200ARC freezes when moved? Used to lock up...

So I have this 200ARC im working on. I am rather bothered by this issue, because I am not sure if it is a bad trade on the board somewhere, or if it is something really simple.

The problem - if you move the laptop around a bit / bump it (i notice it happens when I hold it by the hard drive area), the unit will freeze. The video displays like it was and freezes in place.

When I first got it, the unit was rebooting any time you moved it whatsoever, and then I took it apart and put it back together and now it is doing this.

Any clues or suggestions? I think it might be a bad cable from the IDE to the board, as it commonly fails, but what symptom would that give if it really were bad?

 

any ideas?

 

This laptop has a known issue (by Gateway) in that the cable connecting the hard drive will come loose eventually. They sent me an upgraded cable and a little piece of sticky tape to keep the new cable in place. This the only laptop they made that had a cable connecting the hard drive. It seems to have solved my problem (I replaced it about 90 days ago).

Hope this helps.

 

Yes -- check the hard drive. It seems that the 200ARC has a higher than usual failure rate on the HDD, too (I've had to replace mine and I've heard of others)

And FYI -- this laptop was not made by Gateways usual sources but Samsung -- it's a X10 without discrete graphics.

Bernie

 

This laptop get sooo hot on the palmrest, how do you even use it?

 

actually, this laptop doesn't get hot at all for me.

I have a new / different HD in it, and I have a new ribbon cable in it - it still has the issue. I am thinking it might be a bad trace on the motherboard or something grounding out.

Its like when the laptop has pressure applied to the chasis on a certain spot, it just locks up or sometimes it might just reboot entirely (almost like hitting a reset button on a desktop.)

I am still not sure what the issue is.

Ive tried:
new HD
New HD Cable
New Ram
Took the whole thing apart and nothing looked odd. When I first got it, it would reboot every time it was bumped what-soever. Then after i took it apart, it stopped rebooting and started locking up, but then it also took alot more effort to make it restart. That is why I am guessing a bad trace or it grounding out somehow.

 

any ideas?