Solve my strange computer problem?

Xyth · September 2008

Alright, so a laptop belonging to a friend has formed a strange error. Basically, whenever the laptop begins to start up all the little keyboard lights and such come on, but the screen stays blank (pure black). It will sit like that for 3-4 seconds before turning off and restarting again. It does this about 5 times before just completely shutting off. It emits no beep signals or really makes any kinds of sounds other then the HD and CD drive spinning up and then stopping. Not even so much as a line from the BIOS is displayed.
I tried restarting the computer with the battery/hard drive/RAM/any combination of those 3 removed and it still exhibits the same behavior (did this to rule out HD/RAM/Charging errors).
The computer maker is Toshiba and the laptop is a few years old (has a Celeron processor).
At this point I'm guessing it's a BIOS chip error(but I'd still expect some kind of error message...). However I don't have much experience with working on laptops so I figured I'd ask you guys before I started messing with things.

Comprox · September 2008

Generally speaking, if the machine is not making any noise when it turns on, it is not posting (that single beep when you turn it on, means the machine has posted successfully). No posting usually means some form of motherboard issue and that is even more likely since you have ruled out some other stuff.

In summary, since it is a laptop, a broken motherboard = new laptop time. Might have been an electrical shock, might have been bumped/dropped too hard, might have poor manufacturing, etc.

I can't say for sure this is the problem, just the most common explanation from my years as a tech.

Drfuzzy · September 2008

Try the CD drive also, i've had a few laptops i've worked on keep from POSTing because of that. Also unplug your keyboard and touchpad cable (touchpad carries +5v on most laptops so when it shorts, it kills the power pretty quick), but more than likely though your board is dead. When it shuts off like that, its generally a short to ground. You could also try to completely disassemble the laptop and put it back together to rule out any chance of a lose or bad connection to any devices.

Spooge · September 2008

You could always try something simple like reseating the RAM, using only one stick (if there are two), or removing the battery and running straight from AC. You could also try a different AC adapter.

EDIT: right. note to self: read closer next time. I can see now that you've tried all of this. nevermind.

Xyth · September 2008

Alright, well I'm going to give the laptop one last look over when I see my friend Tuesday and try unhooking other internals to make sure there are no shorts anywhere. If it still doesn't work I'll be ordering a replacement motherboard (luckily they are only like 90$, woo!).

lolfighter · September 2008

Swapping out a motherboard is a ###### and a half though. Have fun with that. -_-

Kouji_San · September 2008

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(lolfighter @ Sep 15 2008, 10:14 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1688199"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'>Swapping out a motherboard is a ###### and a half though. Have fun with that. -_-</div>
Oh the horror of hidden screws and fragile connectors etc!

frostymoose · September 2008

Another possibility is that the CPU is overheating, and it's shutting itself down to avoid damage...

My friend and I had this same problem with our computers turning on, turning off, then restarting (His, however reached POST. Mine did not). It turned out to be a thermal compound problem on his, and a not-entirely-fastened headsink on mine. Maybe this isn't so likely as it's a mass-produced laptop, but I suppose there could be a glitch.

Xyth · September 2008

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(frostymoose @ Sep 15 2008, 10:12 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1688215"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'>Another possibility is that the CPU is overheating, and it's shutting itself down to avoid damage...

My friend and I had this same problem with our computers turning on, turning off, then restarting (His, however reached POST. Mine did not). It turned out to be a thermal compound problem on his, and a not-entirely-fastened headsink on mine. Maybe this isn't so likely as it's a mass-produced laptop, but I suppose there could be a glitch.</div>
This is a good point. The computer did have some over-heating problems in the past. I'll try messing with the heatsink a bit and see if I can get anything.

ytuio9 · September 2008

This is already written but it worked for me (it wasent on my laptop though, should work). before i begin, i have to say that i dont understand why that happened... ok here i go!

i had a DVD inserted into the CD-drive. then, just when i inserted it the pc restarted. kept doing that 5-6 times then shutdown completely. after trying many times with revoing different things, nothing happened. this went on for several days... then, i suddenly thought (dunno why) about a CD (i had forgotten what it was) in the CD-drive, so i ran the computer, and opened the CD drive. then to my amazement the computer opened.
end of story.

kinda stupid, but i really dont understand what happened... can somebody please explain what happened? and why...? thanks in advance.

locallyunscene · September 2008

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(ytuio9 @ Sep 22 2008, 03:56 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1688616"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'>This is already written but it worked for me (it wasent on my laptop though, should work). before i begin, i have to say that i dont understand why that happened... ok here i go!

i had a DVD inserted into the CD-drive. then, just when i inserted it the pc restarted. kept doing that 5-6 times then shutdown completely. after trying many times with revoing different things, nothing happened. this went on for several days... then, i suddenly thought (dunno why) about a CD (i had forgotten what it was) in the CD-drive, so i ran the computer, and opened the CD drive. then to my amazement the computer opened.
end of story.
kinda stupid, but i really dont understand what happened... can somebody please explain what happened? and why...? thanks in advance.</div>
Just kind of guessing here, but maybe you have your bios options set to boot from cd and it was crashing because of that,

Hawkeye · September 2008

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE</div><div class='quotemain'>kinda stupid, but i really dont understand what happened... can somebody please explain what happened? and why...? thanks in advance.</div>

What disc was it? Some discs are boot discs (much like bootable floppies) such that when you restart your computer with the cd inside, computer tries to start up according to what the disc says, and not what the hard disc says (as it would normally), which may or may not mean that it would startup normally. More often than not, it'll start up some sort of setup program or graphics user interface, but if it is corrupt or unintentionally 'bootable', it might create strange problems.

Just a guess, but you've already figured out that it was due to the CD, and that's all you really need to know.

As for the first problem, I don't know what it could be, but I've had a piece in my laptop monitor break once which lit the screen to its usual luster. Didn't even know that such a thing could happen, but apparently so. The strangest part was that the monitor wasn't off, just really really really dim. I initially thought it was off, which made me think it was the actual computer (and potentially a much worse problem). I was relieved to find out that it was just the monitor in the end.

Solve my strange computer problem?

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