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    Inspiron 6400 won't power up

    Discussion in 'Dell' started by steve987, Jul 7, 2007.

  1. steve987

    steve987 Newbie

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    Hi
    Can anyone shed any light on this

    My Inspiron 6400 will not power up at all.

    I have tried spare battery and a spare mains/charger and still the same. The power goes to the laptop and lights the poer light and turns into 3 flshing orange lights followed by 1 green

    Also, very strangely when the power button is pressed on the laptop to turn it on, it clicks once and the adapter gets 'knocked out' as in the green light on the adapter goes out as if it trips it.

    Then you have to turn off the adapter at the mains wall socket to regain power to the adapter, but it keeps happening.

    On battery, it also gives a faint click sound when the power button is pressed and then nothing.

    It is as if the laptop power button is tripping out the power sonehow for some reason.

    I am just out of warranty

    I have taken aprt and cannot see any 'fried' areas of the motherboard - all looks ok, and obviously re-seated the processor, memory amd everything else, but makes no difference, and as i say same problem with another battery and adapter

    Can anyone advise, is it a simple problem or major one?

    Many thanks

    Steve
     
  2. kowell

    kowell Notebook Evangelist

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    This Combinaison of flashing (3 oranges and 1 green) means your battery is busted. (not to be confused with a regular flashing wich means your battery is too hot). I had to change my 9 cell battery after just 1 year and it's easy to find similar cases on a lot of forums. You can also check your battery health's meter. Turn your battery and use the charge meter button's secondary fonction. Keep it pressed down for 5 to 10 seconds and check the lights. In this mode, each lit up light represents a 10-15% degradation. If all 5 lights are lit up, less than half of your battery's "health" remains and the laptop will refuse to boot if the battery is inserted. You can however continue to use the laptop with the battery out and the cord plugged in. Dell sells their 9 cell batteries for +/- 200$ but you can get them on ebay, brand new, for less than 100$.