not boot at 9 pm and her flight was at midnight. She was about to re schedule when I found this post. I called her back, she tapped the thing and voila. As we say here, compadre, I owe you, my wife loves me. You saved her day!
June 3, 2012 at 4:54 pm |
Tapping the back of the pc worked for me as well.
June 28, 2012 at 11:14 am |
Wow.. your tip saved my day.
Got to get it repaired.
🙂
July 3, 2012 at 2:50 pm |
Got this on a brand new L530 today right after unboxing. Kind of sad that Lenovo doesn’t seem to have any quality control after manufacturing the device. A simple power-on test would have prevented shipping a non-working unit.
July 30, 2012 at 3:29 pm |
The fan error issue is CLEARLY a design flaw. IBM cooling fans from the previous models did not have this problem. When they send the field tech’s a replacement. The design of the fan has clearly improved. Can’t believe they haven’t done a recall or something. Geesh!
August 31, 2012 at 9:00 pm |
I got this working by tapping, blowing in the vents a little, taking the battery out and putting it back in. I assume I’ll have to replace the fan soon. they should last longer than this.. machine is not that old.
September 4, 2012 at 4:29 pm |
Brilliant! You saved my day! Thank so so much!
September 4, 2012 at 8:35 pm |
Hooray, this solution fixed my laptop! I thought it was game over for the project I am working on, but you *so* saved the day! Thanks so much for sharing this
September 17, 2012 at 2:57 am |
Thanks a lot for the suggestion. The problem I had with “fan error” got resolved – did 1) spray with air,& 2) turned the fan with a pen tip and blew the air on the fan at an angle so the fan was able to spin fast on its own. This fixed the error. Thanks!
October 15, 2012 at 12:24 pm |
Tapping did it – Great ! Thanks
November 5, 2012 at 12:07 am |
Thank you! This worked just now for me!
November 18, 2012 at 9:52 pm |
Amazing. This worked. The system hadn’t been used for several weeks and left in a cold room. Possible that parts just got slightly stuck. Thanks!
November 28, 2012 at 6:33 pm |
I’m trying to do the tapping and blowing of air through vents but still my machine t410 is not working. Anything else that I can do .
December 17, 2012 at 7:24 am |
Blow air into the FAN . It works
December 26, 2012 at 12:27 pm |
worked for me as well….thanks
January 2, 2013 at 2:25 pm |
On Lenovo t410 Press Esc while the system boots.
Hope it work.
Thanks