[CabezaEnFuego]

I was watching a movie on my XPS notebook when it suddenly froze up. When I restarted my computer it did almost nothing. The power light comes on and it sound like it's about to start up but then nothing. It's a couple years old, and last weekend I opened it up to clean it out for the first time but it has been working fine since then. My impression would be the motherboard failed.

Edited by CabezaEnFuego, 29 May 2010 - 08:32 PM.

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Have you tried starting in safe mode?
Start tapping F8 during boot up.

[123Runner]

Have you tried starting in safe mode?
Start tapping F8 during boot up.

[CabezaEnFuego]

it doesn't boot up at all. I get the power light and a split second of ssomething whirring, but it doesn't do anything else, never displays anything

[CabezaEnFuego]

anyone?

[deggitt]

Hi, What model XPS ?

What did you clean

How did you clean it

Did you remove anything to clean it

[CabezaEnFuego]

it's a m1730, i cleaned out the dust, had to detatch the screen, the wireless card and the video card, it worked fine for a week then just froze up and died on me

[deggitt]

Boy!! a [bleep] of a lot of stripdown just to clean. I should think the strip down & the crash are connected. I would check again that it all went back together correctly even though it worked for awhile. If you havn't got the service manual it is here.

http://support.dell....en/sm/index.htm

[CabezaEnFuego]

well i re-did everything and still nothing

[deggitt]

Pull your memory & hard drive. Power up, do you get any Post Beeps ?

[CabezaEnFuego]

no beeps, but the numlock came on and the caps and scroll locks were flashing. then after about a minute of that it shuts itself off

[deggitt]

Try this..disconnect power adapter, remove main battery, remove bios battery (coin cell battery). Instructions are here...

http://support.dell....en/sm/index.htm

With power adapter & batteries removed hold down power button for 20/30 seconds & then replace bios battery (clean battery with tissue to remove fingerprints etc.). Plug in power adapter only for now & power up comp.

[CabezaEnFuego]

Ok, I don't know that doing that did anything, but it did show me that the computer will power up using Media Direct and I can then access Windows through that. But when I hit the power button it still doesn't respond.

[deggitt]

Hi, what we just did was reset the bios. I didn,t realise you had MediaDirect. This has been a problem for many (mediadirect 1 & 2).
At least we know your comp. can boot to your os. How do you access XP, is it by booting MediaDirect & then pressing the DMD button again.

You can try booting MediaDirect & when up & running press the power off button to shut down the comp. & then press the DMD button.

[CabezaEnFuego]

I'm not in front of it right now, but as I recall it would bring up the DMD screen, then I either hit that button again or Esc. and it went to a command screen, asking for F1 to continue, F2 for something else, and F3 for some diagnostic, I think that was the order. I hit F3 and it booted Vista, but it seems to have limited capabilities, it said it couldn't auto check for updates and seems it couldn't run embedded media in pages. I'll check in about an hour when I'm at my computer again.

Edited by CabezaEnFuego, 02 June 2010 - 06:41 PM.

[deggitt]

Hi, when you boot into DMD does it run ok ?. Do you have only vista on your comp.

it's nearly 3am here so i won't be around for a few awhile, will have a look later.