[pjones1978]

okay so i have a presario 900. i recently had to put in a new hard drive due to bad sectors. when i began my install of xp pro the laptop would freeze between 8 to 10 minutes into the install. i thought i might have tapped the cd door open so i tried again. same thing, freezes. this happened a couple of times. now, the laptop will not even come on. if i use the ac adapter with the battery plugged in of course the battery will charge, when i turn it on, the power LED will light up as well as the battery charge LED BUT the hard drive will not kick on, the cd/dvd drive will not kick on and the cpu will not kick on. so it is getting power but not starting up. what could be the cause of this problem, a failed memory chip maybe? i really don't know. help would be very appreciated. than you in advance

 

[TriggerFinger]

hi,

i think you need to reset the CMOS. a dead RAM will shutdown your system. it will start to power up but shuts down immediately. you could have failing RAM given the freezing during the installation.

try to remove the battery and unplug the AC adapter from the wall outlet and the laptop. press power ON for 30secs at least. put back the battery, and plug back the AC adapter. power ON as normal. obviously you will end in error since you do not have an operating system installed yet. but that is not the point, our objective is to have the drives kick in when powered ON.

 

[pjones1978]

thank you for your reply. unfortunately i tried to do this last night and i got no response from the laptop. i also tried by taking everything out, except for the cmos battery. when i did this i could hear a little pop noise come from area that the ac adapter plugs into, any ideas on what this could be. its not a very loud pop, you can barely hear it, almost sounds like the cd door unlocking itself, but like i said, i had all of that pulled out at the time. im am at a loss right now on this. im not very savvy in the laptop area.
thanks again

 

[TriggerFinger]

try removing the CMOS battery to reset CMOS. if you strip it down, leave the RAM, you can remove modem, drives, wifi.

 

[pjones1978]

well i tried the cmos and still no power, found out what the popping noise was though. the speakers kicking on when it tries to start. its a split second, but after that no power, so can this be a mobo or cpu problem?

 

[TriggerFinger]

so you tried it stripped down to only RAM, LCD and motherboard but still no power (LEDs are off, no signs of life)? and resetting CMOS did not help. then it could be the motherboard.

 

[pjones1978]

no my LEDs are on, showing power and battery charging but with everything stripped out, hd, dvd, the battery i still get nothing, did the cmos reset, ive tried with and without ram with and without the battery with and without hard drive and dvd drive but still nothing, i checked the ac plug for tightness, all solder points look good and i tried using my desktop screen also instead of the laptops. so im guess my guess is a shot board. i tried to power it up the other day, sunday i think it was, i started and shut down within 2 seconds since then. nothing but LEDs

 

[TriggerFinger]

yup, your guess may be correct. it indeed looks like a shot board. try a repair shop for a second opinion.