Ghost in the machine

[JohnnyQ]

I have a client's laptop that is just doing ....weird... things. It gets stuck on startup at the post screen (seeing the first screen), and that's it, nothing else happens, but squeeze the bottom left corner and everything carries on loading like normal, stop squeezing windows will freeze, start squeezing again and windows keeps on loading. It does not shut down or anything just goes and hangs when not squeezed, and carries on like nothing is wrong when squeezed.

Any hints, fixes, exorcism rituals?

 

[Gnome]

I have a client's laptop that is just doing ....weird... things. It gets stuck on startup at the post screen (seeing the first screen), and that's it, nothing else happens, but squeeze the bottom left corner and everything carries on loading like normal, stop squeezing windows will freeze, start squeezing again and windows keeps on loading. It does not shut down or anything just goes and hangs when not squeezed, and carries on like nothing is wrong when squeezed.

Any hints, fixes, exorcism rituals?

Uhm yeah either open it to see what's wrong or send it in for repairs, the laptop is physically damaged...

 

[kronoSX]

take out the hard drive and the memory modules out at the bottom and side.THen put them back in but this time push hard on the hard drive as you slide it back in,,sorry what type of laptop is it

 

[JohnnyQ]

Uhm, i know something is wrong, i fix laptops (not component level), but the stange thing is, it will freeze anywhere at any time when one stops squeezing, no errors, no reboots, it just freezes, and squeezed again everything "unfreezes" and works 100%.

 

[JohnnyQ]

take out the hard drive and the memory modules out at the bottom and side.THen put them back in but this time push hard on the hard drive as you slide it back in,,sorry what type of laptop is it

HP nx 6110.

I have swopped mem, hdd and cpu.

 

[EchoZA]

hmmm... un-documented pause feature maybe

 

[Gnome]

i fix laptops (not component level)

If you replaced the hard-drive, CPU and RAM to no effect then the motherboard is probably damaged.

Are all the heatsinks are ok? Most CMOS circuits today throttle when they become too hot (to the point where the PC freezes), and may stop throttling when the heat is reduced, such as pressing the heatsink back into place, the Pentium 4+ and Geforce 6+ series graphics cards are notable examples, some Intel chipsets might have similar features.

 

[JohnnyQ]

If you replaced the hard-drive, CPU and RAM to no effect then the motherboard is probably damaged.

Are all the heatsinks are ok? Most CMOS circuits today throttle when they become too hot (to the point where the PC freezes), and may stop throttling when the heat is reduced, such as pressing the heatsink back into place, the Pentium 4+ and Geforce 6+ series graphics cards are notable examples, some Intel chipsets might have similar features.

This does make some sense, but the freeze and unfreeze is immediate when squeezing and letting go. And like i said the laptop works 100% stable when squeezed.

My client would sit with his elbow pushing down on the left corner, and doing the rest with his right hand, everything working fine until he gets tired.

 

[kronoSX]

well if it fell then there is a crack on the pcb,the tracks dissconnects,this can be repaired,but time consuming.

 

[Gnome]

This does make some sense, but the freeze and unfreeze is immediate when squeezing and letting go. And like i said the laptop works 100% stable when squeezed.

My client would sit with his elbow pushing down on the left corner, and doing the rest with his right hand, everything working fine until he gets tired.

Hmm, not sure what else it could be either MB or Heatsinks, perhaps the power but laptops run from a battery (which is a perfect DC source) so unless the battery is not the one that came with the laptop (or damaged) I doubt it's that, also not sure how it goes for Laptop CPU's but when you remove the heatsink from a CPU like a P4 it'll throttle in a matter of 1-2 seconds.

Tomshardware did a video about it a long while ago and also followed it up with a recent article where they did the same to the Core 2 Duo based CPU's. Anyway the P4 for example almost immediately froze (the Amd Athlon XP on the other hand rose to something like 200 degrees celsius and cooked itself )

 

[kronoSX]

s sounds familiar.parden the stutter,but its damn cold here

 

[acidrain]

s sounds familiar.parden the stutter,but its damn cold here

Too cold infact.. pity my elec blanket only has 2 modes ( off or blerry hot with the occassional shock treatment )

 

[dotVIBE]

yep, sounds like the mb pcb is cracked. Laptop is klaar.

 

[bekdik]

or a ribbon cable has become unseated. get a qualified repair shop to look at it as opening it will daunt all but the most courageous. or put a c clamp on it.

 

[Conspirator]

How the hell does one crack the MB without any other damage on the outside?

 

[JohnnyQ]

Yeah, i suppose i will have to take it to the guy that does the actual component level repairs for me.

Nah, i will just clamp it.

 

[nocilah]

has this got nothing to do with the lap tops sensor whether the lid is closed or not? seriously does not sound like a m/b issue or anything else or else windoze would be going mad.

 

[kronoSX]

sensor damn,this can also be a problem,but afaik what he described is 70% pcb board is cracked.
To answer conspiritors Q,yes a laptop can be damaged...have you ever heard of the tigerbomb claw..perfected by jet lee..lol.
Remember the fist that touches and breaks everything inside the body but no signs of bruising on the outside..lol

 

[JohnnyQ]

So you saying my client was in a fight with Jet Li, and used the LT to defend/block.

 

[kronoSX]

correct