Broken Laptop

[chris]

Help! My laptop has given up the ghost!

It's a Compaq nx7010 and it keeps shutting down. The problem first occurred a couple of months ago soon after upgrading the RAM from 512 to 1280? Meg. It just turns off with no warning, and the only way to get it going again is to remove the battery then connect and disconnect the power supply a couple of times, then replace the battery. At first it shut down about once per week, but today it has got a lot worse, and now I'm lucky if it will finish booting before the power cuts out. I don't think it's a broken battery as the problem is the same when the battery is not fitted. I have reseated the RAM (both boards) as recommended by HP.

I think it might be the power adapter, but I'm not sure how to find out (it still gives 18.6V on the old AVO immediately after cutting out).

It also seems to stay on for longer if I leave it for a while before restarting.
Any ideas greatly received.

[border-rider]

Could well be a memory fault

try this test

MemTest: RAM reliability tester for Windows

[tonycollinet]

Do you still have the old memory - and is the machine reliable if you put it back in?

[chris]

At the moment the machine will not boot up at all. I have tried all possible combinations of memory to no avail.

[Tim Hall]

Processor fan?

Laptops are very hot little beasts, and there's a lot of heat sinkery and blowing of air to keep the processor cool. If it gets too hot, it'll shut down to protect the processor.

Daughter's Thinkpad had this problem, fixed by buying a replacement fan module off Ebay for a fiver.

Can you boot it up with the back/keyboard off to see if the fan spins? 

[токамак]

I reckon you've got a loose DC socket - a similar case to this one: USB ports problem. The socket can be replaced, although probably not at your nearest PC World...

[chris]

Its in at the local repairers. I've had a look inside and it's nothing obvious.