NC20 - Just black screen and only "on" LED lit when starting laptop

Was browsing the web and my 3 year old Samsung NC20 just froze. Couldn't get any movement so turned off, waited a minute and turned back on. Now when pressing the start button there appears to be no boot up, the screen remains black, the only LED lit up is the 'on' LED, the fan whirs and gets hot but there is no other sign of life.

Would appreciate any assistance in resolving this issue

 

Try:

1. Disconnect mains power, remove battery and hold down power button for 30 seconds. Then replace battery, reconnect mains and try again.

2. Remove and replace the RAM module (which cleans the RAM contacts).

John

 

Hi John, thanks for the response.

Removed and reinstalled the battery and RAM module before but didn't press the power button at the time but will try now.

Ok tried but same result. Any other ideas?

 

Did you hold down the power button while the battery was removed and mains disconnected? That sometimes helps to clear any messed-up BIOS settings.

The next step would be to remove the hard disk and see if the computer boots enough to tell you that it is missing.

John

 

Yes. Held down power button for 30 seconds as suggested but no change.

Just took out hard drive and tried powering up but same result. Just black screen, power and charging LED only plus heat from fan.

 

Any other thoughts or suggestions on diagnosing this problem folks?

 

I am short of other suggestions.

I presume that there are no other activity lights that might suggest that the computer starts but the display is off (the best test is to plug it into an external monitor and then boot up).

Another test is to remove the HDD and see if the computer boots into the BIOS and tells you the HDD is missing. Sometimes an HDD can die in a way that stops the boot process.

After that it's a matter of strip down and reassemble, which sometimes fixes a connection problem.

John

 

No other lights to indicate any activity. Fan works, HDD spins that's about it.

Tried booting without the HDD but same result.

Had the back off today to see if there was anything obvious but nothing to see. Took out the CMOS battery for a while also. Same result.

I think I'm almost resigned to taking it to the repair shop.

 

I had a similar issue with G7 when i was messing around with it...it was because the screen display was set to 0% brightness. i had to hook it up to a monitor / tv to navigate and bring up the brightness back up to something above 0%. was pretty black until around 6% for me.

 

Many thanks John,

I had the same problem as my three and half years old Samsung NC20 just developed the same problem described above. I did as advised - held down the power button while the battery was removed and mains disconnected, then replaced battery, reconnected mains and tried powering on the system again - and it worked. My net book is now working okay. Thank you once again!

 

Thanks for reporting that this worked for you.

BTW, my NC20 is approaching 4 years old and is still in daily use with no issues reported.

John

 

Hi John, sadly this was but a temporary fix. After the laptop came on and booted to the desktop, I thought all was well. Unfortunately, the system was frozen and the mouse or any other key on the keyboard wasn't working. I couldn't even shut it down. So I had to force shut down by pressing in the button. That was the end. It would not come on again even after trying the same procedure that worked previously. Not sure why the system is behaving this way. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

 

That's not good news.

Is it showing any sign of life when you press the power button? If the power light comes on briefly then that may indicate that the BIOS is starting but has a problem with the hardware and quickly stops. The usual cause of this is that the RAM can't be identified, which is often fixed by removing / replacing the RAM (which cleans the contacts), or try another module. An electronic failure of the hard drive can have the same effect and can be tested by disconnecting it. The computer will boot into the BIOS if it has working RAM but no HDD.

The final method to attempt to resurrect a computer is to dismantle and reassemble it. Connections which loosen or oxidise with age are a common cause of failure.

John