If you own a Toshiba Satellite M35X, A70 or A75 laptop then you can experience the following problem. You laptop might lock up, freeze up or even reboot by itself when you touch the palm rest around the speakers area. It happens because of a static electricity discharge when your touch the laptop speakers. In some cases you will not even fill that discharge. The problem occurs because of improperly grounded top cover assembly. To fix the problem, it is necessary to install a new modified top cover assembly. If you laptop was made before January 2005 then most likely you have unmodified top cover. For example, I made some pictures from a Toshiba Satellite A75 top cover assembly. The top cover for Toshiba Satellite M35X is almost identical.
On these pictures you see unmodified top cover assembly for Toshiba Satellite A75. The foil runs from the speaker and from the touchpad to the metal chassis.
On these pictures you see a modified top cover assembly. The foil runs from the speaker and the touchpad, touches the metal chassis and ends on a screw stud.
On this picture I remove the metal bracket, so you can see where the foil tape is connected.
I think it is possible to make this modification yourself. All you need is to find a foil and run it as it shown on the pictures. I have never done it myself, so not sure about the result. 
Here are some other problems found in these models.
Power jack issues: Toshiba Satellite M35X and Satellite A75 power jack and battery charge problem
Overheating: Why my Toshiba laptop suddenly shuts down by itself without warning?
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May 26th, 2006 at 9:14 am
Hi Yvette,
I am almost 100% positive that you are experiencing a power jack problem on the system board. Read the post and you’ll see how many people have the same laptop failure. It’s a very common issue with Toshiba Satellite A70 and A75 laptops. Over time the power jack looses the connection with the system board and the laptop stops charging the battery. I guess the repair center didn’t see the problem because the jack is still connected to the system board and fails intermittently.
May 26th, 2006 at 7:14 am
Hello: I have a Toshiba A70. It has a sporadic problem where switches from AC to battery when pluged in. It then works on battery and drains it and gives me the critical battery level message. There is nothing that I can do at this point to make it revert to AC. Unplugging and re-plugging the AC adapter into the computer does not work. The computer goes into hibernation and shuts down. When I restart it it starts charging the battery and works fine till it suddenly repeats the same thing. Have you run into this problem and know the solution. I purchased an extended warranty from Toshiba and took the notebook into their service centre. However the problem did not occur while they had the notebook and they say that they cannot fix a problem when they don’t see it. Please help. Thanks. Yvette.
May 21st, 2006 at 11:30 pm
David,
I do not have a picture of a speaker assembly. If you want to get access to the speakers, you have to take the laptop apart and remove the top cover assembly . On the pictures above you can see a place where the speaker is connected to. It is just a little speaker secured by two screws to the top cover, nothing special.
May 21st, 2006 at 1:17 pm
I have a A75-S211, and the left speaker seems to have fallen inside the laptop. Do you have a picture of the speaker assembly? I’d like to take a look at it before I risk breaking anything.
Great website!! Thanks for all the information!!
May 21st, 2006 at 12:42 pm
Hey Kal,
The problem you described is not very common for this model. The battery connects directly to the system board through the connector you can see in the battery bay. Either the battery or the connector on the system board is bad. The best way to test it is to find a spare battery and see if you still have the same problem. I would try to replace the battery first if I would get your laptop for repair.
Try to find second Satellite A70 or A75 laptop and swap the battery.
May 17th, 2006 at 8:40 am
I bought my Toshiba A70 in September 2004, and strangely enough, I didn’t have this problem.
However, there is another problem with the laptop that really pisses me off. For some reason, the contact between the battery and the laptop is really worthless and I can’t really use the laptop unplugged. When I put my laptop on my lap, the pressure against my lap may cause the battery to shift slightly, and then BOOM! The laptop loses power and shuts down.
The battery is not dead, it still discharges properly and can last 2 hours when the battery remains in good contact with the laptop. I suspect that it’s really a design problem and not just a defect. When the laptop is plugged into the wall, I can play around with the battery; if I put the laptop upright and apply a little bit of force with my hand and push the battery towards the right, the battery is detected (the battery indicator LED turns on) and gets charged; as soon as I take off my hand, the laptop loses sight of the battery (the right most battery indicator LED turns off).
I brought it in to Future Shop to get it fixed and specifically told them that the battery is not dead, but a week later they say it’s a bad battery and that it’s not covered by the extended warranty. I really don’t want to spend more money to buy another battery just to get the same problem again. Do you think there is a way I can argue that it’s an inherent design problem?
May 2nd, 2006 at 7:01 pm
Steven,
Have you tried to reinstall the Power Saver software? You can download it from Toshiba website. I am not familiar with this particular error.
May 2nd, 2006 at 11:28 am
Any ideas on a Toshiba Power Saver Error. This error pops up after booting up.
It reads ” A Fatal error has occured. This program will be terminated.
Code: 0×0
May 2nd, 2006 at 12:02 am
[...] Toshiba Satellite M35X, A70 or A75 locks up, freezes up or reboots when you touch the laptop speakers. [...]
April 16th, 2006 at 1:45 pm
[...] Not properly grounded top cover. The laptop will shut down or lock up when you touch it around the speaker or touchpad area. This problem could be fixed by replacing the top cover assembly. [...]