One of those "My laptop isn't working!" threads...

[Theo]

*stereotypical repair company customer*
My laptop isn't working! Any ideas??
[/hoho]

Yes... so I found an old Gateway Solo laptop (Pentium 2, not sure on the rest..) in my mothers cupboard. She says she has no use for it, so I'm free to give it to Ellie for when she starts back at Uni.

It hasn't been used since the summer I think, so after removing it from it's bag, I plug it in, as you do, and the power supply detector led came on, as did the little green light on the psu brick. So I press the on button, and the power LED comes on.

Nothing else though, no HDD clicks, no LCD picture, no fan whirring, not even the power up "mreeeeeeeeee" laptops seem to make. The power LED stayed on though, along with the psu led.

I tried again, and I noticed that the HDD LED flashed momentarily, yet the same thing happened as before. I checked all the drives were fitted correctly, the battery was in properly, I also tried without the battery. Still the same.

I left it plugged in overnight to see if the battery might have charged, but it didn't... so I'm guessing that errr.. something isn't getting power probably?

I have little experience with laptops, to be honest - except changing hdds, installing operating systems, gutting them, etc.

I know it's probably VERY vague, and I apologise, but does anyone have a clue what I might be able to do? Might it just be dead, and I should just salvage what's left of it?

[Saracen]

I had EXACTLY the same symptoms from an old laptop - and the problem proved to be ........... BIOS battery dead.

It seems that if the laptop is left unused and unpowered for long enough (some months in my case) the main battery runs out, and then the BIOS battery died.

I found that, in my case, repeatedly trying to get it started and occasionally (by which, I mean maybe one try in 50) it would boot. Then it would be back to it's old tricks. When it booted after this, all BIOS settings were obviosly lost, but just starting it on Auto cured that.

Eventually, I got it to boot, and left it running for several days. Then I powered it down, left it for a day, powered it up and repeated this process. It took several cycles of this to recondition the battery, but it now seems ok. Last time I left it powered off and not connected to mains, it was left for about a month and still powered up OK. I haven't hadthe problem since, but I very nearly junked the machine, as I have a much newer laptop anyway. Nonetheless, I sourced a new BIOS battery.

I'd suggest you investiage this technique, or get a replacement BIOS battery. It's certainly worth a try before scrapping it.

[Theo]

Sorted! Thank you ever so much, sir - very much appreciated

I switched the bios battery, so now this one works perfectly. Tis a P2 400MHz, 256MB RAM, 12xDVD, 6GB HDD. Not a bad find, I suppose!

[Number5]

Nice one! Saracen ive got a similar scenario at work that I'll try this out on, cheers