Let’s talk about problems typical for Toshiba Satellite A60 and A65 notebooks. Do you own one of these laptops? Is it working fine for you?
Here are some typical issues I’ve notices with this model.
1. First of all – overheating
Does your laptop shuts down without any reason when you ran CPU intensive programs? If yes, then most likely it happens because the laptop overheats. It happens because overtime the heatsink gets clogged with dust. A layer of dust collects between the cooling fan and the heat sink (dashed line on the picture) and heat produces by the processor gets trapped inside the laptop. As a result of that, the processor overheats and the laptop shuts down.
There are two different way to clean the heat sink and fan in these models:
- Buy a can of compressed air or find an air compressor and blow off the heat sink through the air intakes on the bottom of the laptop.
- Remove the keyboard (steps 5-9) and you’ll get an access to the cooling fan. Blow off dust from the fan and the heat sink.
In some cases the laptop overheats because of defective cooling fan. The fan should start working as soon as you power up the laptop. If the fan will not star, most likely it’s bad and must be replaced. You can find a new heat sink cooling fan for Satellite A60 and A65 notebooks by the following part number: V000042110.
2. Defective onboard memory
Here’s another common problem – bad onboard memory. This memory is integrated into the motherboard and if it goes bad you’ll have to replace the entire motherboard.
If your laptop starts with some weird characters or lines of dots on the screen, most likely you have a faulty onboard memory. If you test the laptop with an external monitor, you’ll see the same defective video on the external monitor too. You can test the onboard memory with Memtest86+ utility. Remove any external RAM modules and run the memory test. If the onboard memory fails, you’ll have to replace the motherboard.
The integrated memory module is located close by the memory extension slot, under the foil.
UPDATE: If you have bad memory, you should read comment 93 submitted by Daniel on September 28th, 2007.
3. Last but not least – power jack issue.
With Satellite A60 and A65 notebooks this problem is not as common as with Satellite M30X, M35X, A70 and A75, but it’s still a problem. Overtime, the power jack might get loose and the positive pin stops making a good contact with the motherboard anymore. As a result, the laptop switches to the battery power even though the power adapter is still plugged in. Usually you can temporally fix the problem by adjusting the power adapter plug on the back of the laptop, but after some time the problem reappears.
In this case you’ll have to disassemble the laptop, remove the motherboard and resolder the power jack. I’m buying new power jacks here.
Do you experience the same problems or you have another issue with your Satellite A60 or A65 notebook? Please share your experience.
Instructions for replacing laptop power jack yourself
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November 13th, 2009 at 4:26 pm
Steve,
If you have nothing to lose, you can try cutting off all eight memory chips with a sharp knife and use the laptop with memory installed into the external slot. A few people reported successful memory removal in this thread.
That’s a really strange part number. Will not pop up when I search all motherboards sold for US models.
I searched on eBay and found a couple but they are from UK.
Most likely any motherboard from another A60 will work just fine.
Tell me which CPU you have installed and I’ll try to find a part number for the motherboard that supports this CPU.
November 13th, 2009 at 2:42 pm
Hello ,hopefully this hasnt been asked but i have an A60-cjw that the onbaord 256 memory has become corrupt.
I ran memtest and it was massive failure
What i am trying to do at this point since the local computer shops seems to want 100 bucks to remove the onboard ram i am simply looking to replce the motherboard.
What i have not been able to find is what motherbards are compatiable for what models as in my motherboard is a V000916790 ,I’m having trouble finding this exact model in Canada is there a model that would work the same and have no compatibility issues with.
I see various models for A60 for sale but of couse the motherboard number doesnt always seem to match up with mine.
Any tips on where to buy or what would be compatible would be greatly appreciaated
Thanks
November 2nd, 2009 at 4:05 pm
Bell,
1. It’s possible that your failure wasn’t related to onboard memory.
2. It’s possible you damaged the motherboard while removing 8 chips.
3. You must have memory in the external slot in order to start the laptop successfully. Maybe the memory module you are installing is not good?
November 2nd, 2009 at 4:02 pm
Dean Bennett,
1. Insert the recovery disc into the optical drive and restart the laptop.
2. As soon as Toshiba logo appears on the screen press the F12 button.
3. Select the CD/DVD drive from the menu of boot devices and press enter.
4. After the laptop boots from the recovery disc follow instructions on the screen.
November 2nd, 2009 at 10:49 am
Exactly the same problem as Bell’s
Bell Says:
October 2nd, 2009 at 6:33 pm
Hi guys, I’ve been reading this site on the last couple of days. I have a A60-S166 that had all the symptons for bad onboard memory. So, I removed the 8 chips, but the board won’t boot now. It turns on just for a few seconds, without image on the screen and with a high beep sound. I don’t know if this board is killed now or if it’s trying to tell me something. So, what should I do? I already cleaned the memory contacts. What could it be? I tried to turn on the motherboard inside the case and outside. Same thing… Hope you can help me. Thank you.
Is there any solution?
Thanks
November 2nd, 2009 at 10:44 am
I tried to fix the defective onboard memory, by removing the 8 ram chips, but this didn’t worked for me, and laptop doesn’t boot any more.
October 30th, 2009 at 4:05 am
I have an A60-S166 that had all the symptons for bad onboard memory. So, I removed the 8 chips, but the board won’t boot now. It turns on just for a few seconds, without image on the screen and with a high beep sound. I don’t know if this board is killed now or if it’s trying to tell me something. So, what should I do? I already cleaned the memory contacts. What could it be? I tried to turn on the motherboard inside the case and outside. Same thing… And this also happens when I put a memory module on the memory slot… Does this notebook’s motherboard turns off if it has no memory?
October 30th, 2009 at 12:40 am
Hi I have a toshiba satellite a60 my computer has crashed it will not start even in safe mode. I have a windows cd how can I install windows from scratch? I have back ups of my files from my windows one care
I think it happened from my new telecom mcgee security software as it crashed the day after installing it. I wish I had never left onecare!!
Can you help me is there a reset combination of keys ?
October 29th, 2009 at 9:10 pm
Colin,
Not sure what’s going on.
Can you heat the cooling fan spinning? Maybe laptop overheats?
Also, can you boot from a live Linux CD (Knoppix for example). Will it start Knoppix and boot to the desktop?
If it’s not memory and you have a new hard drive, it’s possible the motherboard itself is failing.
October 27th, 2009 at 8:37 pm
When I put in the toshiba a65 bootdisk now it loads until it says
“starting up:” then restarts.