Service Forum

[fabianusv]

hi victor,

i can't find a forum for posting other than IBM issues.... i saw your idea about creating new forum for others brand.... but can't find where to post.... so that i just post it here.

i will move or re-post if you tell me there is a new forum / category.

anyway, my problem is a compaq presario 12xl405a which can start-up but can not boot-up..... the power-on LED lit on but no activity of the hard-drive.
the hard-drive seems start to boot but failed.

i have change to a new hard-drive but still the same result.

is there any possibility that the ATMEL which hold the information about boot-strap loader is damaged?

regards,
fabianusv

[Staff note:] Hardware problems discussed in this section. Bob

[victor]

The bootstrap loader is located in the first sector of each bootable volume, usually C:. This is not the BIOS loader.

For Windows 9x/Me this can be fixed with sys command. For XP, boot from the original XP CD, enter in repair console and launch 'fixboot'.

There are many ways to check if is a software or hardware problem with the drive, but I hope you did find a solution till now. Sorry for the late reply..

[fabianusv]

[victor]

I do not think the BIOS chip is damaged unless someone tried to reflash it.
I guess the motherboard is faulty, I mean the IDE controllers (possible Intel 82801 must be re-balled) do not work, or DMA controller is in sufference

Is not a problem to work on AC w/o batteries, au contraire, is better to preserve the battery life by removing and not using it everyday.
You can find a nice resource here, courtesy of Thinkwiki:
http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Maintenance#Battery_treatment

[fabianusv]

victor the boss.... thank you,

i will try to re-ball the BGA chips i found on the mainboard.

thanks for sharing your experience and thoughts.

now, i have two units of notebooks which have the same symptoms (both units can power on but can't boot) which are compaq presario 1200 12xl405a and acer travelmate 291xci.

is there any possibility these two units failure were caused by Electrostatic Discharge (ESD) ???
i try to recall the case, i remember i unplugged the power adapter socket from the electricity socket first then the dc-power socket from the notebook.
my friend told me, i should unplug the dc-power socket first then the electricity socket if running the notebook w/o battery because unplugging the electricity socket first may produce spike (or something similar to electricity spike) and somehow cause ESD to BGA chips inside the notebook........
what is your thoughts here?

many thanks for all your help guru....

regards,
fabianusv

[linuxian]

I myself have a dead compaq laptop, model: Evo N620c.
it will power on with nothing on screen, fan is on, but nothing else ... i have looked on some forums on hp website ... ofcourse nobody has a solution not even an explanation of whats wrong with those laptops ... just CHANGE the motherboard & SHUTUP... but i will never never do that because buying a motherboard is = to buying a new better super fast whole laptop.

[fabianusv]