Today I was able to fix a “dead” notebook simply by reseating connectors. The customer brought in Compaq nx5000 notebook with the following complaint:
“Laptop shuts down on power up. When the power button is pushed, the laptop flashes green lights for several seconds and then powers down. Unit will not stay on with battery or when plugged in”.
I plugged the AC adapter and tried to turn on the laptop. After I pushed on the power button, fans started spinning and were active for a few seconds and laptop just turned itself off. The video never came on. I tried to power it on for a few times with the same result.
Here is how I fixed it.
First of all I tried simple stuff: remove the battery and start the laptop with AC adapter plugged in, reseat and swap the memory module, remove the hard drive, the DVD drive, the wireless card. Nothing helped to start the laptop normally. After that I went a little bit further. I opened up the laptop case, removed the LCD screen assembly and reseated the video card and… Surprise, surprise, the laptop started fine with an external monitor attached. Just in case I restarted it 3-4 times and each time I got video on the screen. After I assembled everything back, one more surprise was waiting for me. The laptop failed to boot again with the same symptoms. So, the only part that I added before it failed was the LCD screen assembly. I unplugged the video cable from the system board and the laptop started fine again with the external monitor. Now I know that the problem is somewhere inside the display assembly (of course, if the video connector on the system board is fine). The next logical step would be opening up the LCD display assembly and check if all connectors are seated properly. Bingo!!! I wasn’t very surprised, but I was very happy. The video cable was half-way out from the connector on the back of the LCD screen. The laptop started perfectly fine as soon as I plugged the video cable back in place. Fixed!
That was my first experience when improperly plugged video cable prevented entire system from booting.
Read more:
How to troubleshoot and fix laptop video problems
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December 13th, 2011 at 10:20 am
right cj got the heatsink on the graphics chip
tried to boot up same thing cut out 2 minutes in
left it for the day tried a hirens boot cd in it
surprise surprise it boots up i go to one of
the boot utilities think it was Smart Boot or something
it prompts me right away Virus? in bootsector asks me if
i want to overwrite Y/N of course said yes took the hard
drive out wiped it and reinstalled Windows installed speed fan
to monitor temp on graphics chip seems ok 47c idle hard drive 30c
idle seems a bit hot under power jack is this normal for an advent and im not getting sound just a vibrating buzz this may have been my fault when trying to remove the keyboard still not
got that b*****d out must be superglued removed all the screws i could see still wouldnt come out anybody got a clue how to get
this out anyway least its going
Graeme
December 8th, 2011 at 6:20 pm
@ graeme,
Maybe faulty motherboard? CPU failures are not very common.
December 8th, 2011 at 6:32 am
ive already tried the thermal tape from ebay
still same problem cuts out after about a minute
although this time it gave off 2 or three sharp beeps
tried to install puppy linux that cut out while loading
drivers what surprises me is when it cuts out the cpu
fan keeps spinning yet no life in optical drive i have
to take battery out to stop fan faulty cpu?
graeme
December 7th, 2011 at 1:09 pm
greame,
I’m using Shin-Etsu X23-7762 Thermal Compound.
December 3rd, 2011 at 6:07 pm
Its definitely not thermal pads i removed the residue
from the heatsink with a one sided razor blade and cleaned
it off with a med wipe it came off no problem so im left
wondering whats the best stuff to re-apply can you recommend
anything
graeme
December 2nd, 2011 at 7:54 am
graeme,
Some laptop models user thermal grease and some use thermal pads. You’ll have to use same type (grease or pad) as it was used by the manufacturer.
Here’s the difference. Let’s say your laptop had thermal pads on some chips. If you replace them with thermal grease, the heat sink will not make good contact with the chips. It happens because thermal pads are thick.
So, if you had thermal pad before, use thermal pad.
Probably there are screws under the keyboard.
1. Remove all screws from the bottom and disconnect all cables on the bottom.
2. Remove hinge covers (if you can) and keyboard. Disconnect all cables under the keyboard.
3. Separate top cover from the bottom case.
December 1st, 2011 at 3:31 pm
thanks for the reply cj i can access it thru memory
bay i can see outline of heatsink where it came off
i got sekisui thermal tape off ebay but reading on
internet there is little play in it once its down its down
or does it not matter where it is placed on the chip as long
as its as near its original position as possible or would it be better to use something like artic silver thermal adhesive
would this give me more play to manouvere it into position
this is a nightmare laptop to take apart i took all the screws off bottom got the hinge cover off tried to take keyboard off seems like theres another screw holding it but i cant see it
didnt want to force it so left it could you tell me if any old glue residue left on chip would nullify the new stuff tape or adhesive going on ive cleaned it as best as i can with a toothbrush dipped in isopropol it looks clean can see writing on chip would appreciate your feedback CJ
Thanks Graeme
December 1st, 2011 at 11:20 am
graeme,
Yes, it can cause the problem. It’s likely the laptop shuts down because the chip overheats.
I’m not sure you can do that though the memory bay. Most likely it will be necessary to remove the motherboard in order to reattach the heatsink.
December 1st, 2011 at 6:20 am
ive got a friends laptop trying to fix an advent 7094
he was changing the memory when he saw a heatsink loose
now when the laptop boots it shuts itself off straight away
i can get into bios but before i can make any changes it shuts itself off the part that came off was attached to SiS M661FX
chip would this cause it to shut off prematurely and how would
i re-attach it with adhesive or thermal tape ive uploaded a picture of it thats it just above memory module (striped thing) when you zoom in
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=D0QCNS5U
any help? i would have to re-attach this part through memory bay
as i cannot find a disassembly manual anywhere which makes me wary of using tape as i dont think i could position it accurately
Help!!!
November 30th, 2011 at 10:23 am
EXCELLENT. Thank you so much. Worked perfectly fixing my Toshiba A-135.