posted
So I was transferring a couple of gigs of pics from a 4 gig CF card. I noticed that the hard drive was getting a little full so I looked for a few things to delete. Did that and then thought I could run the disk clean up to clean out a few other things too. It didn’t seem to be working and I eventually just X’ed out of it. Pic got done transferring and I was deleting some of the folders off the card. Stared to look at some of the pics I copied over and when I opened one I liked the whole thing crashed. Just totally stopped. Couldn’t do a thing. Waited a bit and eventually just turned it off. When I turned it on the three lock lights light up briefly, then the left most computer light came on and stayed, Nothing else. No fan, no nothing. Tried all kinds of stuff. Pulled battery out. Tried AC power only. Let it sit. Held power button down for 20 seconds. Pulled out the memory. And it’s always just the same lights and nothing. I was connected to the press network at the Fiesta Bowl and half wonder if I got hacked. Would this be what happened if my BIOS got taken out? I’ve searched on line for similar things and I did see something about the hibernation switch going bad and causing similar issues. And then also I saw some people having something like this and after 2 weeks it would just start working. Tried to call Dell tech support and they said the warranty is expired and want to charge me $$ before we talk and don’t guarantee anything of course. Went to a local repair place and the tech guy was out on a call. They wanted me to leave it, but I would prefer to be there when they’re working on it. Plus I’d like to get it fixed today…. If possible. So now I’m looking for other repair places….. Argh….. anyway…. Anyone know anything that might make this happen or something I might do?
Posts: 2845 | Registered: Oct 2003
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posted
Couple of questions to try to determine the problem:
Does it make any noises when you try to turn it on? (Any at all - a beep, or hard drive spinning?)
Are there any pictures by the lights that do or don't light up? Chances are one's power, one's processor, one's network, and I don't know about others.
If somehow your BIOS did get corrupted, you're probably screwed. But the chances of that happening might as well be negative. My best guess would be a hard drive failure, or maybe a power supply problem. Have you noticed anything wrong with it in the past few weeks? Fan's louder than normal, or anything of the sort?
Posts: 39 | Registered: Apr 2007
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You don't get anything on your screen at all when you turn on the computer? (meaning, you don't get to the BIOS screen?).
Posts: 8473 | Registered: Apr 2003
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If it doesn't even start to boot then it sounds like faulty/damaged components.
One thing you can try is to clear the CMOS memory just in case there's something wrong with the BIOS settings stored there. This would revert to the default settings. I have no idea how to try that with a Dell laptop. On my desktop motherboard it involves removing the CMOS battery and moving a jumper from one spot to another for a few seconds.
You will probably need a tech to test the components. Unless you have the tools and spare parts to try swapping them out one by one on your own.
Posts: 4287 | Registered: Mar 2005
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Well, got it to the tech guy here and he said the motherboard is fried. Nothing at all would even light up for him. He was able to pull my data off the hard drive. Whew…. There was one folder with the pictures from the first half of the Fiesta Bowl I really wanted to get. He’s going to order a new motherboard. Should be cheaper then getting a new one since I have a couple of upgrades that would be more expensive on a new one. The strange thing was he said that has been known to happen at big live events like that with all the signals bouncing around. I know my cell phone was acting funny too during the game. That cleared up after though. Who knows.
Posts: 2845 | Registered: Oct 2003
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posted
Interesting. I've never heard of something like that happening, but I suppose it doesn't really surprised me. Then again, I don't own a cell or a laptop, and my friends that do own laptops don't generally bring them to crowded events like that. There'd be quite a bit of electromagnetic fields generated - motherboards are generally surprisingly resilient, but sometimes the slightest thing can set them off.
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