dstrider, I spilled my Inspiron 8200 with Fanta. There liquid ran down, around the keyboard and onto the mobo ....every where. Syrup every where you could think of. All the drives were stuck in their bays like they were glued in.
Because not a warranty case (and out of warranty anyway) I had nothing to lose, took the whole thing apart into pieces and carefully shampooed item by item whith a very soft brush.
Then everything was flushed with warm water, shaken out to get rid of most of the water; and finally dried on a soft towel with a hair dryer.
Everything was re-mounted and it worked on the first try.
Because of the sealed design of a HDD (they have only a tiny "breather hole", to compensate for pressure differences) it's not likely that your drive itself got damaged, even though it was wet. I'd have a closer look to its contact bank and as well onto the bushings side on the mobo. Also you can detach the tiny mobo of the drive and clean that.
Thanks for the advise. I have a new HD intalled now, can see it in the BIOS! That is very encouraging, need to partition the HD and load OS. Think things should go OK.
Now out the blue the battery is not charging and the bat lite is flashing yellow? The indicatoeron the battery show it is charged and the BIOS shows the battery as charging however it never changes and when to aC is unplugged the laptop powers off. What could be the likely problem??
The flashing yellow/green light means an abnormal current draw; probably a short or at least a low resistance path somewhere from the spill. My CPiA started doing the same, but on mine I think the Problem lies in the video circuit to the LCD.
Well, I was right about the video causing the alternating flashing amber and green light, but it was not the Flex Cable. It was the Video Daughter board; I had one from a "junker", and after installing it the problem is gone, adios, sayonara,adieu!!
How To Flash Bios on a floppyless Dell/IBM/Toshiba Notebook:
Solution: Example: I have a Toshiba Notebook Satellite A30: 1. extract your biosxxx.exe onto a floppy using any (Windoze)PC with floppy and CD burner and app. like Nero Express, ... will do fine. 2. Make a bootable CD using Nero express by adding the contents of the floopy. 3. Boot your Toshiba/Dell/IBM Notebook using your newly created Cdrom boot image from step2. -it will boot up as A: drive and start the flash update,...
Thats it, your bios is now updated.
-I found this to work just fine considering Toshiba suggests you need their USB floppy (US $99) to do it
-accesorize eh ? forget it, invest a dime ina blank CD borrow your freinds burner and be done with it. you'll only update your bios a couple times for the life of your laptop anyway.
..How To Flash Bios on a floppyless Toshiba Notebook:
Solution: Example: I have a Toshiba Notebook Satellite A30: 1. extract your biosxxx.exe onto a floppy using any (Windoze)PC with floppy and CD burner (Nero Express) will do fine. 2. Make a bootable CD using Nero express by adding the contents of the floopy. 3. Boot your Toshiba Notebook using your newly created Cdrom boot image from step2.
Unless they go wrong, as it seems like they frequently do. Then you have a piece of trash, or as Forum Regular Stonent says, "another expensive doorstop".
Sorry to hear about your issues. Dell laptops su_ck, and the only thing worse than the hardware itself is the software Dell supplies to support it. Wait, scratch that, their tech support is well behind both of those. I mean really, who the HE_LL releases HD BIOS installers that fail with such regularity.
I would recommend you reflash using the CD drive (assuming you have one). I'm not familiar with your specific machine, but these days just about every PC or laptop made can boot from the CD (assuming it has a CD drive). To do this I would recommend:
1. Start the computer
2. Enter BIOS set-up (using the proper key, like F2 or something... it should flash on the screen when you turn-on the PC).
3. Reorder the boot sequence, placing CD at the top of the primary (or all) lists. This is actually preferable since very few CDs will actually interfere with boot anyway (I leave CDs in all the time with this order and the only CD I worry about doing any boot procedures is the XP CD).
4. Reboot with a CD with the latest BIOS update on it.
To do this you'll need to create a bootable CD using a CD-r/rw drive on another machine, so find a friend and do it on his if you need to. There are other posts in this thread that cover creating a bootable CD.
bill40
3 Posts
0
January 27th, 2004 00:00
flortep
114 Posts
0
January 27th, 2004 09:00
dstrider, I spilled my Inspiron 8200 with Fanta. There liquid ran down, around the keyboard and onto the mobo ....every where. Syrup every where you could think of. All the drives were stuck in their bays like they were glued in.
Because not a warranty case (and out of warranty anyway) I had nothing to lose, took the whole thing apart into pieces and carefully shampooed item by item whith a very soft brush.
Then everything was flushed with warm water, shaken out to get rid of most of the water; and finally dried on a soft towel with a hair dryer.
Everything was re-mounted and it worked on the first try.
Because of the sealed design of a HDD (they have only a tiny "breather hole", to compensate for pressure differences) it's not likely that your drive itself got damaged, even though it was wet. I'd have a closer look to its contact bank and as well onto the bushings side on the mobo. Also you can detach the tiny mobo of the drive and clean that.
Have good success !
flortep
dslrider
14 Posts
0
January 27th, 2004 13:00
Thanks for the advise. I have a new HD intalled now, can see it in the BIOS! That is very encouraging, need to partition the HD and load OS. Think things should go OK.
Now out the blue the battery is not charging and the bat lite is flashing yellow? The indicatoeron the battery show it is charged and the BIOS shows the battery as charging however it never changes and when to aC is unplugged the laptop powers off. What could be the likely problem??
DSLRIDER
JoiseyBill
1 Rookie
•
91 Posts
0
January 27th, 2004 13:00
Its likely that the battery needs to be replaced.
Depending on the model and usage patterns, laptop batteries usually last between 2-4 years.
If you have a friend/associate with a similar model computer, swap batteries and see if the problem follows the battery.
Bay Wolf's page lists the battery models, compatibilities, and good tips for prolonging battery life:
http://www.bay-wolf.com/battery.htm
leduke30
2 Intern
•
4K Posts
0
January 27th, 2004 15:00
Well, I was right about the video causing the alternating flashing amber and green light, but it was not the Flex Cable. It was the Video Daughter board; I had one from a "junker", and after installing it the problem is gone, adios, sayonara,adieu!!
Message Edited by leduke30 on 01-28-2004 01:55 PM
solarux
2 Posts
0
March 22nd, 2004 00:00
How To Flash Bios on a floppyless Dell/IBM/Toshiba Notebook:
Solution:
Example: I have a Toshiba Notebook Satellite A30:
1. extract your biosxxx.exe onto a floppy using any (Windoze)PC with floppy and CD burner and app. like Nero Express, ... will do fine.
2. Make a bootable CD using Nero express by adding the contents of the floopy.
3. Boot your Toshiba/Dell/IBM Notebook using your newly created Cdrom boot image from step2. -it will boot up as A: drive and start the flash update,...
Thats it, your bios is now updated.
-I found this to work just fine considering Toshiba suggests you need their USB floppy (US $99) to do it
-accesorize eh ? forget it, invest a dime ina blank CD borrow your freinds burner and be done with it. you'll only update your bios a couple times for the life of your laptop anyway.
Rick.
solarux
2 Posts
0
March 22nd, 2004 00:00
yup It worked great for me.
see my first reply to you, or,
..How To Flash Bios on a floppyless Toshiba Notebook:
Solution:
Example: I have a Toshiba Notebook Satellite A30:
1. extract your biosxxx.exe onto a floppy using any (Windoze)PC with floppy and CD burner (Nero Express) will do fine.
2. Make a bootable CD using Nero express by adding the contents of the floopy.
3. Boot your Toshiba Notebook using your newly created Cdrom boot image from step2.
Thats it, your bios is now updated
jimmy_zhang
4 Posts
0
May 5th, 2004 07:00
if you hasnt floppy drive ,you are simpleness upgrade bios use hdd edition,
if computer has no hdd edition ,you must borrow floppy drive from another person to upgrade...
Treven
8 Posts
0
May 12th, 2004 03:00
leduke30
2 Intern
•
4K Posts
0
May 12th, 2004 04:00
Treven
8 Posts
0
May 12th, 2004 21:00
YAEPW
Yet Another Expensive Paper Weight
(or doorstop).
leduke30
2 Intern
•
4K Posts
0
May 12th, 2004 23:00
colinbumcrack
3 Posts
0
September 27th, 2004 13:00
pgharavi
18 Posts
0
January 13th, 2005 07:00
boconnell
5 Posts
0
January 13th, 2005 15:00
I would recommend you reflash using the CD drive (assuming you have one). I'm not familiar with your specific machine, but these days just about every PC or laptop made can boot from the CD (assuming it has a CD drive). To do this I would recommend:
1. Start the computer
2. Enter BIOS set-up (using the proper key, like F2 or something... it should flash on the screen when you turn-on the PC).
3. Reorder the boot sequence, placing CD at the top of the primary (or all) lists. This is actually preferable since very few CDs will actually interfere with boot anyway (I leave CDs in all the time with this order and the only CD I worry about doing any boot procedures is the XP CD).
4. Reboot with a CD with the latest BIOS update on it.
To do this you'll need to create a bootable CD using a CD-r/rw drive on another machine, so find a friend and do it on his if you need to. There are other posts in this thread that cover creating a bootable CD.
good luck,
boc