HP Pavilion laptop - No boot issue

[wlsnoops]

HP Pavilion dv4-1222nr

A client brought this to me and said her daughter hasn't used it for about a year and a half. She said it wouldn't come on. I always like to ask as many questions as I can about the problem they were having to make diagnosing easier.
She said her daughter wouldn't remember and that she (the mother) didn't really know anything either.

Okay, so here we go:
*When the AC adapter is plugged in, the battery charging light on the front blinks continuosly. No light at the power jack
*Holding down the power button will get all the lights along the top and the cooling fan to come on for about two-three seconds.
*Holding the Windows key, the "B" key and the power button down for several seconds will get the lights along the top and the cooling fan to come on until I shut it down, BUT no bios ever appears on the screen. (I even connected an external monitor.)

The HP support site suggested flashing the bios via USB. I downloaded and tried to load the USB stick from my Dell computer but it wouldn't take.

Anyone else run into this problem before.

Thanks.

 

[BryanLee]

I recall some of these having an issue with the card reader. Even if this isn't it Im pretty sure you are going to have to open this thing up anyway. Try to disconnect that card reader from the motherboard and see what happens. When you disconnect it make sure you disconnect the cable from the card reader end and not on the motherboard. After disconnecting it, make sure it isn't touching anything and power on the computer. If it boots, let it boot all the way into Windows and then shut it down. Reconnect the cable and then boot up again.

If that doesn't work then maybe try...

1. Pull the battery
2. Press and hold the power button for ~40 seconds
3. Plug in power cable (don't insert battery)
4. Power on laptop.

You can also....

-Unplug any peripherals from the computer.
-Ensure fan for processor is running.
-Reapplying thermal paste to the processor

 

[wlsnoops]

If that doesn't work then maybe try...

1. Pull the battery
2. Press and hold the power button for ~40 seconds
3. Plug in power cable (don't insert battery)
4. Power on laptop.

You can also....

-Unplug any peripherals from the computer.
-Ensure fan for processor is running.
-Reapplying thermal paste to the processor

Thanks for the suggestions, Bryan. I'll definately look into them.
I have tried pulling the battery and holding the power button down for about a minute but that didn't do anything.

Also, after removing the battery and plugging in the AC adapter, I don't get any lights whatsoever.

 

[NYJimbo]

I'm not going to address your specific problems nor attempt to actually help you diagnose this machine. What I am going to do is offer some help in improving your diagnostics.

First, a non booting laptop can be caused by many different issues. The most important thing is to understand what you are looking at. When you plug in power or press a power button and you see (or dont see) certain lights do you fully understand that specific models reaction or output ? If you are not sure of what a blinking light or beep means then you cannot properly diagnose the problem.

If you get a non-booting laptop you must have a set of standard procedures you go through to eliminate some well known problems, if you do not use them you will just be poking around and not really making a useful, reliable diagnosis.

Do you have an alternate AC adapter of the correct type and adequate amperage ? You must be sure its not the customers AC adapter causing the problem. ALL techs working on laptops must have at least one good quality universal AC adapter and know which tips work with the laptop in question. You should also understand how a AC adapter may not work properly if it cannot provide enough amps for the laptop you are working on.

Do you know how to determine if power is getting into the laptop, not just assuming or guessing it is ? Do you know how to test a power button to be sure its not at fault ? Do you know how to probe a DC jack (when its easily accessible like this DV4) to see if voltages are getting to the motherboard ?

If you remove a battery and only try the AC or vice-a-versa, what do you see it do on power up and do you understand what that response means ? You should also do a little research on how a laptop runs off a battery or AC adapter. Every tech working on laptops should understand at least a little about how the battery charging controller works. The AC adapter is NOT the "charger" as everyone calls it. I know its easier to call it a charger and I do with my customers, but it does not decide if your laptop will charge the battery, the laptop itself is responsible for that.

Do you try to remove enough components to determine that a short is not causing it not too boot, like the DVD, HD, WIFI, etc ? Did you reseat and if possible try known-good ram to be certain that is not the problem ?

Do you check all the external ports for damage like crushed pins or any indications of burns. Did you pull up the keyboard and look for obvious liquid spills ?

Did you do enough research on this specific model with those specific problems and see if anyone was able to fix it and how they did ? There are hundreds of posts like yours on this forum (and thousands on the internet), I dont know if you were able to search them or not.

What you posted shows you did not do much diagnostics and I can tell you that while hundreds of techs will read your post, very few will offer REAL help because these booting issues have been discussed here countless times and people get tired of posting the same questions and answers.

Go back and do a bit more research and perform a more thorough diagnostic.

ps - Here's one tip, don't waste time regreasing the CPU/GPU, that is not whats causing this to not boot up.