Hard (forced) reset a laptop?

[slimjim]

So I'm still having a little problem with my HP laptop in that it sometimes (but not every time) won't power-up when I hit the "on button". A couple of lights go on, the fan starts up... then it all switches off, and this will sometimes happen when I am still pressing the "on button".

On a couple of techie forums I found reference to a hard reset... basically disconnecting from the mains, disconnecting printer, router, mouse etc then removing the battery, holding down the "on button" for 15 seconds then connecting everything back in again. Apparently it depletes all residual power in the motherboard and capacitors and wipes some memory.

My question is should this be used only as a last resort ..... as I can still start the laptop (albeit sometimes after a couple of attempts) am I risking making the situation worse by trying this reset procedure? I'm a little concerned by the mention of wiping the capacitor/motherboard memory:worried:

Any advise will be appreciated... or other suggestions as to what may be wrong with the laptop and how I might fix it?

 

[gb2000ie]

It sounds like what the boards are advising you to do is reset the tiny little logic board that manges the power on your computer. This is a good advice if you start seeing funny stuff like you're describing.

Your symptoms could be solved by that step, but, they could also be symptoms of a motherboard failure. I would definitely try to reset the power management board before I assumed the worst and got the motherboard replace, or indeed the whole laptop.

Ultimately, you have nothing to lose, if it's not the power management board in need of a reset, then it's probably a motherboard failure, which is pretty catastrophic!

B.

 

[bigsal]

I advise you to save as much as you can, because they are the same symptoms that made my old PC before you "go", without giving me a chance to recover important files and programs.

I could also be wrong, because I'm not a computer technician.

 

[yoyo888]

Arrr good old HP! We play with them all the time at work!

Yes what you say is safe to do.

If that fails. Try and boot up the laptop with the battery not connected to the laptop.

We have had that experience at work. If a laptop was left on the boot of a car over night and it was cold, that is the trick we follow and works

If it does boot up without the battery. Wait until Windows or what ever loads. Then plug in the battery, and look at the battery meter in the task bar. If there is an issue with the battery it will tell you there.

Again if it boots up OK, then do a shut down with power adapter plugged in and battery in. And try starting up again.

keep us posted

Your TechiSupport Department

 

[slimjim]

Well having backed most stuff up over the last few days and remembering to write down all my login/passwords etc I have just gone through the " Hard Reset " process.... and so far so good, the laptop booted up OK and everything seems to be running normally. I'm running the windows update - the HP Support Assistant said no updates were required.

I won't really know for a few days whether the problem is sorted - i.e until I have switched on and off a few times and hopefully have no more power-up problems. I'll let you know.

 

[slimjim]

Well so far so good, I've switched my laptop on & off around 15 times since I did the hard-reset and it fires up nice and easy, I'm not having to hold down the power button for a couple of seconds or even press down hard - a light stroke of the finger is enough. No problem getting to the login page or desktop either... fingers crossed it may mean a laptop replacement has been postponed for some time:thumbs up:

 

[slimjim]

Well another week on and it looks like the hard-reset did the job. No re-occurrence of those problems in the last 7 days at all :thumbs up:

 

[yoyo888]

YAY good news.

And dont forget the saying "You only loose data once"

Do do keep remembering to do regular backups including passwords

 

[gb2000ie]

YAY good news.

And dont forget the saying "You only loose data once"

Do do keep remembering to do regular backups including passwords

Amen to that!

Never forget the mantra "Backup backup backup"!

Or, ideally, the three, two, one rule for backup:

"three copies of everything" (the original and two backups)
"backups on at least two media types" (e.g. HDD + cloud, or HDD + DVD)
"at least one off-site" (houses burn down and get burgled, if your backups are right next to the originals, they are not safe)

B.