Toshiba A30

[peahouse05]

Hi All
After a bit of luck with two lightning affected PCs recently thought I'd try my luck with daughter's Toshiba Satellite A30-514 which was similarly affected back in July. Have had the CPU, CDROM, HDD out and in but always ended up with fans start, two loud click, finish!
Knew it was going to p__s down all day yesterday so set to work. Have a downloaded manual for the laptop so took it all apart. Got the MB out and saw ther are no jumpers to reset the BIOS and no obvious damage.
De-dusted everything and re-assembled and blow-me it went to POST. However it would not re-install XP - hardware errors. Tried Linux but could not access the hard disk. Used Hitachi HD tester to check the hd - ok but would not delete the MBR, eventually downloaded a utility to floppy to do this but still nothing.
Loaded Damn Small Linux - perfectly ok in Ram but would not install to the HDD. Linux partitions appeared but would not boot. Finally tried writing a Linux partition to the end of the drive instead of the beginning - worked perfectly with DSL booting from the hard drive. Obviously the boot sector is damaged beyond any repair I have tried.
Sorry this is so long but Daughter will want to reclaim this machine so finally the question - can I get XP to boot from any other than the first sector of the HDD or do I have to replace the HDD?
Thanks in advance
peahouse05

 

[peahouse05]

Hi all
Finally solved the problem with the laptop. Could not access the boot sector of the hard drive with XP or SuSe 10 but it booted Damned Small Linux and installed to HDD , even this would not access the Linux swap partition HDA1 but the boot partition is on HDA2 and this booted DSL.
Thought it must be the hard drive so bought a new Toshiba 40GB, XP OEM and an IDE adaptor to test the old HDD on a PC. Same problems with new HDD but went through boot options on SuSe 10 installation CD. Nothing worked until the last option - 'memory test' - then it all kicked off - 10 minutes of errors so exited the test and removed the first of two 512MB RAM sticks. Tried to install XP - worked with no problems.
Cost of this 'groping in the dark' - HDD £28, IDE connector £4.50 but do resent the £58 for a new XP as it was originally installed on the laptop - 'rescue' CDs useless!
Still, learned lots from this, and daughter has her 2.8 GHz P4, now only with 512MB of RAM working, until the next lightning strike (or is it the local supply?)
Cheers
peahouse05

 

[muckshifter]

We will make a PC technician out of you yet, actually, I think you're already there.

I've said it before, but I'll say it again ... our electricity is 240v +/- 10% ... if my maths are correct, we can have peeks of up to 264v ... would love to know what Amps that equates to ... to me is a big feckin jump.

I have 3 PCs, I have 3 anti-surge devices and I have left these PCs on during heavy lightning storms ... with, I may add, some tribulations in doing so.

I have seen many a PC who's internal PCI modems have been "fried" after a thunder & lightning storm ... all these modems were connected to a BT line ... actually had 3 in the same week ... all with varying degrees of damage. At best, it was just the modem, at worst, the whole bloody PC was fried.

Well done in diagnosing the problem.

 

[peahouse05]

Thanks Mucks,
Have three PCs and the laptop on anti-surge supplies and the BT line to the router through an anti-surge on one of the strips.
Neighbour's HP Onibook XE3 laptop went at the same time as daughter's. Power adapter ok but laptop is dead. Have downloaded demolition manual so looking forward to working on this during slow periods in the cricket World Cup.
Cheers
peahouse05

 

[muckshifter]

72 for 3 ... ouch!