Toshiba Satellite Pro C660-2DH Not Powering On

[soveryapt]

Afternoon All

 

Right, I've been given a laptop that came with a child to the school with a note saying "this is *** laptop, please can you introduce it to Broadfield"

 

Anyway, I powered it on, added the wireless network to it and, as it's on Home Premium, I was going to simply map the child in questions Home folder as a drive so they could access their work etc. I got the battery low warning, so went to get the power supply for it and when I came back, the machine had turned itself off, so I plugged it in, pressed the power button to try and resume it and the charge light came on, and the power light came on for a few seconds before turning back off and not doing anything.

 

I figured the battery was just really low, so left it to charge. When the charge light went green later in the day, I gave it another try, still the same thing, the charge light is on (all be it green now) and the power light comes on for a few seconds, the machine doesn't do anything and it turns off.

 

I've had it in pieces, reseated the RAM, replaced the BIOS Battery just in case, given it a clean out with an air duster as it was a bit dusty in there, and checked for any wire breaks, obvious "help I'm melting" style damage and tell tale black marks on the mother board, but nothing. Put it back together and still nada, doing the same thing.

 

There are a few places about on line that suggest removing the battery and power and holding the power button for 20 seconds to do some kind of reset, then plug back in just the AC and try powering it on, but that doesn't have any success.

 

I'm thinking about just leaving it with no power and the BIOS battery off for the time being and coming back in an hour to see if putting the battery back in etc resolves it, but I thought I'd also ask on here if anyone has any ideas what it might be or anything I could try to get this thing back up and running. The child in question has just been in IT and seen his laptop in pieces and said that it used to not switch on and off properly at his old school either, so I suspect it might have been dropped or something along the way and that there is actual damage somewhere, just nothing obvious (though there are no signs of it being dropped either).

 

Thanks all

Andy

[difinity]

Have you checked the thermal paste ? and for the big finger of "felt" between the fan and the heatsink, It could be an overheating issue.

[soveryapt]

It's not even powering on to be able to over heat, and ran fine for 20 mins or so when I was originally given it, but yeah, I checked the heat sink whilst I was in there.

[difinity]

It was a bit of a long shot.

You could also try removing the hard drive to see if it boots, and try an alternative power supply.

[soveryapt]

It was a bit of a long shot.

You could also try removing the hard drive to see if it boots, and try an alternative power supply.

 

Aye, thanks again, but been through that. Borrowed the heads power supply as she has a Tosh too. I think the motherboard is probably goosed. The fan fires up, but nothing much else.

[sted]

iirc i had a batch of these that did this from the box(or something similar). remove battery remove psu cord. hold down power button for a while, release. plug in power cord power on add battery at some point

[soveryapt]

iirc i had a batch of these that did this from the box(or something similar). remove battery remove psu cord. hold down power button for a while, release. plug in power cord power on add battery at some point

 

Yeah, went through that as that's the first thing I found on Google .. I think it's goosed so I'll have to chat to SLT to see about getting him a new one .. fun ..

[mac_shinobi]

Yeah, went through that as that's the first thing I found on Google .. I think it's goosed so I'll have to chat to SLT to see about getting him a new one .. fun ..

 

Only other thing that I have seen issue wise similar to what you describe is when or if a laptop has had a damaged USB Port and one or more of the copper pins inside is touching the outside of the usb port which shorts it out??

 

Failing that disconnect cmos battery for about 5 mins or so and re-connect and only connect the AC Cable back in ( not the battery ) if that works then insert the battery back etc

 

@soveryapt

 

 

Edited December 5, 2013 by mac_shinobi

[soveryapt]

Only other thing that I have seen issue wise similar to what you describe is when or if a laptop has had a damaged USB Port and one or more of the copper pins inside is touching the outside of the usb port which shorts it out??

 

Failing that disconnect cmos battery for about 5 mins or so and re-connect and only connect the AC Cable back in ( not the battery ) if that works then insert the battery back etc

 

@soveryapt

 

 

 

Ah, hadn't checked the USB Ports, but alas, that's not the case either. I've had it with zero power (including no BIOS battery) for about 45 mins to see whether that had any effect. It's almost like it's gone into hibernation when the battery was dying and just won't come back from it. Very strange ..

[mac_shinobi]

Ah, hadn't checked the USB Ports, but alas, that's not the case either. I've had it with zero power (including no BIOS battery) for about 45 mins to see whether that had any effect. It's almost like it's gone into hibernation when the battery was dying and just won't come back from it. Very strange ..

 

What about trying to power the laptop on with

 

1. the hard drive out of the laptop

2. the cmos battery disconnected

3. Take the optical drive out - I have had a few faulty optical drives that keep trying to read media when there is no media / cd / dvd etc in the drive and it keeps trying to read and will freeze or stop from booting ( although doubt it in this situation as you would hear or notice the drive trying to frantically read the drive as you can hear it spinning around etc )

 

 

Also if you take the ram out and try and power it on, I presume you get beep codes with regards to it detecting no ram installed ?

 

Also I presume it has the heat sink / fan assembly installed correctly so it's not that it is not powering on due to the CPU over heating etc ?

Edited December 5, 2013 by mac_shinobi

[soveryapt]

What about trying to power the laptop on with

 

1. the hard drive out of the laptop

2. the cmos battery disconnected

3. Take the optical drive out - I have had a few faulty optical drives that keep trying to read media when there is no media / cd / dvd etc in the drive and it keeps trying to read and will freeze or stop from booting ( although doubt it in this situation as you would hear or notice the drive trying to frantically read the drive as you can hear it spinning around etc )

 

 

Also if you take the ram out and try and power it on, I presume you get beep codes with regards to it detecting no ram installed ?

 

Also I presume it has the heat sink / fan assembly installed correctly so it's not that it is not powering on due to the CPU over heating etc ?

 

Yeah, tried most of those. The only thing I've not tried (as I don't have any silver compound on me) is actually removing and reseating the heatsink assembly, but it all looks in tact from a visual of it. The fan powers up for the few seconds the power light comes on for, but then (obviously) shuts off again.

 

As for beeps, I don't get anything, I don't even get the BIOS screen coming up.

[mac_shinobi]

Wonder - is the laptop still in warranty , maybe a call to Toshiba or whoever, if it is in warranty may get repaired that way, if it is out of warranty then wondering if they can suggest anything else to try as like you said it was powered on and working and then ran out of battery power and just powered off, odd that it won't power back on just because it ran out of battery.

 

Just had another thought - if you plug in an external vga or similar monitor and use the FN ( Function keys ) on the laptop to swap displays etc , do you get any display on the monitor

 

Just wondering if the back light or similar has blown or stopped working so looks like you are not getting anything due to the screen not working or being very dim ?

Edited December 5, 2013 by mac_shinobi

[notalot]

I've seen similar with one of our 660's, there was a break in the monitor cable. Have you tried disconnecting the screen from the motherboard and connecting the laptop up to a external monitor, just as another thing to test.

[soveryapt]

Wonder - is the laptop still in warranty , maybe a call to Toshiba or whoever, if it is in warranty may get repaired that way, if it is out of warranty then wondering if they can suggest anything else to try as like you said it was powered on and working and then ran out of battery power and just powered off, odd that it won't power back on just because it ran out of battery.

 

Just had another thought - if you plug in an external vga or similar monitor and use the FN ( Function keys ) on the laptop to swap displays etc , do you get any display on the monitor

 

Just wondering if the back light or similar has blown or stopped working so looks like you are not getting anything due to the screen not working or being very dim ?

 

It's out of warranty as far as I know, but I will give Toshiba a call and find out, I guess a phone call wouldn't hurt [EDIT - Checked on the website, Warranty ran out a year back, the old authority only purchased it with a standard 12 month warranty on it! Grrr]. With regards to the dim display, it's not even keeping power to it - i.e. the fan comes on, then a few seconds later goes off, same timing as the power light on the front.

 

I've seen similar with one of our 660's, there was a break in the monitor cable. Have you tried disconnecting the screen from the motherboard and connecting the laptop up to a external monitor, just as another thing to test.

 

I will try this with the VGA though to see if it is indeed a dodgy connection somewhere along the line.

Edited December 5, 2013 by soveryapt

[mac_shinobi]

It's out of warranty as far as I know, but I will give Toshiba a call and find out, I guess a phone call wouldn't hurt [EDIT - Checked on the website, Warranty ran out a year back, the old authority only purchased it with a standard 12 month warranty on it! Grrr]. With regards to the dim display, it's not even keeping power to it - i.e. the fan comes on, then a few seconds later goes off, same timing as the power light on the front.

 

 

 

I will try this with the VGA though to see if it is indeed a dodgy connection somewhere along the line.

 

If it is the laptop display then may as stated above just be a case of disconnecting and re-seating the display cable ( Ribbon cable ) etc

[Zourous]

I would guess the laptop is finished. I've had different models doing almost a similar thing and never found out what it was. As a last ditch effort you could try reseating the cpu, that would be my best guess, otherwise it must be a motherboard problem I would have thought.

[mac_shinobi]

I would be interested to know what happens with this laptop if you manage to try those other things, contact Toshiba and see what they say etc etc ....

 

Thanks @soveryapt

[soveryapt]

I would be interested to know what happens with this laptop if you manage to try those other things, contact Toshiba and see what they say etc etc ....

 

Thanks @soveryapt

 

Will do, though with Christmas shows Mon - Wed next week, it might be a few days! lol ..

[soveryapt]

Quick catch up on this .. I've not heard anything yet as to what to do with this laptop, I'm kind of hoping it's not goosed as then we get into the red tape of who has to pay for it as it's a laptop that was provided with the students disability funds and such .. if anyone has any further suggestions, that would be great ..

 

Anyway, I best get back to making sure 2 of the laptop trollies are fully functional for the staff inset tomorrow on B Squared .. lol ..

[mac_shinobi]

Quick catch up on this .. I've not heard anything yet as to what to do with this laptop, I'm kind of hoping it's not goosed as then we get into the red tape of who has to pay for it as it's a laptop that was provided with the students disability funds and such .. if anyone has any further suggestions, that would be great ..

 

Anyway, I best get back to making sure 2 of the laptop trollies are fully functional for the staff inset tomorrow on B Squared .. lol ..

 

I take it you have tried an external vga monitor / screen etc ?

[Oaktech]

I had a home job laptop do this on me and it gave me heart palpitations! The one in question only came back to life after essentially a strip down and rebuild. Removed cpu, ram, wlan mini card, BT mini card, HDD, CD drive, monitor, KB, batt. And then put the minimum back in (HDD, CPU, 1 stick of ram, external monitor, external KB) and it booted. I then went through the one-thing-at-a-time process untill something stopped it from working. Turned out in this case that it was the BT card. Left it out and it ran happily for days on soak test.

[soveryapt]

I take it you have tried an external vga monitor / screen etc ?

 

Yeah, still nothing .. I didn't really expect it would do anything as the power was just going off before it even had chance to do anything ..

[soveryapt]

I had a home job laptop do this on me and it gave me heart palpitations! The one in question only came back to life after essentially a strip down and rebuild. Removed cpu, ram, wlan mini card, BT mini card, HDD, CD drive, monitor, KB, batt. And then put the minimum back in (HDD, CPU, 1 stick of ram, external monitor, external KB) and it booted. I then went through the one-thing-at-a-time process untill something stopped it from working. Turned out in this case that it was the BT card. Left it out and it ran happily for days on soak test.

 

Cool, I'll give that a go when I'm (hopefully) sat around doing nothing tomorrow at this Inset (i.e. assuming all these other laptops work as they are currently doing when I'm putting them away and such! lol) .. hopefully I'll find some way of sorting this out ..

[mac_shinobi]

Only other thing I can think of that we have seen with Lenovo T410 laptops is that the power on button is apart of the keyboard and the power on button becomes faulty and the only way to sort it is to replace the laptops keyboard ( assuming that the power on button is apart of the keyboard itself ) ?

[soveryapt]

Only other thing I can think of that we have seen with Lenovo T410 laptops is that the power on button is apart of the keyboard and the power on button becomes faulty and the only way to sort it is to replace the laptops keyboard ( assuming that the power on button is apart of the keyboard itself ) ?

 

Hmmm .. Could be a possibility I suppose as it is around the length of time it takes to the do the hold down the power button to force power off .. I'll see if I can find a spare Tosh that I can take a part to check it (though I guess depending on the power button, I could technically test it with a short wire) I do remember noticing that the power button was wired independently of everything else in there ..