Re: Toshiba Satellite boot failure

[Jeff Evans <jwevans1@xxxxxxxx>]

Whiskers wrote:
> On 2006-02-28, Jeff Evans <jwevans1@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
> > Trying to do something with a Sat. A65-S126 with boot problems.  Windows 
> > XP installed on NTFS root partition.  Things got progressively worse, 
> > from Windows not booting until now, when the BIOS screen does not even 
> > appear.  There does not seem to be any video activity of any kind on 
> > powerup (screen is black).  I can't tell if the POST passes or not, but 
> > there are no beeps I can hear.  The CD/DVD drive still spins up if a new 
> > disc is inserted, and the fan is going.
> >
> > Any ideas on things to check/try?  Utilities to use?  Any way to narrow 
> > down the problem even a little bit?  Trying to avoid the need to send it 
> > in for service if possible.  Thanks for your help.
>
> Make sure that you haven't told it to use the external monitor that isn't 
> there ... 

I tried that - actually hooking it up to an external monitor plus using 
the Fn-buttons to switch around between monitor modes.  No signal on the 
 RGB cable.  I'm not even sure if it can send to an external monitor 
this early in the game (i.e. before BIOS screen even appears).

> If you can get one of the 'Live CD' Linux distros that can boot from a CD, 
> does using that produce anything at all?  Does the Windows repair CD do 
> anything?

I tried this as well.  Before things were this bad, I could occasionally 
get it to boot from CD.  I used an XP install disc and ran some recovery 
console stuff which seemed to have no effect other than telling me the 
Windows install was hosed.  I couldn't get it to boot my Ubuntu or 
Knoppix live CDs or the manufacturer's recovery DVD.  The problem seems 
to be happening immediately upon power-up of the machine.

Thanks for your reply.