HP Elitebook 8560p Won't Shutdown

In short - I replaced the DVD drive with a hard drive and now the laptop won't fully shut down.

I just got the Elitebook 8560p a week ago and have been very happy with it so far. Did a couple of upgrades right away since it was a fairly low-specced model from Microcenter. Added an extra 4GB RAM stick - no issues. Replaced the built-in 500GB HDD with a 128GB Crucial M4 SSD, and did a clean Windows install - no issues. Removed the DVD drive from the "Upgrade Bay" and replaced it with the original 500GB Toshiba HDD to use as a secondary drive. Wiped all data on it and replaced with a single empty NTFS partition.

This is when I started having problems. The drive works great, and there are no noticeable errors when using the system. However, when I attempt to shut down the computer (Start -> Shutdown) Windows shuts down but the computer won't. The screen is completely blank, but the lights are still on and the fan is still spinning. I accidentally left it this way for a few hours and when I got to it the case was very hot (usually never heats up, even during heavy usage).

When I choose "Restart", it works correctly about 50% of the time, and the other 50% it hangs again. Shutdown always causes it to hang, requiring me to hold down the power button to fully turn it off. When I boot up again, if gives me the "Windows did not shut down properly" message with options for Safe Mode. I've already made sure all my drivers are up to date. I'm using the F.20 BIOS (don't want to update to F.22 due to SATA speed limit bug). Any suggestions?

 

So... there is one thing missing - you didn't write which reduction to HDD do you use (HP original or caddy from Ebay or from another place).

I got one from Ebay in July last year. When it arrive, I found that caddy was for previous model and I had problems (same as you) with shutdown. After that I did some tests with more caddies for that guy from China and I find out that 8560w (and from what you say - 8560p too) have different pin connection [1] (-> Diagnostic SATA pin MUST NOT be connected to ground signal). I find solution by modifying circuit board of caddy [2], so that China guy did same modification to his caddies too. Now it works like charm.

First picture - bad circuit board.
Second picture - modified board.

=> Get another caddy or modify its circuit board.

 

Thanks so much for your response! I've tried a million things with Windows 7 and BIOS configuration and was starting to give up hope.

I did get my caddy off eBay from a seller called NYComputek so perhaps that is the issue. ( New 2nd hard drive Caddy For HP EliteBook 8460p 8560p 8760p | eBay)

Could you clarify the circuitboard modifications you made? In the second image, it looks like you simply bent back / disconnected the 3rd pin from the right (the one with the red "Manufacturing diagnostic" line). What tool did you use to do this? Are any other changes necessary?

Alternatively, could you recommend where I could buy a caddy that you know works correctly?

Thanks again!

 

Yes, It's only that pin. At first I used old transformer soldering gun with desoldering pump to put away tin, then I used a sharp knife to finish it. (But you can use just anything - only goal is cut off that connection.)

I have this one: FOR HP EliteBook Workstation 8560w 8760w 2nd HDD SSD hard drive Caddy with bezel | eBay
It's probably third version, all of them tested on me .

 

I'm having the same problem with an Elitebook 8460p and a random ebay caddy which I purchased a few years ago. I'm gonna try this, I'll edit this post with the results.

Edit: I just did the modification you suggested, it seems to be working! The board is my caddy was identical to the one in the picture you posted, I just desoldered the pin and removed it.

Thanks for the tip!

 

That's good. It seems that all 8*60* models have this problem.

 

It worked, thanks centaurian! I took apart the caddy and removed that 3rd pin using an exacto knife and tweezers, now the laptop shuts down fine every time. It even gave me a chance to replace the generic caddy bevel with the original DVD bevel. Thanks again!

 

This worked great for me too on my 8460p, I also bought my expansion bay off of ebay. I just wanted to post and say Thanks. It was a huge help!!!

 

I took the caddy from my 2540p and put it in my 2560p and have had this issue as well. I wonder if mine have a connection there.

 

I confirmed that my multi-week nightmare was indeed this specific issue. A 2560p certainly needs to have the diagnostic lead disconnected.

Thanks for the help!

 

I've had the same issue with a 2560p, although I'd rather describe it as annoyance then nightmare. It didn't cause any issues with windows for me, just that I had to hold down the power button nearly every time on shutdown. Either way thanks a lot for figuring out what the exact cause is and how to fix it. I didn't feel like cutting the small lead (and risking to damage something else while trying) and instead went ahead to isolate the sata connector itself. Cutting a thin piece of tape (transparent tesafilm in my case) and putting it over the connector pin works fine so far.

 

Thanks you guys, i've fixed my problem. Hehe :thumbsup:

 

Thanks a lot! It works for my Dell Vostro 3460 too.

 

Thanks for the tip! I just used a knife to pull the pin out of the board. Works great so far on my 8460p.

 

Thank you for information! Works great on 8560p!

You are the best :thumbsup:
RGD

 

holy crap you're the best dude took about 1 minute to do with a pocket knife... my 8560w wasnt shutting down either, and this page was the first hit on google luckily i decided to go here. i just got the tip of my 2.5 inch kershaw in between the connector and the pin, then slowly pulled the pin from the socket, and that connection snapped off once i got it all the way pulled out. good job man works like a charm now i thought my workstation was ate up !!!!

 

This information is invaluable! Much appreciated. :thumbsup:

 

Thanks for the tip, this solved my problem;

I found another way to do it, you don't have to dismantle the caddy
My caddy has a small white dip switch next to S-ATA connector; changed his position and now the problem is solved
I saw some different models and some have the switch inside caddy, others outside (one of the margins)

 

LE: my 9mm caddy have the switch outside and i think the 12.7 have it inside

 

Thanks, this fixed my problem with my Dell Vostro 3450!

 

Thanx for the solution. It worked just fine.

 

Absolutely Genius!

Had the same exact problem with a HP Probook 4430s. Wouldn't shutdown, restart, or sleep properly 75% of the time with the caddy inserted. Never had the time to fully investigate the issue, but figured it was probably something with the caddy.

My caddy appeared to be the same as the one ilyutza pictured, but didn't have either an external or internal switch. Took the caddy apart and found the right three pins joined together with solder on the circuit board. Heated up the soldering iron, reworked the solder so that it was only connecting the right two ground pins and not the diagnostic pin, and reassembled. Tested the shutdown, restart, and sleep functions a couple dozen times and works 100% of the time now.

Thanks for all the tips!

 

$Deity bless the Internet all all who sail in her!

Thanks Centaurian - this fix worked for my 8530w. I just used the tiniest screwdriver I could find to lever out the connecting pin and twisted it off. Works like a charm THANKS.

 

Ditto everyone else. Many thanks to Centaurian. Worked perfectly for HP Elitebook 8560w. Just melted out that 3rd pin from the right and voila!

 

I had the same issue as OP, sata ebay caddy, using 8460w, I had old bios, and other older drivers.

I decided to upgrade to windows 8 pro, and SSD, so I put a Samsung 840 ssd as main drive, and then installed windows 8 that way, I noticed restarts would hang and shutdown would log off only and sleep wouldnt work. I thought it was a driver issue. Until i tried to go back to windows 7 that is on the caddy original HP hd, nope had same exact issues in windows 7. Searched and saw this thread, and took out the caddy and installed the dvdrom back.


So my issue was windows 8 not wanting to shutdown, just logs off and screen off, fans and wifi and other lights on. I updated to latest bios and sleep and restart works, I just put back the optical drive for now.

Sleep is fine restart is fine... I found out that the feature for fast startup is causing the issue.

Went into the power options (win+ x) , next "choose what the power buttons do" next "change settings that are currently unavailable" and below uncheck "turn on fast startup"

For whatever reason this is causing issues, and its not working properly as it should on other windows 8 pcs that I have.

This is really annoying as the SSD boots the system fast and I would like to shutdown the laptop, and cold boot.


My next quest: I did install some of the HP software thats for windows 7 64bit. But I still cant get all the HP FN buttons to work, brightness for example and the auto ambient light F11 does not work either.

 

Here you'll find whatever you need.

 

i didnt try yet, but since a lot people thank, im sure it works. thanks a lot, it was turlly a problem, and solving so simple

 

Many thanks, great solution! Also works for Asus N56VZ using Amazon Caddy (Salcar brand)

 

Awesome huge thanks! 8560w

 

BRAVO!!!

Used the method posted in the earlier part of this thread. My caddy was also bought on eBay from an outfit out of NY. After reimaging the laptop, I noticed it would not restart or shutdown without a hard power down. Did a little research and found this thread. Sure as shi-taki mushrooms this was the problem. I pulled apart the caddy and it matched exactly the pictures found on the first page of the thread. Once I saw how small the leads were, I was a bit intimidated, but after taking a good look at it, I snuck an exacto blade to the back of the that third trace and just popped it forward. The trace/wire came right up and off the board. Nice and clean. Popped the caddy back into my 8460p and was able to restart and shutdown without any problems.

I will definitely give a heads up to the seller of this item, if he cares. This was the second issue I had with this caddy. The first one being the crap bezel that came with it. Had to use the bezel from the optical drive.

Thank you guys for the help. Brilliant, just brilliant!

 

Amazing.... this thread should really belong in the general category for all those who've bought that generic caddy. This totally fixed the annoying 5 minute shutdown delay that my ASUS N56VJ was having. Thankfully my caddy was new enough to have the white tab and I didnt have to remove the terminals or rip the case apart. Reps to all those who helped

 

+1 this switch works without any manual hack.
thanks for the find ilyutza

 

The best solution I found on forum EVER,...
I have HP 4530s with Ebay clone cady and it works in cca 1 minute,...

Thank you,
Cheers
I.

 

Works like a charm on Probook 4730s with a cheap HDD Caddy for MacBook. The pins are really small so you have to be very careful. I had to open the caddy case but it was worth it.
Thanks guys!

 

This thread saved me a laptop. I had this trouble since a couple of weeks, today a Google led me here. Bingo! A fine tip and sharp knife solved the problem. Thanks alot.

 

This thread just give me the answer that I want. I've got an Elitebook 8460p 5 days ago and install a SSD 3days ago and it can't shutdown
I wanna Thank centaurian so much, cuz I did as what you had said and got an amazing result.
THank you so much

 

For the love of God, thank you so much, centaurian.

 

Thanks Centaurian,
I've isolated the two pin with the tape.
My laptop is an Asus K55VD, works perfectly. Now I can shutdown correctly

 

Thanks!!!!!!
now my Asus shuts down completely

 

thanks from Turkiye . I cut the third pin and It worked with my ASUS K56CB .

 

dear friend it worked with my asus K56CB ı have one question .in this case does the electricity go off directly or after the hard drive stops

 

Hi guys!
I have the same problem with my Asus K53SV. I have already cut of this sad pin and it's still does not work. Now actually my laptop does not see this caddy. I also tried with changing the position of this button but after cutting off that pin . So... What should I do to make this cuddy work?

I found out the solution. I don't actually know if it's 100% okay, but if changing position of the switch does not work for ASUS K53 you have to cut off this bloody pin. In my case it worked. Sometimes (1/15) I got message that "There's no booot.ini on this HDD" but usually it works like charm. I do not recommend using this paddy with HDD to boot system from.

 

i have the exact same caddy with you.

change how? i dotn understand the attachment... can somebody teach me pleaseee
im about to buy asus laptop and going to install hdd caddy on it as well

 

Thanks for this thread - you saved my day today

I have Asus K55VM which also did not shutdown and restart correctly after I installed 2nd hdd into the caddy (it is 12.7mm caddy). First I was thinking that it's Windows 8.1 problem, updated all drivers but this did not help. Then I started to google and found this thread :thumbsup: I disassembled the caddy, pulled out with a knife the third pin from the right (as shown on the picture in the first post) and vuala - everything works now! Thank you one more time :thumbsup:

 

Thanks a lot centaurian!

Recently purchased a HP Probook 450 G1. Replaced the HDD with an SSD, installed Win8. Everything worked fine. Then upgraded to Win8.1 and installed the caddy (some noname from China) with the original HDD. Then the shutdown and energy problems started. First I thought it was an OS problem. So I tried: looking for 8.1 updates/fixes, changed power settings, tried booting from an USB Linux (shutdown was working with it!), changed BIOS settings, changed boot settings, upgraded BIOS, formatted the HDD (not to have active partitions on it), reinstalled the OS (!!!) and went crazy in the end because nothing helped. I started thinking of a hardware error at this point. I've removed the caddy and everything was OK again. Then tried the caddy without the HDD in it and the problems just came back even with disabling the CD-ROM in the BIOS. Classic -situation. Googled it and found this post. First I couldn't belive it...
Finally I simply pulled the pin out with a tiny screwdriver, bend it back and installed the caddy with the HDD. It works like charm and the machine shuts down and goes sleeping fine.

Thanks again for this genius solution! How on earth You figured it out?
gaborr

 

Thank you so much for posting this- I have an Asus X551CA which came with no optical drive at all, just a piece of plastic in its place.

The caddy I bought left about a half in gap into the laptop when I installed it, so I ended up modding the piece of plastic it came with to fix the drive and sata connector.

However, I experienced a bunch of issues where it wouldnt sleep correctly, or spontaneously wake up on its own and not shut down either.

I thought maybe the laptop couldnt handle the extra power of a 2nd drive which was causing the problems

I ended up using a small dental hook to pull the pin out and the problem is fixed

 

Hi everyone
I have the same issue with my Acer M3-581TG and Kingston V200 SSD . But my kingston ssd is inside the notebook (replacing a original hdd), and it won't shutdown ;/
Maybe someone have some solution for me ?
Greetings

 

Try if it shuts down correctly in safe mode. If it does, it is a windows issue -> start a new thread here.
If it doesn't, then it probably is a hardware issue, not related to 2nd hdd caddy. Here.

 

Thank you!!!

 

Many thanks to "centaurian" for the third pin fix. Using Nimitz second design 2530p caddy with shaped bezel in 2560p. Yeh! I did the BIOS shuffle for a while and was just so happy to find this thread. Yah!!!!!