laptop keeps rebooting
a friend of mine has a Compaq Armada 1750 (has Windows XP) that keeps rebooting and doesnt stop. I first thought that he had a boot virus but he mention that he did something to the Master Boot Record. We tried the Last known Configuration but that didnt work and also tried to get into safe mode or the Dos prompt but the Laptop kept rebooting after attempting to go into Safe Mode or the Dos prompt
When he mention the Master Boot Record I knew it had to be that but I cant find how to fix it with out losing all his stuff on his computer. That is why Im hesistant to to create a Boot Disk
When he mention the Master Boot Record I knew it had to be that but I cant find how to fix it with out losing all his stuff on his computer. That is why Im hesistant to to create a Boot Disk
There There, Its okay to feel GUILTY...........There is no SIN in PLEASURE!
Comments
I cant do anything to get in to do a FiXMBR
I guess I can create a bootk disk to access the MBR though my laptop is from Dell and his is a Compaq so im frighten that might do something bad.
i know if Desktop Computers have capcitors gone bad it will cause reboots to happen as well but i dont think he has that problem since he fooled around with the MBR
if you have XP-2k, check and see under Device Manager->Advanced->Performance-> uhhh.....forget which button (haven't used XP in a long time - i think last one - in 2k it's the "startup and Recovery" button) and make sure that "Automatically Reboot" is not checked.
go to the manufacturer's website and look up and known issues with your laptop.
scan for viruses etc.
If he does indeed have a corrupt MBR then that should do the trick. Let us know.
okay, i will try this. I hope if removing the battery and holding the button 10 seconds will allow the rebooting to stop and go into the Desktop. If not then I will try what Silver Bullet already mention.
say, is it possible to create an Automated System Recovery disk? Laptops come with one but he losts his. Is it possible to create one?
Post the results of this test.
this is for a freinds computer who has a compaq computer! commands are generally different and I have to be cautious with this thing cause it is an old laptop
Silver Bullet, we again tried the recovery console and the fixboot and fixmbr didnt work.
Im going to do what you just said and also test for the capicitors and other hardware issues.
FIM website of the year 2007
A) TEST THE HARDWARE WITH A FRESHLY FORMATTED, REPARTITIONED HARD DISK (FAT32), BUT NOT THE ORIGINAL HARD DISK. I believe I still have copies of the major drivers for that computer somewhere. I got them off of the HP/Compaq site, which was not that easy to navigate if I remember. I would recommend (as a test) taking out the hard disk, and connecting a cheap reformatted one and then installing windows 98 on it. If that OS runs without the same problems you can pretty much tell that its not the hardware and that there may be something screwy with master boot record on the original hard disk.
C) IF STEP A DID NOT WORK; CHECK THE RAM IF IT STILL KEEPS REBOOTING. Lets say you have a cheap 1 to 3 gig reformatted, repartitioned hard disk (not the original). You also have a win98 start up disk. So you attempt to install 98 on it (shouldn't take too long if you have the maximum ram for the computer). Then you either install it successfully, but it starts constantly rebooting like it was before or you can't install it because even when you try to boot to DOS with the start-up disk it still constantly reboots. If that is what is happening I'd then check the ram. Check both bays with each dim individually alone and see if you can get it to boot that way.
D) CHECK THE FAN ON THE BACK OF THE LAPTOP. If the above test with the ram makes no difference and the ram turns out to be good, the CPU is probably overheating and may actually be damaged. It could also be any number of problems, including capacitors that have leaked out due to either age or too much heat. This model has an internal power supply, not an external AC adaptor.
2) SOME THINGS TO TAKE INTO CONSIDERATION:
A) BE AWARE OF DESIGN FLAWS FOR THAT MODEL. There were some problems with the model such as no standard bios. It had something like a bios on the original hard disk (I know it sounds ridiculous), but if you reformat the hard disk the computer will still work, but with no way to access the bios. Another flaw of this computer was that the fan on the power supply (built in to the computer) had a real loose connection, which could cause it to overheat. This model does not have an external AC adapter, it is internal. MAKE SURE THE FAN ON THE BACK IS BLOWING.
C) MAY BE TOO MANY APPS AND DRIVERS COMPETING FOR RESOURCES UPON BOOTUP It may simply be that there is too much trying to load in the initial stages of boot up for the limited resources to handle. In fact, I have encountered laptops that were behaving similar to what you are describing and that was exactly what was wrong. When the OS installation was fresh the computer functioned fine, but after applications were installed and various drivers and applications started competing for resources upon bootup the computer eventually couldn't boot up properly. This can actually screw up the boot sequence enough to where it can't even start in safe mode.
D) MAY NOT BE WORTH REPAIRING. Its a Compaq. Back in the days of that model Compaq was making lots of lemons. You are looking at a computer you can replace on ebay for $100 to $200 (if you are savy shopper). I wouldn't recommend trying to replace the mother board because even if you get a motherboard for that EXACT model you may get one that was made for a slightly different form factor and won't even fit in the shell. There are soooo many revisions to laptops.
E) SELL PARTS ON EBAY IF ALL ELSE FAILS. At this stage (assuming all the above have been tried) I would recommend to your pal that he part out the computer and sell the ram, hard disk, CD-Rom individually on eBay and gauge on the shipping. Then he can sell the laptop minus the parts and mention that it doesn't boot and has no ram or hard disk but that the LCD should still be good (again, on eBay).
http://h18002.www1.hp.com/products/quickspecs/10012_div/10012_div.HTML
I was just last night trying to remember who it was that had suggested this CD on another topic sometime ago. I wanted to recommend it but wanted to give credit to you as well. Excellent recommendation. That is a cool tool.
Danny, if the IDE DPS test doesn't tell you that the hard drive has failed then the UBCD is a great tool as RussS mentioned.
ebkrantz, it is Windows XP Professional. The laptop is very damn old as well.
Majestic Lizard, thanks for the detail explination. Very impressed and will follow those tests. I will first go with Russ and see if the CD will fix the problem.
"TEST FAILED. DRIVE REPLACEMENT REOMMENDED"
bogus!!!
Say can the UBCD correct the hardrive or is it best to just replace it?? My friend is having alot of problems with before so maybe the parts are just getting old.
I love this cd, I use it at work all the time, it is a great cd.
x_Danny_x, if the ide test failed, personally i would reaplace the hard drive, but thats just me. I do not try to repair a drvie unless its a software crash(which isnt really hard to repair).
The UBCD will not repair the failed drive but it will allow you the ability to boot up from the CD (UBCD) and possibly browse the hard drive for files you want to recover and then backup. From what I can tell from your post, you are able to boot to the splash screen. So, most likely it is not the controller that has failed, but rather has bad sectors/blocks. So you should be able to recover any needed data from the drive with the UBCD (given those files do not reside on a bad sector).
http://ubcd4win.com
That is the site you want. They have very good instructions for creating this CD.
FIM website of the year 2007
There are a lot of functions in XP that load upon booting and 128 to 192 megs or ram with a 300 to 400 MHz mobile celeron is really pushing the envelope. Especially considering that you really don't have that much ram due to shared resources for the video and audio.
By the time you have a few apps on that thing that start competing for resources upon start up, that computer will run so slow you will want to throw it out a window. If you have enough things competing for resources upon start up your computer may actually get to where it simply freazes and can't start unless in safe mode, until you remove things. (Just because the start up menu is empty doesn't mean parts of programs aren't running in resident memory upon startup).
On my laptop (same model) I downgraded to 98SE from Win2K. And I have 192 megs for ram on it. Windows98SE supports internet sharing, 98 doesn't.
On a slightly different note:
Cosmetic improvements (Make 98 look like XP):
This is good to know how to do if you have an old laptop (say 100 to 300MHZ with 96 megs of ram) that can't handle anything above Windows98 very well. Its nice to have the "look" of XP even if you don't have the functionality.
For the fun of it I ripped some of the XP icons (My computer, Recycle Bin, and most of the other noticeable ones) from a DLL. Then I put the .ICO images in the folders on the OS where the DLL file that links to those Icons is located.
Then I went into the registry and linked those commands with the new XP images. (Open HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\ CLSID) So I now have XP icons on a Windows98SE machine. The recycle bin even switches from full to empty when you purge your garbage can. This isn't recommended if you are using a machine with less than 64 megs of ram, or a machine with 64 megs of ram that is sharing ram with the video. It'll have trouble booting when the OS goes to look for the new icons upon start up.
I also created a logo.sys image that looks like the one that loads when you start Windows XP. It even has the colors that scroll back and forth. Except mine simply says "Microsoft Windows" and not "Windows XP". I made this with a program called XrX logo utiltity. So the computer looks like its running WIndows XP in classic mode.
Its nice when your in college and you don't want to look shabby next to next to people that have money.