The power turns on, but after that nothing happens. The hard drive doesn't run and the monitor doesn't even turn on. I know it's not the HDD itself, because normally if that's missing or broken it'll tell you. This just happened all of a sudden today, for no apparent reason. The laptop was dropped some time ago, which caused the CD drive to fail. I didn't have any other problems with it after that.

I really have no clue why this would start happening all of a sudden, but maybe you could help me figure out what could be causing this problem/what needs to be fixed?

Sounds like a fried motherboard or maybe the connection for the video cable came loose.  That happens sometimes.  What kind of machine is it?  Different machines handle differently.

--Terin

I'm leaning towards fried motherboard. A while back I heard a loose part moving around in there (I'm pretty sure it's one of the plastic fasteners inside the laptop, which broke off after the laptop fell) and I'm thinking that may have contributed to the motherboard's death, if that is actually the problem.

Given fried motherboard I hesitate to say it's a compaq. It's a fairly new one though, from after compaq and HP merged. I haven't heard anything bad about their notebook computers yet and I wouldn't expect them to still have the SAME problem, but idk who knows. If it turns out the motherboard died for no reason of my own I will punch them in the face

Try it plugged into the wall without the battery, hdd, and cd rom (and anything else removable/optional including pcmcia cards and USB devices). I would say try a VGA monitor but if the HDD isnt going either thats pretty bad news. Not much else you can try besides that. Is it still under warranty for you to send it in?

Last time this happened to me it was the keyboard. I sent it to a guy my dad knows and he got it fixed for £110($220). I don't think it's the HDD but yeah from your situation it seems leaning towards a fried motherboard!

Just for the hell of it I started it up last night and IT WORKED. But it isn't working again today. Given that it can still start up and work fine sometimes, it seems like something might be loose?

It's not under warranty anymore. I can take it to this place nearby to get it fixed, but they charge like $70 an hour. I wonder if I can buy a laptop without a HDD, cd-rom drive, and pretty much everything else that still works in this one.

What are the stats on the laptop?  A model number would be helpful too and I could give you an estimate on what the parts would cost, etc.  Post-HP/Compaq merge laptops aren't always the best -- I have a pre-HP/Compaq merge that still works -- but most of the post-merge ones I've worked with have all failed by now.  Are you any good at working on normal desktop computers (i.e. building them, swapping processors, installing drives, etc)?  I could probably dig up a service manual for it if you feel like trying to repair it yourself.

--Terin

Since its not under warranty, you can unscrew the case and look around and make sure nothing is loose like you said. Also clear the dust on the circuits and fans, and make sure all the connections are in, and that none of the circuitboards are cracked or burnt.

Just got back yesterday so I could try these.

I took it apart as far as I could (all the drives out, every panel unscrewed), but I'm not sure how to get the whole thing apart. What I could see all looked okay though, nothing looked burnt or cracked or disconnected.

It's a pretty good laptop with 2GB ram, 100GB HDD, some AMD dual processor, etc. I can build a PC, but I don't have much knowledge on laptops at all. I'm not sure this one even comes apart


I can get my college loan refund pretty soon though, so I'm thinking of just combining some of that with what money I have to buy a new one.

don't take it in to be fixed, scrap it: save the hard drive and rig it into the next desktop you get (or get an external hard drive that you can take apart and insert it into the shell)

I suggest you look for a repair shop. If it only takes 60-120$ to repair you can still save yourself a bunch of cash. If the laptop can still turn on fine (if even only sometimes), then there's definitely hope to fix it