Help with an Acer that won't boot right.

[surreal]

My friend has an Acer Laptop --Its an ACER Extensa 5420-5687 and it's running VISTA. And it won't boot properly. It usually gets around to it, but not well. It usually takes several times. It was last shut down on Wednesday, around 5AM. So when he tries to boot it, over and over, it will sound like it's going to power up then it doesn't. The light comes on on the cd drive but never on the USB mouse.

It will finally start after multiple attempts. Usually it's just 5 to 10, today after being shut down since Wednesday it was more like 50... And when it finally did come up it still said it was the 19th (the day it was last on) and the time was 3:30 (about 8 hours after it was shut down).

So I'm wondering if this could somehow be related to the bios battery needing to be replaced? Or ??

[stroyal]

Hi Surreal,

Time not being correct usually means the CMOS battery is dead, but it could be soldered to the motherboard in a laptop.

I'm not so sure it is the problem though.
I pulled an old desktop out of storage, and forgot to put in a battery, and installed windows, with no problem.

It wasn't till I went to use windows update, and got an error, that I realised my mistake.

Unless there is a setting in the BIOS you need changed, but it should be reverting to default, and that shouldn't be a problem.

I would test the memory and hard drive, as that is easly done with software, if the computer is running.

I would then boot with a Linux live disk, and see if it boot normaly, to see if it is just a corrupt operating system.

Hope this gets you started, as I'm sure the rest of the gang will chime in soon.

[surreal]

Interesting, it's not reverting back to the default, I forgot about that part. Hmmmm
Dang, I lost my Linux that I had on a usb... I need to make a disk ..
I think I should try that first because memory isn't all going to fail at once is it?

Which Linux should I use? Can you link me to the easiest one?

Thanks.

[Taxmancometh]

Puppy Linux Community Home - Getting Started

USB Puppy Linux Install | USB Pen Drive Linux

[surreal]

I decided to check the memory first using the memory check that's part of Vista. I didn't get more than 2 or 3 percent into the first test (there are 2) before it crashed. So now I'm checking the drive to just be sure. I don't like working on someone else's computer, especially a laptop. I have no idea what I'm doing

You know, I think it's weird, but it will reboot just fine, no problems. The problem is when it is shut down or it goes into hibernation; then it won't reboot without problems.

[stroyal]

1 failed stick, can make it not work.
If you use memtest86, it doesn't use the hard drive.
Memtest86.com - Memory Diagnostic
If it is memory, then run 1 stick at a time to narrow it down.

I use Ubuntu, as it is what I'm use to.
Home | Ubuntu

I can't tell you the exact difference, but reboot is not the same as cold start.

I know once in a while, when a computer has a problem, reboot won't fix it, but a cold start will. Some things don't shutdown on reboot.

Hibernation is a crap shoot, anyway, only half the computers, I've had work with it.

The thing I hate about working on someone else's computer, is I have to do their back up first.
Nobody backs up.
I'm always afraid I'm going to miss something.


If the battery went dead, the BIOS should have gone to default on the following shutdown and stayed there.
If you change it, now, it should revert, on shutdown.

I hate working on laptops.
Unless you have, another one you can't check the CPU. The only thing you can check is memory, hard drive, and screen, for the most part.

[PoonDoggy]

I would still check to see if you can replace the battery due to the classic textbook symptom of clock not keeping time when lappy is turned off.

How to Replace an Acer Extensa CMOS Battery | eHow.com

Instructions

1
Open the screen of your laptop until you can view your keyboard clearly.

2
Find the bar that consists of plastic on the upper portion of your keyboard. Place your screwdriver on one end of this bar and slowly ease it up until you can grab its edge with your finger.

3
Pull the opposite side of the bar in the upward direction with your screwdriver. Then, ease out the whole bar.

4
Take out the screws on the side portion of your keyboard. Pull your laptop keyboard upward and put it on a soft surface such as a bed or pillow.

5
Take out the four screws from the steel plate, which covers the motherboard of your computer, and take off this plate. This allows you to view the CMOS battery, which sits on the lower right portion of your motherboard.

6
Pull the CMOS battery up from the motherboard and take it off. Insert a new CMOS battery, which you can buy at a local computer store. Put the parts of your computer back in the same manner as you took them off.

[surreal]

But could the cmos battery be causing the boot problems? And isn't it weird that it reboots when you hit restart but not if you shut it down and then reboot?

[paul9]

Usually, the battery being flat would cause the bios to not store settings, and cause the clock to be wrong.
So it could cause boot problems, but personally, I would check for a drive or ram problem.

[surreal]

Now I remember memtest86, thanks for the reminder.

I'll pull the battery and replace it next week too. Hopefully I'll find the notebook ram I had around here, it should fit his. The good thing about back up is that I hooked up a Seagate external drive to it last month. It's all backed up.

Now that I think about it, I had an old raid box years ago and I had the same kind of problem with the RAM, and I didn't get any beep errors either, it just kept restarting or booted.

Thanks guys, I'll have it again to work on next Saturday. I also disabled all the hibernation stuff so it won't shut down.

[stroyal]

Your welcome, as always.

[surreal]

BTW, my friend is mighty impressed with all my super smart friends

[stroyal]

We are blushing.

[surreal]

OK, the acer is really dead now, but the strangest thing..
It tries to boot twice. Yep hit the power and the fan spins up once, quits and then spins up again. BTW I took out the RAM switched it, tried booting with just one and double cked that they were in tight.

[surreal]

Can I pull out the hard drive and check it in my desk top? Is the power supply the same?

[Taxmancometh]

NO! You'll need something like this. USB 2.0 Cable for 2.5 IDE HDD hard drive to PC Laptop | eBay

[ShyguyXPC]

Taxman, from what I find on that Laptop models HDD is that it should be a SATA HDD, if it is, then you can just plug it into your desktop PC, using a SATA Cable and SATA HDD Power Connector. Assuming the drive has the standard SATA connectors on it.

I've done this with a 80GB 7200RPM 2.5" SATA Drive before.


And I hope that HDD adapter in your link from Ebay, has a AC Power connector to it, since most I have seen like that, including the one I have, has an AC plug to the wall, then again, mine is a 2.5 or 3.5 Drive adapter, but still needs AC from wall to power the 2.5 IDE's.

If you, surreal, can afford it, you could just buy something like this to have around, handy things every so often if you need to transfer drive data around.

Newegg.com - Rosewill RX-DU101 Plastic 2.5" & 3.5" Black USB 2.0 Docking Station


assuming the drive in your friends laptop is a SATA drive.


This is the one I have, and use Newegg.com - XIGMATEK Secure II USD03 2.5" & 3.5" Black USB 3.0 External Docking Station

Just got it connected and used today, after having it for more than 4 months now, but its much easier to use than my older Thermaltake BlacX USB 2.0 dock similar to this, though that dock does have a 4 port USB Hub built in as well.

but its a thought. maybe a small investment if you have friends having you fix their PC's every so often.

[Taxmancometh]

Ah! Never new they made a 2.5 " drive SATA. So indeed she could just plug it into the computer. That adapter I linked to was supposed to be for a 2.5" PATA drive where you don't need a power adapter unless it's for a 3.5 hard drive. I just looked at the link again and it does have a SATA connection, but of course you probably will need a power adapter I'm not sure, I never used a SATA 2.5 before.

[surreal]

Thanks guys. Why do you think it's doing the double try to boot thing?

[Taxmancometh]

Can you run HDtune on the laptop? HD Tune website