S96J Assembly problems...

I got my S96J today, and after putting it all together (following the installation manual), I pushed the power button. The CD drive started to spin, the light turned on beside the power button and under the lightbulb simbol at the bottom, but the screen never lit up or displayed anything. Any ideas? This is the first laptop i've built, but I'm almost positive that I installed everything correctly, so what could cause a black screen like this? Processor not installed correctly? Memory? Hard drive?

Thanks for the help

 

Enter the BIOS. There may be a hard drive setting you need to switch.....something about OS Install mode or something.

I think the BIOS is DEL.

 

reseat the ram

 

try removing and putting everything back in, make sure the RAM is in right aswell as the HDD.

The Bios is F2. Try getting into it.

 

I can't get into bios; nothing shows up at all when I hit the power button, it does not go to POST or anything. The back light doesn't even turn on.

I have tried reseating the ram and changing its slot, but it does not fix the problem. I think the computer would at least go to POST if there was bad ram though, so I do not think that the ram is the problem.

Is there any chance that MWAVE didn't load a bios onto the motherboard? I'm hoping that I do not have a bad graphics card or motherboard, but I don't see what else could be causing this problem (CPU?).

 

Remove everything and put it in again.

Also make sure there is nothing lose inside it.

 

Tried that, with no luck.
When I push Scroll lock or Num lock, no light turns on in the upper right, is one supposed to?

 

Take out the battery and unplug it - leave it for about 20 mins, then plug it back in.

Cat

 

Still no luck, even after the battery removal. I'll try it again in the morning, then I think I'll have to give mwave tech support a call.
Could this be a processor problem? I got the processor on Ebay for $100, and before I send the laptop in for an RMA I want to make sure that its not just a bad processor. I have no other computer to try the processor in and I have no other processor to try in this computer, so I don't know of any way I could test it.

If I let the laptop run for a couple minutes with the black screen, turn it off, and then feel the heatsink, its hot, although no fans have turned on yet. Do the S96J fans normally turn on at bootup like some other laptops Ive seen?

Thanks for all the help

 

Have you tried resetting the notebook? There is a reset hole on bottom near the front. Their is a symbol next to hole. Use a paperclip. Try resetting after re-seating ram.

 

Ya give a reset a try. I had similar problems as well with a Dell notebook a few months back - it wouldn't turn on and was very intermittent. The battery removal worked sometimes, and the reset worked other times, but overall the problem was that the power adapter was bad. Make sure you give a try booting up just on battery and see if that works. If not, and you've already tried reseating the ram, booting w/o hard disk and DVD drive and Wifi Card well then the proc could be bad.

Cat

 

I tried it again this morning with no luck, then I tried resetting ram and computer, nothing.
I then tried again to take everything except the processor out sequentially and tried to boot it, but it was the same every time, so the problem is either the processor or video card/motherboard. How likely is it that my motherboard is bad? Is there any way to test the processor, can I take it to Best Buy or something and see if they have problems with it as well?

 

About the only way to test it is to put CPU in another notebook and try it. There are not a lot of Core Duo notebooks out there that are easy to access CPU. They would not test it for you at Best Buy.


Did the CPU via e-bay come with a warranty? This is a Yonah (Core Duo) and not a Merom (Core 2 Duo), correct?

 

You turned the lock-screw on the CPU socket right? This sounds like what the machines do when that screw is left in the unlocked position.

 

I found the problem. I took everything apart again, and this time I took a look at the bottom of the CPU - there was a severely bent pin on the inside row I included a picture so you can see how bad it is.
(I can't seem to get the picture to show up in the post, so here's a link.)


I'm guessing that the pin was bent when I got it (the packaging was horrible - weak plastic case inside non-padded envelope) and screwing down the heatsink made it worse. I've emailed the seller to see if he has any more and what he wants me to do with it, but if I end up having to unbend it myself, does anybody have any tips? It cost me $100 shipped, so it wouldn't be a HUGE loss if I broke it, but I would definately rather not have to buy a new one.

Also, does anyone know where to find a pin diagram of the intel core duos? I searched google but couldnt find one. Maybe this is just a ground pin?

 

If the pin is not broken, it just bend a bit, it should be used again. Try to use a small flat screw driver to be gently bend it back to the original position and setting. It will work and let it up and running.
Cheers

 

I figured that I had nothing to lose, so I decided to try and straighten the pin. I picked it up a little with a safety pin, then slid a credit card around it in 4 directions until it was almost straight, which worked pretty well until it started to spin around instead of unbend. It still had a kink in the middle of it, so I attempted to use the pin again and straighten that. It snapped.
However, figuring I really had nothing else to loose, I straightened the now-loose pin with some pliers and dropped it into the slot where it would have gone. I put the heatsink back on, and hit the power button. It works! I'm installing windows right now. I'll let you guys know if I run into any problems that could be related to it, but I'm hoping to upgrade to a core 2 duo sometime soon so hopefully I can get by.

Thanks for all the help

Andy

 

good job!

you have have trouble gettin it out though

 

That's what micro tweezers are for .

 

I hope that constant cooling and heating won't do anything to the CPU...
I don't want to think what happens if a pin goes out in the middle of the work...

 

That happened to me too. I didn't have a bent pin... but I took everything out and put everything back in, making sure the CPU was well seated.

It came on just fine the second time. Scared me to death the first time

I'd still RMA the processor if I were you.

Krista