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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August 6th, 2008 at 8:45 am
Hi guys was just trying to find a place that will remind me where which screw goes where,… and came here (bine here before),. Anyway just FYI another thing about the e2100’s video, is he place it is attached to the mainboard i is right under the keyboard and I have found (two now) that using the keyboard will BRAKE the video cable connecion right in the middle of the connection and video bord itself
A little soldering will bring the card back to life.
EG: cable plugs into video plug, solder connections on board brake
Just FYI Harry
August 1st, 2008 at 1:23 am
OK I managed to get the TE2100 to power up and boot, but to do this I had to twist the chassis by holding the middle of the laptop and pulling the back right corner upwards and then pressing the on button. As soon as I let it back down it shuts off and looses power. I have now concluded that it is a connection problem between the powerboard and mainboard. Is there anyway to fix this without replacing any of the boards.
I tried to understand what Dennis Peyton wrote to fix his problems but without a picture I cant seem to understand exactly how it should be done.
July 31st, 2008 at 8:17 pm
TE2100 Flashing Orange Power Light Problem
To Dennis Peyton, you didn’t happen to take a photo of what you did that you could post to see how you fixed it.
I finally bit the bullet and pulled the whole Laptop apart, when I finally assembled it again it actually booted up. I shut the laptop down to put 2 screws back in the back but when I tried to start it again it went back to its old ways of the Orange Flash.
I then half puuled it apart so I could reseat the powerboard and cables and also unplug the cmos battery (for 30mins). But no luck. I even took out everything that I didn’t need except the ram as I only have 1 stick. Can anyone help please, I purchased a new battery and I dont want to waste my money.
July 23rd, 2008 at 2:36 am
Hi CJ2600
I tried a couple of separate sticks of RAM for the problem, still nothing – but it got me thinking. What if it were a bad contact on the memory slot to the mobo….
Thanks to your affirmation above, I managed to locate several pins that had “lifted” from the board – due to heat?
Anyway, a cleaned all the contacts and applied a tiny pinhead amount of solder to the lose contacts.
Stuck the RAM back in and you know what? The thing came to life!
Absolutely over the moon mate.
Thanks for your reply – I really appreciate it.
Regards
Chris
July 22nd, 2008 at 1:19 pm
Chris,
Could be memory related problem. Did you try reseating the memory module? If you have two RAM modules, remove them one by one and test the laptop with each module separately. If you have only one RAM module, try moving it into the empty slot.
July 21st, 2008 at 3:45 am
By the way there is are a couple of solder points with RESET written next to it… Hows the best way to short the contacts? Will try anything as am not bothered by soldering etc.
July 21st, 2008 at 3:40 am
Hi everyone -hoping you can shed some light on my situation!
I have a Tecra M2 laptop, its been in storage for a while and hasn’t had any charge to it. I take it out from storage and plug in mains, power on.
I got a RTC battery error, which is fair enough I was going to see if worked and then leave it over night to charge the RTC battery.
Anyway the sytem wouldn’t boot into XP – it kept looping the POST and then reset. So I tried loading XP safemode -RESULT! it worked for around 30 mins, then I got a BSOD which flashed for about 0.5 seconds and since then the sytem won’t POST, boot or anything.
The system has been stripped down looking for burnt out parts, but nothing is visible. The system power light comes on, the charge light comes on, the HDD and DVDlight flash briefly when powered up and the FN key lights up on the keyboard when pressed.
This is bugging the crap out of me -it worked fine then stopped. Nothing on the screen, but I can open the DVD drive and insert a disk which it tries to read. But I can’t see anything on the screen oln both internal and external monitors.
Any ideas? I can’t see why it would just stop working.
Thanks
Chris
June 26th, 2008 at 1:13 pm
I need help taking apart my Toshiba Satellite 1135-S1553. Does anyone know where i get go to get a good guide?
June 11th, 2008 at 6:22 am
Here is another one,A215 the dvd burns but you cannot see it on dvd players older than 2008
June 2nd, 2008 at 7:24 pm
HI, I’ve been ‘into’ my Toshiba 2100, several times, for over a year and may have found a crude yet affective FIX for the ‘power board to mother board connection frustration’.
Here it is…. once all the mounting screws are out of the power board, including the one at the end of the ‘tail’, then ’skew’/rotate the power board counter clockwise just a bit, about the mother board socket connection. I used a piece of plastic about 1/8″ (perhaps less) thick between the CD/DVD drive case and the power board. I had to drill (slightly move the hole) on two of the power board holes since they did not exactly line up with the original holes well enough. I left the power board ‘tail’ screw undrilled and unsecured. Powered it up (after hours of frustration) performed the reinstall of the software (cause I was about to sell the old friend) and eureka .. I’m writing this on the laptop and it has not ‘failed yet’. Perhaps this will help another. Cheers.