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Laptop boot problem - any suggestions?

nozzer
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Registered: ‎04-08-2009

Laptop boot problem - any suggestions?

Clevo P170EM laptop (just over three years old) with integrated Intel HD Graphics 4000 and dedicated AMD HD7970M card. Both are showing as healthy in the Device manager.

 

When the machine boots up from cold (eg after overnight), there is no BIOS POST showing at all. However, it boots up but with a black screen and the usual LEDs showing, and when W7 starts the display wakes up. After this first boot, the POST displays as normal from square one every time when I reboot.

 

I can get into the BIOS, but as usual with a laptop there are no video options available.

 

I'm a bit concerned that this is the first sign of something sinister going on. AS far as I am aware the BIOS POST doesn't use the dedicated video card but instead uses the internal graphics, ie the Intel one, which is part of the CPU. Is that correct?

 

Anyone got any ideas?

10 REPLIES 10
VileReynard
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Re: Laptop boot problem - any suggestions?

How does a dedicated AMD HD7970M work on a laptop?

What provides the power for it - 100W(?)...

"In The Beginning Was The Word, And The Word Was Aardvark."

nozzer
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Re: Laptop boot problem - any suggestions?

Dunno, but it's got one!

nanotm
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Re: Laptop boot problem - any suggestions?

if its not something simple like the display initially being set to zero illumination on cold boot then;

it sounds like the power supply is not quite good enough to provide the juice required to switch everything on at once, the warm up cycle for the screen uses more juice than once its warmed up and the additional gfx card wasn't power matched to the supply or the battery (or both) for long term usage.

 

in saying that it could also be any of the other parts inside aging and requiring moor oomph to get them going and the display being switched in later in the cycle than it was originally or it could be the display is on its way out and needs more time to warm up, although its supposed to be an LED backlit device based on the specs I read earlier so it shouldn't have the same issue as the old cathode displays had with respect to warm up time,

so I would suggest the problem is likely to be either the PSU wearing out or the battery is starting to show its age or a combination of the two, depending on how its been used over the years that's certainly the most likely combination of problems (and its the problem for one of my laptops on which the battery has died, because the psu has a fixed output and cant provide the total startup power draw)

 

 

just because your paranoid doesn't mean they aren't out to get you
shutter
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Re: Laptop boot problem - any suggestions?

Perhaps the battery is in need of a complete discharge.... and a re-charge...

 

Leave it on overnight... then in the morning. remove the battery.  then ( with the power plug removed ) press and hold the "on" button for 30 seconds. replace the battery, and the power plug. to recharge it...

 

Hopefully, the next time you boot up, all will be well.

 

Wink

nozzer
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Re: Laptop boot problem - any suggestions?

Well, I think it's sorted. Thanks for your replies.

 

It appears to have been some kind of corrupted W7 process. For some unknown reason, selecting "Shut down" on the W7 Start menu was in fact putting the machine into hibernation, hence the lack of POST on startup. I have reselected all the correct settings in the Advanced Power options (although none of them were apparently wrongly selected) and it seems to be ok again. So it was a power problem, but a weird one!

VileReynard
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Re: Laptop boot problem - any suggestions?

If I ever use Windows, I always go for a hard power-off - it may take longer & a subsequent start-up means that I can go and make a cup of coffee.

Windows mostly lacks the stability to go into a Hibernation mode.

"In The Beginning Was The Word, And The Word Was Aardvark."

ReedRichards
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Re: Laptop boot problem - any suggestions?

The point is, Jeremy, that Nozzer was going for a hard power-off.  But, unaccountably, that's not what he was actually getting.

nanotm
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Re: Laptop boot problem - any suggestions?


@nozzer wrote:

Well, I think it's sorted. Thanks for your replies.

 

It appears to have been some kind of corrupted W7 process. For some unknown reason, selecting "Shut down" on the W7 Start menu was in fact putting the machine into hibernation, hence the lack of POST on startup. I have reselected all the correct settings in the Advanced Power options (although none of them were apparently wrongly selected) and it seems to be ok again. So it was a power problem, but a weird one!


I've had that before on my desktop, I cant remember which one but some app I installed or updated rewrote the power settings line in the registry so power off = hibernate, only reason I discovered it was the 20gig loss of drive space to the hib files, funny how you forget quirks on an OS when you stop using it.

just because your paranoid doesn't mean they aren't out to get you
VileReynard
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Re: Laptop boot problem - any suggestions?

A good reason not to have a have a monolithic registry system, accessible by all programs.

"In The Beginning Was The Word, And The Word Was Aardvark."

dvorak
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Re: Laptop boot problem - any suggestions?

if you haven't got anything productive to say I'd leave it.
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