Looking for faulty component

[daniellouwrens]

Hi

Since firing up my Toshiba Satellite L650 Laptop this morning things have been getting worse.

When I switched it on it took a while to boot up, then once it got to the desktop it took another 1-2 minutes for the icons to appear and when an icon was double clicked it took about 2 minutes for the program to start and then the program was not responsive.

I restarted and the whole process took a lot longer, I restarted a couple of times with the same or slower result then the Laptop would only boot to the desktop screen with no icons, even after 10 minutes.

I tried a hard boot to the W7 install disk so I could use the "repair" functions but a "Startup Repair" did not work.

Then I tried a reboot again and the screen just went black, no text or icons, I tried restarting and hard booting but I still only got a black screen.

I tried booting to a bootable CD but this time there was still only a black screen.

I can still access the BIOS and boot drive selector so I chose the CD/DVD drive as the boot drive, with a bootable CD in it,but still only got a black screen.

The CD drive is spinning up but nothing appears.

I am looking for advice based on these events, is this likely a RAM issue or a hard drive issue?

Any advice appreciated.

Thanks

Daniel

 

[Megahertz07]

Let's do the basic.
Schedule a disk check. Open a CMD window and type chkdsk c: /f It will say it is in use and if you want to schedule to next boot=Yes.
Pay attention on the results, specially bad clusters or bad blocks. Report.

 

[daniellouwrens]

Hi

Thanks for your replty

I cannot do a scan, the Operating System does not load nor will it boot to a CD/DVD Drive, all I get is a black screen.

All I can get to is the BIOS or the F12 option of drive to boot to, and selecting either the OS drive
or the CD/DVD Drive still goes to a black screen.

By the way, the Hard Drive is seen in the boot cycle and in the BIOS.

Cheers

Daniel

 

[Megahertz07]

Is your ODD recognized at BIOS?
Check the power and data cables on the HDD and ODD.

 

[daniellouwrens]

Hi

Yes, both are seen in the BIOS.

Being a Laptop I don't think I can check cables

Cheers

Daniel

 

[Megahertz07]

Very strange behavior.
How did you do to try to boot from the win 7 installation disk, by setting ODD as fist option on BIOS or by launching the boot menu and choosing the ODD?

 

[daniellouwrens]

Very strange behavior.
How did you do to try to boot from the win 7 installation disk, by setting ODD as fist option on BIOS or by launching the boot menu and choosing the ODD?

Hi

I used both methods at least twice each.

The drive fires up but nothing happens.

Cheers

Daniel

 

[daniellouwrens]

Hi

I have thought this through and wonder what you think of this.

The Power supply is okay because the machine fires up.
The Bios sees the HDD and ODD so they must be connected and working.
The Graphics is on the CPU.
The DOS boot disks like Memtest and Seatools for DOS don't work and I
believe these are opened in RAM, so it figures that the RAM is the problem.

Does that make sense?

Cheers

Daniel

 

[SIW2]

Did you try booting from usb?

 

[daniellouwrens]

Did you try booting from usb?

Hi

I do not know how to boot from USB, I do not have a bootable USB
as far as I know.

Cheers

Daniel

 

[Megahertz07]

Use Rufus to create a USB boot able disk.
Rufus - Create bootable USB drives the easy way

 

[daniellouwrens]

Hi

thanks for the link to RUFUS, very easy to follow.

I created a bootable USB, I used a W7 iso, I tested the usb on another PC and it booted to
it without a problem.

But my problem Laptop did not, the light on the USB flashed a couple of times, showing
that it had been seen, activated, but went no further.

Cheers

Daniel

 

[daniellouwrens]

Hi

is no-one prepared to theorise on which component has failed?

Cheers

Daniel

 

[Megahertz07]

You have a issue that I never seen before. And believe me, I have seen many.
- You can enter BIOS, so CPU and MB is working.
- On BIOS ODD and the HDD is recognized.
- On boot menu you can see the ODD, USB and the HDD.

I can only think on a BIOS corruption. How old is your computer?
Take out the main battery and wait 2 minutes and reinstall it.
Fist try to load BIOS defaults.
Have you ever replaced the coin battery?
Is the coin battery easy to reach? If it is, with the main battery out, take out the coin battery and wait 2 minutes. Replace with a new one.
Try to re flash the BIOS. Do you have a BIOS update option?

 

[daniellouwrens]

Hi

Thanks for the reply, I will folow the plan you propose and get back to you.

Regards

Daniel

 

[Megahertz07]

When you enter BIOS, is date and time correct?

 

[daniellouwrens]

When you enter BIOS, is date and time correct?

Hi

yes, it is spot on.

Also I cannot find the coin battery and I am reluctant to delve behind things in case
I cannot put them back...

Cheers

Daniel