In this post I’ll explain how to troubleshoot a dead laptop and find the problem. The following troubleshooting tips are not model and brand specific, they should work for most laptops.
Let’s take a look at two different scenarios.
Example 1. The laptop is absolutely dead.
When you plug in the power adapter and press on the power button, there is no signs of life at all. The laptop will not make usual noises, LEDs will not light up, the fan will not spin, the screen is blank and black, etc… In short, the laptop is dead.
What you can do in this case?
1. Make sure the wall outlet is working and the laptop DC adapter is getting power from the outlet. Try another wall outlet.
2. Test the laptop DC power adapter, make sure the voltage output is correct. You can test the DC power adapter with a voltmeter.
3. Let’s say the DC adapter is fine and the adapter outputs correct voltage. In this case unplug the power adapter from the laptop, remove the battery, wait for 1-2 minutes, plug in the adapter and try turning on the laptop again.
OK, you tested the adapter and it’s bad. If you decide to replace the original DC adapter with a generic one, you’ll have to follow this rule:
The voltage output on your new adapter has to be exactly the same as on the original adapter. The amperage on the new adapter could be the same or higher.
If nothing helps and the laptop is still dead, apparently the motherboard is fried or there is a problem with the DC power jack. It’s possible the DC power jack is broken and the motherboard is not getting any power from the adapter. In this case you’ll have to disassemble the laptop and replace the power jack. Check out this guide for fixing laptop power jack.
Example 2. When you plug the DC power adapter and press on the power button, the laptop starts making normal noises, the LEDs work properly but noting appears on the screen. The laptop will not start.

First of all, take a closer look at the LCD screen. Look at the screen under bright light. It’s possible that the image is still on the screen but it’s very faint. If that’s the case, check out these tips for troubleshooting laptop with backlight failure.

If there is no image on the laptop LCD screen, test the laptop with an external monitor. Connect an external monitor to the VGA port on your laptop and turn the laptop on. You can toggle video output between the internal LCD screen and external monitor by pressing Fn and F4 keys simultaneously on HP laptops, Fn and F5 keys on Toshiba laptops, Fn and F7 keys on IBM laptops. Other laptops may use different key combinations.
Let’s say the external monitor works fine but the internal LCD screen has no image at all. If that’s the case, your problem could be related to the LCD screen or the video cable. Also, make sure the video cable makes good connection with the motherboard and the LCD screen. Try reconnecting, reseating the cable.

In my case, both internal and external monitors were absolutely dead. Neither of them had image. That means the problem is not related to the LCD screen or the video cable. From my experience I know that this problem could be related to the laptop memory.

Try reseating the memory module, maybe it’s not making good connection with the memory slot. Try cleaning contacts on the memory module with pen eraser. Try moving the memory module into another slot. Try replacing the memory module with another known good module, it’s possible that your original module is dead.
If you have two memory modules installed you can try removing them one by one, it’s possible that one of the modules is bad. Try installing different memory modules into different memory slots.
In my case reseating, swapping the memory module didn’t help. I was pretty confident that my problem is not memory related and I moved on.

Try removing battery, hard drive and DVD drive and turning on the laptop without these components.

Also, try turning on the laptop with an external monitor when the video cable is unplugged from the motherboard. If the laptop start with video on the external monitor, apparently there is something wrong with the laptop display panel.

In my case removing the hard drive and DVD drive didn’t help. Unplugging the video cable didn’t help either.
I continued taking my laptop apart piece by piece and tested it after each step.
I removed wireless card, modem, disconnected the keyboard but it didn’t help.

I still wasn’t able to boot the laptop with video on the external monitor.

Finally, I disassembled the laptop and removed the motherboard.

On this picture you see my final test. The motherboard has been removed from the base and I assembled basic barebone system on my bench.
1. Motherboard. Like on most laptops, in my case the video card is integrated into the motherboard
2. CPU with heatsink and cooling fan.
3. Known good memory module.
4. The power button board witch I need to turn on the system.
5. Working DC power adapter.
Still cannot get any video on the external monitor. The system turns on, the cooling fan starts spinning but there is no video.
At this point I’m 95% sure that the motherboard is dead. CPU failures are not very common, so it must be bad motherboard.
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September 21st, 2009 at 6:12 am
Laptop does not start. Power/battery charger light is on, however when I press the start/power up button, nothing happens.
September 20th, 2009 at 11:32 pm
Ogwal Boniface,
Here’s my guess. It’s possible that you have a faulty AC adapter and because of that the laptop will not start. Can you test the laptop with another adapter?
If the AC adapter is OK then your description sounds like a problem with the motherboard.
September 20th, 2009 at 11:29 pm
Paulo Cezar,
I’m not sure if the blinking battery LED is normal for your laptop or not. Is it blinking because the battery is charging?
September 20th, 2009 at 11:17 pm
Qayyum,
Sorry, I’m trying really hard but I cannot understand the question.
Maybe someone can translate for me, please?
September 20th, 2009 at 10:00 pm
James,
Do you mean the AC power adapter? It still could be bad even though the battery light is on. It’s possible that the AC adapter doesn’t provide enough power.
September 17th, 2009 at 2:15 pm
Great post. I did exactly what you said. I have a Compaq F730 and the wireless card quit working. Then the video went out a day later. Bought a new mboard. New board, when stripped down to power, power button, CPU/heatsink and mobo, shows power at the LEDs for charging. However, when the power is pressed, turns on for about a second, but not long enough to post BIOS. Since I’m getting power lights at the battery, can I assume the power inverter is okay? Don’t have the old board, had to exchange it for new one.
September 15th, 2009 at 3:52 am
I have a system dat water powd on d motherboad,wht can i do?
September 14th, 2009 at 12:41 pm
if the battery led is blinking but the laptop does not start? what can be?
September 14th, 2009 at 1:23 am
I have a Sony Vaio laptop VGN-S5HP/B.
When I press the power button, the power and battery LEDs flash then go off. The WLAN light flash as well.The computer won’t start then…
I have removed the battery and tried with the adapter only but the same occurs. I even changed th RAM but nothing works.
Any help is appreciated
September 8th, 2009 at 7:51 am
I have IBM Thinkpad R52 the problem no power in laptop, adopteris ok , jack is ok give me solution.