The customer brought his Toshiba Satellite A85-S107 and complained that the laptop will not boot. First of all, I tried to start the laptop with a known good AC adapter, to make sure that the customers AC adapter is not a problem. The laptop didn’t start and there were no LED activity, the unit was “dead”. The good AC adapter wasn’t able to start the laptop. I started removing the laptop components one by one trying to eliminate the problem. I removed the battery, the memory module, the wireless card, the DVD drive and it didn’t fix the problem. I had just very few parts left: the system board, the CPU and the switch board. I remove the keyboard to check the power switch board and found that the switch board cable wasn’t properly connected to the system board, it was half way out. I reseated the cable on the system board and the laptop started properly.
BTW, the system board has 2 memory slots and by default the memory stick is located in the slot hidden under the keyboard. BUT, it is not enough to remove the keyboard if you want to replace the original memory module. After you remove the keyboard, you still will not be able to remove the memory because it is hidden under the top cover. To replace the original memory stick in Toshiba Satellite A85 you have to remove the entire top cover!!! It sucks!
Here’s a disassembly guide that shows how to replace a memory module on Toshiba Satellite A85.
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June 17th, 2006 at 10:01 am
Kaah,
Is this sound coming from the system board? If you laptop is under warranty, take it to a Toshiba repair center. From my experience, a high pitched buzzing noise might indicate a problem with the system board.
June 16th, 2006 at 1:21 am
I have Toshiba A85 series. The laptop makes high pitched buzzing noise when I start to boot system. It won’t boot up, and the buzzing noise will continue and system is unpluged. any advise is appriciated.
Thanks
June 7th, 2006 at 11:21 pm
Melissa,
I think you might have some issues with the system board (main board). I’ve never heard that the laptop keyboard makes high pitched buzzing noise. I guess that when you press on the keyboard you flex the system board and it makes the noise, not sure though. I do not have a straight answer on your question. If the laptop is still under warranty I would recommend taking it to an Authorized Repair Center.
June 7th, 2006 at 7:18 pm
I also have a Toshiba A85-1072 that I could use some help with. After it has been running for awhile it seems to make a weird high pitched buzzing noise when the keys on the left side are pressed. The sound is not coming for the speakers which I have muted but seems to be coming from under the keyboard. It started with just the left shift key but now seems to be the whole left side of the keyboard. Also, when you push down on the keyboard at a place where there are no keys the same sound is made. I have also noticed that recently the fan has been making some strange noises, just seems to be running a little off. Do you think that these two problems are related?
May 15th, 2006 at 6:03 pm
David, Satellite A85 and A75 laptops are complete different. You cannot use A75 disassembly guide for A85. I will create a disassembly guide for Toshiba Satellite A85 as soon as I get it for repair.
It is possible that the keyboard is causing the problem. You can try to remove the keyboard and turn on the laptop. Is it still freezing up? I would also check the memory and the hard drive.
May 12th, 2006 at 8:50 am
I have a Satellite A85-S107 (Part No. PAS82U-00R004) as well, and it also won’t boot. I looked at irisvista.com, but didn’t see any guide specific to the A85 line. Will the A75 disassembly guide work as well?
The freezing is sporadic, sometimes it gets all the way to Windows, sometimes freezes on the BIOS splash screen, with or without constant beeping, like a key is stuck. When it does boot, it doesn’t indicate a keyboard failure, but sometimes “n”, sometimes the left arrow, seem to be stuck. Any info would be greatly appreciated.
April 26th, 2006 at 7:39 pm
Dylan,
First of all check the AC adapter. For Toshiba Satellite A65 it should provide about 19V. You can check it with a multimeter. “-“ is outside and “+” is inside the power plug. If you have no LED activity when you connect the AC adapter into the laptop, then most likely either the system board or the AC adapter has died. If the AC adapter is good, then I would suspect the system board.
April 26th, 2006 at 2:41 pm
I should also mention that i retested the resistance between the center pin of the jack and the other side of the board, and then between the inside wall of the jack and the other soldered parts, and the resistance was 0, I dont know how to test the voltage of my power adapter, since I’m kind of new at the multimeter.
I dont’ know anyone with a working toshiba cable to test in my laptop, either.
I honestly think something on the board might have just “given out.” But–hypothetically–if the computer stopped getting power, it would have died this way, right? with the blinking yellow light and all? especially since i had the cooling pad and was charging my phone off of usb connections.
April 26th, 2006 at 1:22 pm
You’re my last hope–at least as far as my Toshiba a65 s1762 is concerned.
I bought it refurbished, and everything was fine for almost a year. The machine has always been a little on the “hot” side, but I use a cooling pad to keep that in check.
The center pin in the ac jack broke off, and I took the notebook apart to get that fixed locally, and put everything back together.
Shortly thereafter (but I’m not at all sure it’s related) I started having shutdowns, which seem to be related to heat (”Temp1″ in Speedfan often ranged very very high, and to avoid a crash I would have to shut the notebook down to cool down). A couple mornings ago, I wake up, go to my notebook, and the power button is slowly flashing yellow. The usb’s are still powering the cooling pad and another device I had connected. I disconnect these and try to restart the laptop without success. Finally, I pulled the cord and the battery, reconnected everything, and tried to restart. No luck. No lights whatsoever, not even the led that indicates the power cord is connected.
I noticed a few websites talking about “MOSF chips” and replacing them, but they don’t explain much more. Besides, they seem a bit suspicious.
Any ideas?
I really appreciate any response,
Dylan
ps. I opened the laptop again to check for noticably burnt capacitors: none that I could tell were leaking or “fat.” While I was in there, I cleaned the heatsink as per your instructions (yes, it was clogged, so Thanks for the how-to!) and doublechecked all the cables, ribbons, cords, etc. Everything is as it should be. Put it all back together. Completely dead. No leds, no power, nothing.
April 17th, 2006 at 6:24 am
Well thanks for the help, on my laptop problem, I know it’s very strange i work for a computer company and there’s a couple guys that have been doing this for a long time, and they never heard of anything like that. Today no matter what I try I can’t get it to boot up at all with external monitor or without. I tried kinda pressing a few spots, to see if i could stop a short, I think it might be the speakers to maybe in some way?? Well I try the ram thanks for the help and timely reply.
Shane