Reviving an old Dell laptop

[phly]

So I stumbled across an old laptop I owned - (A Dell XPS 1645) and thought it wise to ask around here for what could be the issue based on the symptoms it is showing as I am clueless as to what the issue could be.

Backstory: I was working on it some years back and had a document open that I was still working on and had to leave office in a haste, so I just closed the lid and put the laptop in my backpack. Only to later find out that it comes on but nothing shows on the screen. I think it may have still been running even in my backpack and the heat being dissipated while the lid was closed killed it. I have even tried to have it plugged to an external screen but still no joy. Could it be the graphics card that got busted. Have sent it in to various places for repairs but no one could fix it.

When I press on the on switch, the laptop seems to come on and the keyboard lights up (it has a backlit keyboard) but no sounds or any indication that it has switched on or doing anything. No beeps either. Sometimes the volume indicators flash repeatedly but thats it.

 

[ChuckMeFarley]

Maybe?

xps 1645 display dead on startup

Hi all, Having some drams with my xps studio 1645. Was working fine last night but when i went to start it this morning its not cooperating. The laptop itself starts and the keyboard starts up and after a period of time you can hear the windows startup "song" but the display stays black. When i...

www.dell.com

 

[TheMightyQuinn]

MB is fried.

Throw it away.

 

[phly]

Maybe?

xps 1645 display dead on startup

Hi all, Having some drams with my xps studio 1645. Was working fine last night but when i went to start it this morning its not cooperating. The laptop itself starts and the keyboard starts up and after a period of time you can hear the windows startup "song" but the display stays black. When i...

www.dell.com

I recall going through the some similar diagnostics so it may not be something I have not tried. If all else fails I guess throwing it is the next best thing but man was it a dope powerful laptop for its time with all the ports that your heart may desire... sigh

 

[soload00]

Very likely to be a mother board that has died BUT

It is a long shot, but I had a T420 Lenovo laptop with a very similar issue.

After it had been shut down for a long time, it would not power up.
On pressing the power button, the power light just flashed a few times, no display, no fan, no error!

It turned out to be a bad CMOS battery which had corrupted the CMOS memory, resulting in the laptop hanging n the bootup.
The fix was to remove the CMOS battery, wait 24 hrs and restart. The laptop now gives an error message, but it does boot.

Have a look at this YouTube video, towards the end you will see the blue CMOS battery being removed.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tjuVnZVULuc

Good luck!