Any Computer gurus out there

[modmachz]

I need help with my laptop, Just had a new hard drive put in by the Geek Squad, After they totally Fvucked me right up the A$$, Now the computer keeps shutting down for no reason, had it back and the geeks took two days to say nothing was wrong and to just take it because they had it on over nite with no problems. I get it home and started to do some work on it and bang in 20 minutes the prick shut down. so I looked at the battery signal meter wouldn't you think on ac power the battery should stay at 100% charge and not drop off? well it drops off. I put a new battery in this laptop last august along with a new power supply. I am gonna try and get another battery and see if that does it. also this is a Toshiba a 35 satellite about 6 yrs old.

Any thoughts or help would be greatly rewarded.
Donny Kompas
262-521-2250

[WickedSix]

not to sound dumb...but did you check out the standby settings?

[Reverend Cooper]

a laprop will run with a bad battery or none at all with the cord plugged in

[moels]

If he was doing work it shouldn't of went to standby, but maybe he let it sit?

[modmachz]

Yes I did, It happens at any time while I am typing all off a sudden it shits on itself

[moels]

Do you use it with a power cable and it does the same thing?

[flyin_blue_egg]

does it give you a low battery warning or anything like that??

[modmachz]

yes I thought no matter what the status the battery is in what difference does it make when its on ac power?? But it still will do it.

[modmachz]

The low battery alarms are set at 25% they will go off.

[Slow Joe]

Is it overheating??

Edit: Nevermind...

It's most likely overheating... Is there anything blocking the fan on the bottom of the laptop? Mine use to overheat once in a while and shut town... It was a Toshiba Satellite from around '04...

[WickedSix]

energy star setting?? battery conservation setting?? I seem to remember my last laptop having that problem would beep then shut down...think it had a bad energy save setting...

plus there is always the virus option...I had that trojan that shut the computer off in like 5 minutes b4 lol

[modmachz]

I really do not think its over heating, I do keep the fans and everything clean. How would it really overheat anyways sitting on a table or counter.
also this is a satellite A 35 by toshiba 2002 model.

[Slow Joe]

Well, there'd have to be something blocking the fan, or the fan would of had to of stopped working... Mine use to overheat because I'd leave it sitting on my bed.

[moels]

My toshiba laptop gets pretty hot if it sits on anything, but it never shuts down like that.

[05caddyext]

I have a satellite also, at least 6 years old. I have to have it propped up on a book or something tall to keep the fans clear. If I don't it shuts off pretty quickly. I put a new hard-drive and a new dvd burned in it last fall so I had the entire computer apart. I cleaned out the fans real good, all the internals as well. Still overheats if I dont have it propped up. Buy a cool-pad, they work well and are only about 30 bucks.

[Cryptic]

I'd take the whole thing apart to blowout and reseat everything...
6 years old its very likely the CPU fan or possibly the video card fan is gunked up with dust.

[modmachz]

I'd take the whole thing apart to blowout and reseat everything...
6 years old its very likely the CPU fan or possibly the video card fan is gunked up with dust.

How hard is that to clean, can I just pull bottom covers off and blow it out?

Where do you get a cool pad from?

[ND4SPD]

Hold on there tiger... laptops are a pain in the ass to get apart, and even harder to get back together and have everything still work so I would strongly advise you ignore what Cryptic said. Start out with just taking a compressor set to about 100psi and blow the shit out of every opening in it you can find. If you're lucky, you'll blow whatever dust bunnies you have in there out of one of the larger openings. If not, well, maybe they'll get blown off of the CPU heatsink and into a part of the laptop where it doesn't matter. *IMPORTANT* DO NOT spin up any of the fans using the compressor. You will overspin and wreck them. If at all possible take a pin or a paperclip and stick it into the fan housing to keep the fan from spinning. If you can't see any fans from the outside, then you probably won't have to worry about this.

It does sound like your computer is overheating, but if you want to try to make sure... get this program, install it and run it.

http://www.7byte.com/hotcpu.exe

It will stress the CPU so that it heats up. Chances are if you're having an overheat issue, this will cause it to shut down in a much shorter amount of time than just using it normally. If you blast it with a compressor and it's still shutting off on you... then it could very well be that the heatsink has come loose from the CPU in which case it would need to be disassembled and have new heatsink compound applied. If you don't want to do it yourself I do computer work on the side and would be willing to look at it for you. I've been working on computers for over 15 years (did a stint with Geek Squad too, so I'm not suprised that you had issues with them).

[modmachz]

Call me Please.

414-852-3534
Donny...

[ND4SPD]

Will try to give you a call after dinner... wife is on the phone atm.

[Cryptic]

he's right about laptops are hard to take apart... but I've done a few in my day

[ND4SPD]

Donny, this is what your old hard drive was doing when I tried to recover it. As I mentioned on the phone I've never heard a drive make this noise before (usually they make the loud "click", but I've never heard them "beep" before). I suppose I should have mentioned that if you wanted I could have shipped it off to a company in Madison that has a clean room. That usually costs upwards of $600 to $1000 and I was pretty sure you didn't want to spend that.

http://i215.photobucket.com/albums/cc93/xND4SPDx/Miscellaneous/th_MVI_1924.jpg (http://s215.photobucket.com/albums/cc93/xND4SPDx/Miscellaneous/?action=view&current=MVI_1924.flv)

The drive has since been destroyed and disposed of to safeguard any personal information that you may have had on it. The destruction process involves disassembly of the drive and destruction of the actual physical disks inside. The discs were made out of a metal coated polycarbonate (which was news to me). Most of the drives I have dealt have discs that are made of aluminum.

If you were at all curious about the inner workings of a hard drive, this is how they work inside.

http://i215.photobucket.com/albums/cc93/xND4SPDx/Miscellaneous/th_HD.jpg (http://s215.photobucket.com/albums/cc93/xND4SPDx/Miscellaneous/?action=view&current=HD.flv)

[07ROUSHSTG3]

geek squad FTL.



that is all.

[ND4SPD]

Yep, been there done that. When I worked for GS I knew more than all the other techs combined ('course I was coming out of the gate with near 20 years of experience) and got more work done than all the other techs combined. GS was a good company when it was founded... but BBY has since run it into the ground. The guy that started Geek Squad is rumored to be getting ready to jump ship and once again start his own company.

[modmachz]

Yep, been there done that. When I worked for GS I knew more than all the other techs combined ('course I was coming out of the gate with near 20 years of experience) and got more work done than all the other techs combined. GS was a good company when it was founded... but BBY has since run it into the ground. The guy that started Geek Squad is rumored to be getting ready to jump ship and once again start his own company.

This thing is getting worse!!
Now when I start it up cold it shuts down numerous times, so heat is out of the question, out of no where it will just shut down. I am getting the new battery back next week, not sure but plugged into the wall what difference would it make if there is a battery in it or not? if you are on ac power it should stay on regardless!!! Better hurry up before this prick shuts down.

[H8RADE]

Retarded, half-assed advice FTL...
I would pop a new HD in there and try to load Windoze XP.
If you get past the format stage, you can eliminate the HD as a culprit.
Next, fire it up in Safe mode so you can eliminate the graphics card and other Add-Ons as a source of trouble.
Does this happen if you are on batteries without the AC plugged in?
The current that flows across the circuit board that charges the battery could also be the issue, because if there is a burned trace, the voltage will spike and the CPU will shut down to save itself.
Lets try and eliminate one potential source of trouble at a time before you start blasting air into a laptop case.
100 psi of air can unseat ribbon cables, blow out plugs, and push wires into areas where they shouldn't be.
Air from a can is OK if you have the beast apart and can see wat you are blowing on.
Be it the Geek Squad, RocketFish, or some guy who has a degree in punch card machines, it doesn't matter.
Some people never learn to troubleshoot properly, and all the 'certs' in the world won't erase those bad habits.
...
Google your laptop make and model with your symptoms and look for similar issues experienced by others.
Can you see you device manager?
If so, is everything 'kosher'.
How about a log file from your event viewer?

[modmachz]

Retarded, half-assed advice FTL...
I would pop a new HD in there and try to load Windoze XP.
If you get past the format stage, you can eliminate the HD as a culprit.
Next, fire it up in Safe mode so you can eliminate the graphics card and other Add-Ons as a source of trouble.
Does this happen if you are on batteries without the AC plugged in?
The current that flows across the circuit board that charges the battery could also be the issue, because if there is a burned trace, the voltage will spike and the CPU will shut down to save itself.
Lets try and eliminate one potential source of trouble at a time before you start blasting air into a laptop case.
100 psi of air can unseat ribbon cables, blow out plugs, and push wires into areas where they shouldn't be.
Air from a can is OK if you have the beast apart and can see wat you are blowing on.
Be it the Geek Squad, RocketFish, or some guy who has a degree in punch card machines, it doesn't matter.
Some people never learn to troubleshoot properly, and all the 'certs' in the world won't erase those bad habits.
...
Google your laptop make and model with your symptoms and look for similar issues experienced by others.
Can you see you device manager?
If so, is everything 'kosher'.
How about a log file from your event viewer?

took cover off heat sink, cleaned heat sink, was really clean! Put new heat sink lube in there and reinstalled.. still does it! does it with battery or ac power..

[H8RADE]

took cover off heat sink, cleaned heat sink, was really clean! Put new heat sink lube in there and reinstalled.. still does it! does it with battery or ac power..

Possibly an improper device driver or a resource conflict.
Is there a blue screen before the reboot?
Even for just a brief second?
Logfile FTW!!!
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/308427