USB Pen Drive shuts down laptop

[Mr_M_Cox]

i have got a teacher who every time she puts a usb drive into one of the usb sockets on her laptop the machine instantly turns off. It only happens when attached to one port all the others are fine and it happens with any USB drive.

Any ideas?

[Geoff]

The port is physically damaged and is shorting out the laptop. The power control hardware in the laptop is shutting the machine down to prevent it melting itself and/or causing the battery to explode in her face.

[Mr_M_Cox]

Cheers for the quick responce, even if it was a little OTT. Back to Dell then with this one

[Geoff]

No really, it would go bang. I have youtube videos to prove it.

[Mr_M_Cox]

Fair enough, thats something i wanna see. any chance of a link to said video.

[Geoff]

For example:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WeWq6rWzChw

[jwood]

That's a handy problem.

I've got a Windows 98 laptop that never shuts down properly. Could I borrow your memory stick?

[Mr_M_Cox]

i said that to her aswell, might be quite usefull for shutting down quickly!!

Personally i would rather have some data left on my stick and just click shutdown!

[gwendes]

That's a handy problem.

I've got a Windows 98 laptop that never shuts down properly. Could I borrow your memory stick?

LOL! Nice. I could make you one

[Michael]

This very thing happened to a client of mine on a Tiny laptop many years ago. They wanted £400 for a new motherboard lol no wonder they went bust.

In the end I promptly said "no" to the motherboard and asked them to patch up the port. The laptop still works today, minus one USB port.