What should I look for (boot problem)

[Shawn E. Hale]

The other day my daughter plugged her Dell Inspiron 6000 into a wall outlet
(while it was running - the battery was low) and the screen instantly went
black. We tried to power it back on but it would freeze either at the BIOS
loading screen or on occasion it would make it to the options screen that
gave menu choices (Safe mode, last good configuration, normal, etc.). The
hard drive light would flash or stay on briefly, then nothing. Trying to
power it on over and over gave the same results but it never made it to the
Windows logo screen. My wife has the same laptop and if we swapped drives,
my daughter's drive would boot right up in my wife's laptop but the wife's
drive would do nothing in the daughter's laptop. I disconnected the power
and the battery and held the power button in for a few seconds and tried
again. Nothing. Then oddly enough, I had the laptop with the screen facing
up on my lap and the keyboard sticking straight up, I pressed the power
button and it booted right up and has been running all night with no
problems. I don't dare try to re-boot it again. I am out of warranty.
What could this be indicative of and what should I do (loose cable,
motherboard issue?). Thanks for any advice.

 

[DL]

Hazarding a guess I would say a connection, but which one????

 

[Peter Foldes]

Before anything Back Up all important files to any outside media just in case it is the Hard Drive or anything else that will cause no more reboots.

 

[Shawn E. Hale]

I "Ghosted" the drive to an external USB and it seems to be running fine.
But I don't trust it. I am wondering if I open it up if I will see
something loose that I could re-seat. If anyone has any pointers of what to
look for I would appreciate it.


Before anything Back Up all important files to any outside media just in
case it is the Hard Drive or anything else that will cause no more reboots.

 

[Peter Foldes]

I would not touch the inner workings of the Hard Drive. You are asking for a certain death of the Hard Drive

 

[Shawn E. Hale]

I wasn't clear - I know the hard drive is fine as it boots up immediately in
my wife's computer. I was thinking of opening up the laptop and seeing if
something was loose in there but I have no idea what to look for.

I would not touch the inner workings of the Hard Drive. You are asking for a
certain death of the Hard Drive

 

[Shawn E. Hale]

Turns out, it was bad RAM. The odd positioning of the laptop was just
coincidental as I learned that sometimes the thing would boot up on the
first try, sometimes the 50th. I should have checked the RAM first since my
wife has an identical laptop. But I called Dell tech support and we started
disconnecting network cards, the modem, etc. without any resolution.
Finally I pulled the RAM from my wife's computer, swapped it with the RAM in
the problem one, and I was able to duplicate the problem repeatedly. So I
ordered another RAM chip (actually upgraded) and my issue should be over.