Troubleshooting Tip for When Your Laptop Won't Power Up
Laptop Won't Power Up - Power Button Flashes Off
Tonight my main laptop would not power up when I pressed the 'On' button, it just flashed on and off 5 times and stopped, would not switch on or off at all.
This had not happened on this computer in the two years I've had it. But I remembered something similar happened to another laptop some years back and it was my dad who is in his 70s and never took any computer classes who told me the simple solution, oh I say 'simple' but I've just been on youtube looking at young experts get this wrong or half right and say that many people throw out their laptops at this point or pay a technician to 'fix' them!
A Simple Solution to Get Your Laptop to Come On!
- Unplug from the power adaptor for a few minutes - that may actually be enough!
- If it still won't open /power up for you, remove the battery for a few minutes too
Yes, it really can be that easy. You can press the thing on and off for hours and that on button will just keep flashing 5 times then stop, but power off and within minutes it can be back for you.
Luckily removing from the adaptor was enough for mine tonight because this one requires a special screw to get the battery out - there's a tip in preparedness because the older Toshiba laptops had no screws to remove and I wasn't expecting to ever need a special tool and I see the guys on youtube even had worse problems in finding the right screwdriver for their portege's [mine is a lower model with the advantage of no silly security star shaped screw]
- So when it came back on it did tell me the battery was an issue and I had to reset the time, the guys on youtube removed their battery completely, but I find that was not necessary, both computers working now with batteries in place.
Worth a Try
This may not solve every powering up issue out there but it solved it on two of my laptops over the past couple of years, so worth a try. This may save you the expense of taking your laptop to a technician and save you time by getting it working within minutes again. Each time it happens it feels like a major disaster, so quite a relief to be up and running again :)
Mary
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I had a similar instance not too long ago. But, my problem became a permanent disaster.
I was updating my bios and I knew...yes, I knew...NOT to turn off my laptop during the process.
Then came a power outage and the battery went dead before the bios update was complete.
When the power came back on, I tried to power up the laptop and got the flashing power light.
I went through the same steps you describe in your post. Didn't work.
I then added a step. After taking out the battery, I held the power button down for at least 30 seconds. This is supposed to clear any electrical current still remaining in the laptop.
When I restarted the laptop, guess what? Still got the flashy thingy!
Turns out that, through no fault of my own, my laptop had died. I removed the hard drive and buried it ceremoniously in the backyard...next to my dead weed eater!
But, I jest...
Onward we go...
Jim
LOLOLOL! Seriously, you buried it ?!
Well talk about lightning striking! Such timing!
Great extra tip about holding the button down for 30 seconds without the battery in...
Yep...I sure did, Mary!
I was so mad that I actually buried it...minus the hard drive and a few other cannibalized parts that I could maybe use in the future.
Jim
LOL! I guess that is a piece of technology's worst nightmare, all that damp soil and the rain pouring down - maybe ceremoniously spill a cup of coffee over the keyboard first :D
Mary, I appreciate your sharing such tip to power up computer.
Any computing nugget is welcome.
Sage advice from the senior citizen! I've been in IT for close to 30 years and sometimes the easiest fix(reboot!) or taking the battery out for a couple of minutes is the best fix. I ran into this 3 nights ago with my wife's laptop that wouldn't power up and removing the battery solved it for now. That laptop has a recurring charging issue to begin with and this is likely to occur again, then it may be Macbook time as that is what the wife really wants.
lol, I just love it when the Universe gets on board with what we really want and the gremlins come in to take care of things in a timely manner! :D
Mary, Thanks for the useful tip. Usually, if something happens we are so shaken by the possibility of our computer being down that we don't stop to do simple troubleshooting.
Barbara
That is the nail on the head! Panic sets in, thinking that we now have no access to our computer, our emails, websites, WA, google, work, social life, shopping, all of which seem to have been on our plan to do that very evening and to think we can get all of that back in a few minutes - phew - I honestly didn't believe it would work first time I heard, I just humored him :D
But as we can also see from Brad's experience there is a lot of simple stuff could get us a long way :)
Could be your cooling too, create a laptop stand, so it gets more air beneath Make Your Own Laptop Stand
thanks Loes, in my case the computers worked again without any change to the cooling, I've heard of other brands in the past though with cooling issues
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Good afternoon Mary,
This is exactly what happened to me some years ago.
My little laptop did not go on and neither off.
I took it to the shop nearby, then a clever young fellow did just that. Turned the computer over and took out the battery, voila, problem solved.
Have a nice Sunday, Taetske
did he charge you?
I live in rural Ireland, going to a shop is a half a day out of the way, and sometimes these places charge 25 euros just for looking in the door, on top of the lost computer time
glad you got sorted anyway
No Mary, I got away with a Muchas Gracias.
Greetings from the south of Spain, Taetske
LOL!