Diagnosing a Dead Laptop


kuru

Laptop und Trachtenjanker
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I've been asked to take a look at a dead laptop, an acer Aspire e17.

According to the user it abruptly stopped working when she did a 180 with it on the table, for another person to look at the screen.
The power cable wasn't connected at the time. It's 2 - 3 years old and looks like new.

When powered up the fan fully ramps up for a second as per usual. After a moment of quiet it comes back and stays at max RPM.
There's no beep code and no display.

I opened it up to check for loose connectors, water damage or any other obvious stuff. At least from the top of the PCB I couldn't make out anything. It's shiny and very clean.

I'm looking for ideas on what to check when I get back to it on monday. Then I'll probably remove the board and look at the underside.
 
Happened the same to me, with exactly the same effects, except that after some turning on/off it died totally.

In my case the only visible thing was that the CPU was burned... I found out that the cooling paste over the CPU was completely dry and wasn't anymore in contact with the heatsink.
I had that Laptop for like 4 years and wasn't exactly one of those you can open at will (I had to remove 57 screws and broke some plastic pins to reach the motherboard).
 
You have some thing to check:

Bios: could bios be accessed?
If Bios is ok you should check booting with a live Linux Distro.

If not possible maybe the Motherboard or CPU only, or GPU (for the fun) is broken
 
I haven't tried mashing DEL etc., worth a try!

And I haven't tried connecting it to a display over HDMI.

Motherboard and CPU are what I've been thinking, too. Still weird that a slow vertical movement would cause such damage.
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57 screws
!!! Holy moly.
I'll definitely look at the underbelly to check the CPU.
 
Pretty sure you have the Dark screen problem, either in software (a dead BIOS due to empty BIOS Battery Cell -replace that first before attempting reflashing it):


Or in Hardware (Just the cable getting loose - should be able to test connecting the VGA port to a monitor):

 
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BIOS battery cell? It's a long time since systems used battery backed RAM to store settings. Usually the battery is still left to power the RTC when the system's otherwise unpowered, but that's all it does these days. In my experience, systems will still come up even if the RTC battery is dead.
 
I've been asked to take a look at a dead laptop, an acer Aspire e17.

According to the user it abruptly stopped working when she did a 180 with it on the table, for another person to look at the screen.
The power cable wasn't connected at the time. It's 2 - 3 years old and looks like new.

When powered up the fan fully ramps up for a second as per usual. After a moment of quiet it comes back and stays at max RPM.
There's no beep code and no display.

I opened it up to check for loose connectors, water damage or any other obvious stuff. At least from the top of the PCB I couldn't make out anything. It's shiny and very clean.

I'm looking for ideas on what to check when I get back to it on monday. Then I'll probably remove the board and look at the underside.

By doing a 180 you mean opening it flat on a table?

If so, check the LCD wiring and/or plug it to another screen (VGA, HDMI or whatever it has...)

Not every notebook beeps on POST, you can usually turn the beep off in BIOS.

It could be worth a shot performing a NVRAM reset. Procedure is different for each PC.
 
I worded that weird; she spun it around for another person to look at.

Highly doubt that this user has even heard of BIOS. She uses the machine basically only for two websites.

Didn't think about disconnecting the battery either, thanks!
 
Or maybe it doesn't even have a motherboard buzzer... I would try this, from easier to more difficult, trying to boot on each step:

1st plug it to another screen.
2nd try/check what FBnil suggests.
3rd check the hinge/LCD wiring.
4th remove RAM, HDD and peripherals, insert only 1 RAM and try to boot it that way.
5th Perform a NVRAM reset and try to boot it as step 4.

If after 5 you get no video signal then most likely there's some kind of hardware problem, most likely dead GPU, so list it on ebay as not working/for spares only.
 
It works now after desoldering the battery.
It's a wee bit weird that it comes on - fan and LED - and goes off after about 5 seconds. Then it starts again properly and stays on. It seems to be unhappy with something.
Oh well I'm sure the owner will be happy she doesn't need to buy a new one.

Thank you all for your suggestions!
 
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