Why Toshiba Tecra TE2100 laptop locks up or will not boot at all?
One of our biggest customers use a lot of different Toshiba laptops and one of the models is Toshiba Tecra TE2100. We repaired many of these units and we noticed that some of them had very similar problems:
- Laptop locks up when you move it or sometimes freezes by itself. The video is still on, but the acupoint (keyboard mouse) and the keyboard itself do not work anymore.
- You can start the laptop, but you see CMOS (RTC) battery error on start up. After you clear the error, the laptop boots fine. After you reboot the laptop, you get the same error.
- Laptop will not boot at all. There is no power or power LED blinking. There is no hard drive activity. There is no external or internal video.
- When you press power button, laptop shows some activity, but there is no video on LCD screen.
At the beginning, when we just started working on this model, we tried to fix CMOS (RTC) battery error by replacing the RTC battery. Unfortunately, it didn’t help to fix the problem at all. We found that the main culprit of the problem is a poor connection between the system board and the power board (CMOS battery is connected to the power board). In some cases you can fix the problem by reseating the power board. Carefully disconnect if from the system board and connect it back. Turn on the laptop and see if it fixed your problem. If it didn’t help, most likely you have to replace the system board and the power board. Unfortunately, I cannot say exactly which one is causing the problem, the system board or the power board. The same story with laptop lock ups, try to reseat the power board.
You can fix a video problem by reseating the video card. We noticed, that over time the video board pops up from its connector on the system board and you can get video if you push it back in place.
Conclusion: before you start replacing parts, disassemble the laptop and try to fix the problem by reseating the power board and the VGA board. My disassembly guide for Toshiba Tecra TE2100 can help you to take apart the laptop.
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January 8th, 2007 at 4:35 am
Hello everybody!
Please help me, I have Tecra M3 failed – it is start booting and turning off in 1-2 minutes with orange LED blinking. (long-short-short-short-long-long-long-short) According previous comments – the errorcode is 71h.
Could somebody advice me – that is the mean?
Thank you!
January 3rd, 2007 at 8:05 pm
Katey,
First of all I would test the memory module and the hard drive. You can test the memory with Memtest 86+ utility, it’s free and accurate, I use it almost every day. If the memory fails to pass the test, replace it. You can test the hard drive with Hitachi drive fitness test utility. Even though it’s made for Hitachi hard drives, it works fine with other hard drives too. I also use this utility on daily bases.
If you need files from the hard drive very badly you can do this. Buy an external USB enclosure for laptop hard drives. You can find it in any computer store and it’s pretty cheap, I would say $15-25. Remove the hard drive from the laptop and install it inside the USB enclosure. Connect the enclosure to another working computer. If your hard drive is fine, it should be detected automatically and you’ll see it in My Computer. Access the drive and backup all personal files.
January 1st, 2007 at 11:49 pm
Hi,
I’m having real trouble with my Tecra TE2100. I’ve gone on a trip and when I got here my laptop was fine. I was watching a DVD and started to fall asleep so I keyboard short-cutted the computer to shut down – which it did. I woke up the next morning, turned on the computer, and found it started to boot, but then… the blue screen of death appeared: page fault in a non page area – caused by “ntfs.sys” (or something). I tried multiple times to turn it on, even in safe mode, (which it did multiple times), but not for long, then it physical dumped on me each time. Other times I got “win32k.exe” on the screen instead of “ntfs.sys”.
My system is XP Pro with SP1. I since installed SP2 and all the updates not long ago, so when the computer did decide to start up properly for me (without dumping after a few seconds) I decided I’d uninstall SP2, just to see if that were the problem. Unfortunately, during the end of the uninstallation, it did physical dump AGAIN.
Is this a video board problem or a software problem caused by SP2? I was thinking of opening the machine up myself, but a year ago I had the problem of no response at all (and ended up having to have the video board and motherboard replaced twice), so I am not keen on touching the insides unless I know what the problem might be. At least this time it’s still responsive when I press the power button, but it still dumps and errors on me. I tried removing the battery, but that did nothing. I don’t have my system discs on me nor the boot disc….
ANY HELP PLEASE? I’m frustrated and haven’t got to back up my hard drive!
December 10th, 2006 at 2:11 am
I have a Toshba TE2100 that suddenly refuse to reboot. When I disassembled it I found that that the connector on the video board had worked loose (where the flat cable connects to the display unit). Where will be able to find a video board for the machine? Can I connect the machine to an extenal monitor? Do let me know.
Thanks,
Ssh
December 5th, 2006 at 7:05 pm
Hi Cj, I have an hp pavilion dv 4000 and it will not power up with the adapter. I t will when I take the battery out and recharge it in another unit and put it back in. The power adapter light is on so I know I am getting power from the wall but not into the laptop. Is there any hope? Thanx Rene
December 4th, 2006 at 9:02 pm
Hi CJ,
My laptop (Toshiba Satellite Model 3000-PS300L-04JKL
) is about two years old and I always use it with care but one
day the screen become blank with faint display. I power recycle it and it runs for a while and then video fails again. I connect an external mon and it can give normal picture.
I turn the brightness to highest level, the display can last longer or even does not drop. If I use a lower brightness, the display shutdown very soon even before Windows logo comes up. I check the close lid switch but cannot fiind any problem there.
The laptop warranty has lapsed and I ask a Toshiba repair shop but they are charging me high price to replace inverter. I am thinking if I can do the repair myself and also for coming future I can do the maintenance but I need to know if a correct spare part is available and the price before I proceed.
Do you think what problem is my laptop? If it is inverter problem, can you help to check the spare part no. for me. I check this on Ebay but the PC model no. given is not the same and I am not sure if I get the correct part no.
tks for your help.
Kevin
December 4th, 2006 at 2:54 pm
I have a Toshiba Satellite A45 and a year after I got it , it started to to turn off. I know there is a class suite aganist certain laptops, but what about ones like mine??
Toshiba sucks!!
December 3rd, 2006 at 10:47 pm
Wayne,
It’s possible that you have a faulty phone connector on the sound board. The sound board pictured on the step 24 in the lower left corner. I don’t know what is wrong, may be a bad connection, bad jack, or something else. In order to check the connection it’s necessary to remove the sound board.
December 3rd, 2006 at 9:34 pm
es,
Run the DFT utility 2-3 more times to confirm the hard drive failure. Probably the utility detects bad sectors and you can “fix” it for a while if you reformat the hard drive and reload the software, but from my experience bad sectors tend to multiply overtime.
It’s totally up to you. If you use the laptop just for entertainment like web browsing, email, youtube stuff, etc… then use is until the drive fails completely. If you use this laptop for business or other important stuff then I would go with a new drive.
December 3rd, 2006 at 6:49 pm
Hi CJ,
How silly of me. After I posted the previous comment, I restarted the laptop, removed the Hitachi CD ROM and to my surprise, the laptop started in no time, even after trying to find a CD ROM first. I then reconfigured the boot sequence to strat from HDD and it now starts in a matter of seconds every time. Some kind of magic?! Can I now trust the hard disk drive after Hitachi reported a problem? I am now totally confused.