The "Help Scinik Revive a Toshiba Laptop" Thread

[Scinik]

Re: The "Help Scinik Revive a Toshiba Laptop" Thread

going back to selldoor's first post,
now you stripped it - what's the condition of the cmos battery?

2.875V.

...What voltage does the battery have now? - Perhaps try to get it fully charged...

The constant on battery LED means it's charging (the blinking it was doing earlier means "low"), so it's plugged in for now. If it changes (or the 4-5 hours it's supposed to take for a full charge passes with no change), I'll measure it, but if it's on external power the battery state shouldn't be affecting it?

...Did you see this?
http://ftp.toshiba.ca/support/isg/ts...ocid=TSB001555

Yes. I do not know if the fix was applied (I'll ask next I see the owner), but there's no sign of any melting or damage near the power input socket.

OK When you get back to it can we have some pictures? Hopefully you took some when it was apart?...

No camera in the toolkit, ATM. The irisvista site you linked to earlier has good pics (this one looks exactly the same).

...Whatever you need to examine and test the inlet socket and connector to the motherboard

Very closely examined ALL parts of this box (with 2x and 5x loupes), especially the power connections, no scorching, no damage, no cracks, no discolouration. If there was no (or insufficient) power getting through, the LEDs wouldn't come on at all, right?

[dj_ricoh]

Re: The "Help Scinik Revive a Toshiba Laptop" Thread

look!
first you need to start with the board naked.
board+cpu+ram = external

after i`ll suggest something because you can`t see those small cracks.
cook the board.
maybe cracks under the chipset, cpu socket you will never know .
if you do got the time and XP to do those thinks with all the chips with a BGA station good for you; if not ,cook it

[Scinik]

Re: The "Help Scinik Revive a Toshiba Laptop" Thread

...so it's plugged in for now...

Brick is warm (that tells me power is going through; as nothing is sparking or melting, I'll assume it's going where it should --> the battery).

...first you need to start with the board naked...

A nice lady told me that last week, but I don't think she was talking about a Toshiba...

...cook the board...

Errr, what?

[selldoor]

Re: The "Help Scinik Revive a Toshiba Laptop" Thread

Its conceivable that while it is charging the battery there is not enough power
to do much else. Leds take very little power a brief connection will charge up capacitors which will keep the led lit for a while.
Can you borrow another suitable charger to try?
Looking at other pictures will not help us spot problems on your boards.
As you suggest leave it until the battery is fully charged 10.8v then look at it again.

As the original problem was with the screen have you tried unplugging it and trying to use it with an external screen/monitor.
Did you take any voltage readings off the board when you got inside?

[dj_ricoh]

Re: The "Help Scinik Revive a Toshiba Laptop" Thread

i got a post with something similar!
take the battery out and discharge the board.
then plug the charger without battery

[Scinik]

Re: The "Help Scinik Revive a Toshiba Laptop" Thread

...Can you borrow another suitable charger to try?...

No.

...Looking at other pictures will not help us spot problems on your boards...

Pictures of those boards will tell you as much as pictures of these boards: there is no damage/discolouration visible to any of the boards or components (even with a 5x loupe).

...As the original problem was with the screen have you tried unplugging it and trying to use it with an external screen/monitor...

Yes, as detailed in this response.

i got a post with something similar!
take the battery out and discharge the board.
then plug the charger without battery

Already tried that, last paragraph in this post.

[Scinik]

Re: The "Help Scinik Revive a Toshiba Laptop" Thread

Battery LED turned green from amber (manual says this indicates fully charged), but no change in response: press the power button, and power LED comes on for 1/2 second then goes out.

Back to the troubleshooting procedure from the service manual:

...If the external monitor appears to have the same problem as the internal monitor, system board may be faulty. Go to Procedure 2.

Procedure 2 Diagnostic Test Program Execution Check

The Display Test program is stored in Diagnostics disk. This program checks the display controller on system board. Insert the Diagnostics disk, turn on the computer and run the test...

And if the computer doesn't turn on (which was the problem in the first place)?

Never mind that the T130D HAS NO OPTICAL DRIVE to "Insert the Diagnostics disk" into...

[stj]

Re: The "Help Scinik Revive a Toshiba Laptop" Thread

so?
if the laptop wont boot then what do you think it will do with a disk!

so have you removed the ram and lifted the heatsink off the cpu to inspect it yet?

[Scinik]

Re: The "Help Scinik Revive a Toshiba Laptop" Thread

...so have you removed the ram...

Yes.

...lifted the heatsink off the cpu to inspect it yet?

No. As excruciatingly minute inspection of the entire motherboard and everything else revealed no signs of damage (aside from one fin on the radiator that was about 15 degrees out of true), discolouration, abuse, mishandling, or overheating, is there anything in particular I should be looking for?

[stj]

Re: The "Help Scinik Revive a Toshiba Laptop" Thread

chips,cracks etc.

[selldoor]

Re: The "Help Scinik Revive a Toshiba Laptop" Thread

[QUOTE=Scinik;455875]
Pictures of those boards will tell you as much as pictures of these boards: there is no damage/discolouration visible to any of the boards or components (even with a 5x loupe).

Pictures are not clear enough for us to suggest where/what you could test

Yes, as detailed in this response.



Yes but did you unplug the laptop monitor ( could be a short on the inverter}

[Scinik]

Re: The "Help Scinik Revive a Toshiba Laptop" Thread

chips,cracks etc.

After removing the heatsink/fan assembly and a generous (but not excessive) coating of paste, all shiny like factory-new.

...did you unplug the laptop monitor ( could be a short on the inverter}

I can try that next. Do I just reassemble the thing without that connected? I'm kind of shy of plugging semi-assembled stuff in, for fear of shorting everything out.

[selldoor]

Re: The "Help Scinik Revive a Toshiba Laptop" Thread

Yes but if its going to be loose inside I would wrap it with tape or plastic bag it, just in case.

At some point you are going to have to run it naked as has been said.

As long as you work on a non conductive surface and things dont touch its
pretty easy.

I have had many a "laptop" running like that.

As dj ricoh said you just get the motherboard take eveything off it except the cpu and the fan and attach a speaker/headphone if you can in case of beeps.

Attach or connect the button board if its not part of the motherboard.

As you know there was a problem with the screen attach a known to be working external monitor.

I usually try with NO ram just to see if the screen lights or the fan twitches
or it might beeb a fault code to indicate there is not ram/ no hard drive/
no keyboard.

Then switch off /unplug and add one stick of ram and try again.
If nothing try it in another ram socket if there are two.
If nothing try both sticks of ram.

If nothing motherboard or cpu is dead. DJ would then try reflowing it
and if you dont have the correct equipment you can find instructions
on the internet on how to do it in the oven ( never tried myself- think it has a low success rate but at that point you have nothing to lose)

An alternative would be to take a good in focus well lit picture of it and someone may be able to suggest more tests at a component level, but only
really worthwhile if your soldering skills are good.

[Scinik]

Re: The "Help Scinik Revive a Toshiba Laptop" Thread

Tried running it naked (it, not me) with various stuff unplugged, no changes except: attempting to power up with the internal video cable unplugged makes the LED under the power button non-functional (all other LEDs remain the same).

But, a couple of things that may mean more to someone more knowledgeable:

In another thread, someone with video problems was told to take out the battery, unplug the power cord, and hold "Fn" + "Esc" while plugging cord in and pressing power button, so I tried that (why not?) and... there's an LED in the keyboard below the F10 key that comes on very briefly, under what looks to me like a "Full Screen" icon (same as on the F10 key, but in white, where it's grey on the key). Repeat this with the power cord still attached, and this indicator stays dark.

I believe the LCD layer is responding, as there's a reflection that changes. If I hold a bright light up to the screen, it reflects kind of greenish, goes darker when the power button is pressed, and then returns to the greenish when the computer decides "no, I'm not starting" (about 1 sec.).

No beeps through headphone outlet or speakers. No twitches from the fan. No indicator lights (aside external power LED, power on LED [which is matched in behaviour by the LED under the power button itself], and battery LED [which changes depending on battery state, as expected]). No noise from harddrive (which checks out perfectly in my PC).

Any suggestions before I 1) tear apart the LCD to see if I can suss a problem with the inverter (I've seen many recommendations that this be the last last last thing to do, except for: ) 2) cook the mobo (have no idea what that entails, aside from a sacrificial toaster oven and some voodoo).

[selldoor]

Re: The "Help Scinik Revive a Toshiba Laptop" Thread

Its LED lit so no inverter.

Did you find anything out about the recall situation.

Cant you borrow a camera or phone with good camers in?
could even try a scanner - sometimes works.

[Scinik]

Re: The "Help Scinik Revive a Toshiba Laptop" Thread

Its LED lit so no inverter...

My bad for using the wrong term. There will still be a power supply of some sort for the LED backlight, so that's my next target. Any clues as to what to check/test/look for would be appreciated.

...Did you find anything out about the recall situation...

Owner is not knowledgeable about those things, but it was in for service after the recall, so I'm assuming the fix was applied then (as computer will not start, no way to check). Even if it wasn't, the problem addressed by the BIOS update was with melting the power supply cable inlet port area, and there is no sign of excess heat/damage of any variety there (or anywhere else).

...Cant you borrow a camera or phone with good camers in?
could even try a scanner - sometimes works.

Aside from a bit of worn paint on the underside (and the aforementioned single, barely tweaked fin on the radiator), this thing could have left the factory yesterday.

Is there a particularly undamaged area of this undamaged computer that you'd like [strike]me to waste time and forum bandwidth posting[/strike] to see pics of the complete lack of damage to?