[Radien]

Well, my computer has another major problem again, and I don't have anywhere to turn, so I come beseeching all of you for some help. I'm sorry for the lack of information here, but I literally can't get much from the computer right now. Hopefully one of you will have a hunch that I can follow up on...

I have a Dell Inspiron 6000 laptop running Windows 7. Last night I was using my latop normally, when the screen went black without warning. As far as I could tell, nothing else was wrong, so I attempted to reboot the computer. Well, technically I tried to "Hibernate" instead, because the power button is set to that, and it often seemed to solve problems.

The first time I tried to hibernate and then resume, a startup screen of sorts came on, but just as the desktop was about to appear, it went black again. At this point I heard a default Windows noise; might've been the startup sound.

After that, I did a hard-reset by holding the power button in for 5 seconds. This time, I didn't even get a boot screen of any sort. It's just completely black. I think I might've heard a sound effect or two, it's stopped responding.


A little background here:

A few weeks ago, my computer's hard drive died. I got a friend to look at it, and since his wife had an old Inspiron laptop she didn't use anymore, he swapped out the hard drive into mine and got it to boot. Later he used some recovery tools on my old hard drive and was able to rescue most of the data from it.

His wife's old hard drive had Windows 7 on it, so that's what my computer is using now. During the hard drive replacement he also installed some extra RAM he had lying around. Up until now, most of the fixes/replacements he made had been working fine.

I can't think of any major programs that would have been likely sources of malware. Most of what I use is well-known freeware/shareware like OpenOffice and Paintshop Pro. But on the other hand, it seems like a virus might be a possibility considering the computer's behavior. I use Adblock and Noscript while internet-browsing (mostly in Firefox, sometimes in Chrome), but I hadn't gotten around to reinstalling AVG since I'd only had the new hard drive for a short while.

Any ideas about what I should try first?... The one piece of good news I can think of is that all my old rescued data is still on the external hard drive we used to transfer it to the replacement hard drive, but whatever I've done since then is on the replacement drive.

Thanks for your help in the past, and thanks in advance for any ideas you might be able to throw my way.

Edited by Radien, 12 December 2011 - 07:57 AM.

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It seems this hasn't gotten any replies after two days. I thought I'd come back with some additional information.

I created an AVG boot CD and started my computer with it inserted. The screen did not come on. I'm not 100% sure the boot CD is functional, but a couple of reboot attempts showed me that the screen is indeed still capable of functioning, but it turns off shortly after some of the startup actions. So far I have seen the boot screen and the profile selection screen. I suspect Windows is running normally behind this.

My current suspicion is that my laptop is incorrectly detecting whether the lid is closed. If it thinks the lid is closed, it might be automatically turning off the monitor. The question I'm trying to answer is: would this be a software error, or a hardware error?

The lid is a little looser now than it used to be, so I think it might be a connection, I guess. But I'd like as little as a suggestion as to where I should start. Should I get help replacing the monitor? Inspecting the lid hinge? Or should I go back to attempting an alternate boot sequence? Any advice is greatly appreciated.

Alternately, if I posted this topic in the wrong forum, and that's why I've gotten no replies, I'd appreciate it if a mod could move the thread to the Windows 7 OS forum...

Edited by Radien, 14 December 2011 - 07:57 AM.

[Radien]

It seems this hasn't gotten any replies after two days. I thought I'd come back with some additional information.

I created an AVG boot CD and started my computer with it inserted. The screen did not come on. I'm not 100% sure the boot CD is functional, but a couple of reboot attempts showed me that the screen is indeed still capable of functioning, but it turns off shortly after some of the startup actions. So far I have seen the boot screen and the profile selection screen. I suspect Windows is running normally behind this.

My current suspicion is that my laptop is incorrectly detecting whether the lid is closed. If it thinks the lid is closed, it might be automatically turning off the monitor. The question I'm trying to answer is: would this be a software error, or a hardware error?

The lid is a little looser now than it used to be, so I think it might be a connection, I guess. But I'd like as little as a suggestion as to where I should start. Should I get help replacing the monitor? Inspecting the lid hinge? Or should I go back to attempting an alternate boot sequence? Any advice is greatly appreciated.

Alternately, if I posted this topic in the wrong forum, and that's why I've gotten no replies, I'd appreciate it if a mod could move the thread to the Windows 7 OS forum...

Edited by Radien, 14 December 2011 - 07:57 AM.

[phillpower2]

Topic replied to on the Hardware Forums 12 minutes after the OP
http://www.geekstogo...is-recoverable/

[Radien]

Topic replied to on the Hardware Forums 12 minutes after the OP
http://www.geekstogo...is-recoverable/

Shoot... I'm confused too, because I swear I reloaded that page at least three times before posting this one. Thank you for the reply; I'll continue over in that thread.

[Dakeyras]

Since you are currently being assisted by here this topic is now closed.

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