Strange problem with HP laptop, takes 30 minutes to start!

[d3v]

Hey guys I had a 2 year old HP laptop come in yesterday customer complaining that it will not start-up although it does power-on with the LED's and fan spinning. Interestingly he also said it does bootup and reach desktop if left powered on for approx 30 minutes!?!

After a full diagnosis I told him the motherboard must be faulty and he let me transfer his data/outlook files to he desktop PC.

I never tried leaving it powered-on for 30 minutes to see if it would indeed bootup to Windows so he calls me tonight saying he doesn't think it's the motherboard because he once again left it for 30 minutes and is now working fine!

I've never come across an unbootable machine that suddenly begins to bootup if left for 30 minutes, but then again I've never tried leaving one on for that length of time to see.

Anyone else come across this strange problem?

 

[MDD1963]

I've certainly seen hard drives develop malfunctions where each required a full 2 minutes to even show up in the BIOS...; additionally, since HP laptops tend to display so little other than the goofy twirling circle and/or HP logo, it could just as easily just be something botched with Windows itself....

However, if it is a strange MB issue, then the laptop would likely be less than successful booting a live Linux CD as well...(A live Mint17 DVD will be at desktop within 1 minute or less...that would only leave a potential faulty drive or something preventing Windows from reaching the desktop easily,,,,)

Once it comes up fully, can also have them reboot it into safe mode.....

 

[d3v]

nope, during diagnosis i tried booting with bare minumum, no HDD, CD, keyboard, trackpad, speakers, even unplugging the video display cable and instead plugging in an external monitor.... it still did not POST.

there is nothing coming up on the screen, no POST, nadda.

 

[NYJimbo]

Sounds like a thermal issue, probably with some surface mounted chips. I have had them "fix themselves" after leaving it on for a few hours, but that's most likely temporary and very unreliable. It will likely fail again and then may work again, but I wouldn't trust it.

 

[ComputerRepairTech]

I've only heard about a scenario like this once before and it was with an acer laptop but I don't know what became of it.

Did you already try updating bios just in case?

 

[glennd]

Sounds like a thermal issue, probably with some surface mounted chips. I have had them "fix themselves" after leaving it on for a few hours, but that's most likely temporary and very unreliable. It will likely fail again and then may work again, but I wouldn't trust it.

Agreed. Could also be 'cold' solder joints that suddenly start conducting when the temperature reaches some threshold.

 

[d3v]

that's an interesting point regarding 'cold solder joints'. it could very well be!
re: BIOS update, it doesn't POST until 30 minutes according to the customer so I suppose I could get it back off him and try and 'catch' the F2/Del oppertunity but I'd literally have to watch the screen like a hawk for 20-30 minutes!

 

[Thedog]

Doesn't sound like a machine that's worth fixing to me. I remember that the xbox 360 had a badly soldered GPU and lot's of people got hit by it and one solution was to start the machine wrapped in a towel (no ventilation) and the GPU would "melt back"

Wasn't a stable solution so to speak...

 

[ComputerRepairTech]

Does it recover from standby?

 

[Larry Sabo]

Try a new CMOS battery.

 

[d3v]

I asked him if he'd like me to give it one last go at fixing but he said he's keeping it powered-on to complete some work task for the time being. Maybe in the near future I can try fixing this issue.
In hindsight a thermal problem does indeed seem the obvious cause!

 

[frase]

Doesn't sound like a machine that's worth fixing to me. I remember that the xbox 360 had a badly soldered GPU and lot's of people got hit by it and one solution was to start the machine wrapped in a towel (no ventilation) and the GPU would "melt back"

Wasn't a stable solution so to speak...

HP += Hardly Perfect def Thermal Issue not GPU more CPU and motherboard.

 

[Altster]

Hey guys I had a 2 year old HP laptop come in yesterday customer complaining that it will not start-up although it does power-on with the LED's and fan spinning. Interestingly he also said it does bootup and reach desktop if left powered on for approx 30 minutes!?!

I never tried leaving it powered-on for 30 minutes to see if it would indeed bootup to Windows so he calls me tonight saying he doesn't think it's the motherboard because he once again left it for 30 minutes and is now working fine!

Not leaving it on AND observing / listening to the unit (for weird noises, etc.) was your first mistake. You've GOT to pay attention to what is happening during the boot / startup process when computers take so long to get to the desktop!

I've seen this problem all too often and come to find out that the startup problems were due to all of the junk (read: malware) programs which were loading into memory during the boot process.

 

[ProFix]

I'm sure you tried this, but go to MSCONFIG, stop everything from starting.... see what happens. Sounds to me like something is scanning in the background. also, when it finally boots, can you turn it off and back on?? will it boot faster?

 

[Altster]

I've never come across an unbootable machine that suddenly begins to bootup if left for 30 minutes, but then again I've never tried leaving one on for that length of time to see.

Anyone else come across this strange problem?

Any resolution to this issue(s) yet?

 

[d3v]

No resolution, he has not got back to me about the laptop.
As others have said it is a thermal issue, a mistake in the laptops construction.