acer travelmate will not boot to windows

[Magill]

My laptop died this morning. It had been running for a few minutes on battery power - I thought I had it plugged into AC. It shut off. No big deal, I plugged it in and tried to restart. It POSTs, then goes to the Windows XP Home splash. Then it shuts off and tries to start again. Then I get the "start in safe mode etc " option. I try all the options including start "normally" and last good configuaration. No luck.
I will pull the HD and put into an external enclosure to test the drive and see if that is the issue.
I did try pulling each of the 2 sticks of RAM individually to see if that was the issue.
Any other suggestions of what I might try?

Thanks.

K

[jstanek7]

first I would disconnect from the mains and pull the battery out for a few seconds the replace the battery and connect the ac and see if it will start.

[Magill]

Did do. No luck.
Thanks

[Magill]

One other note:
It is at loading mup.sys that the computer shuts off and tries to restart.

[liam858]

Can you access the CMOS battery easily? I would pull that for a couple of minutes to reset the CMOS.


Liam

[Magill]

Can you access the CMOS battery easily? I would pull that for a couple of minutes to reset the CMOS.

Interesting, not really sure. I can have a look. When I realised it was hanging at mup.sys, I did a little research. I think the CMOS reset was one suggestion as was doing a recovery although I long ago misplaced the Recovery CDs that came with the machine.
I'll post back.

[SuperSparks]

That hanging on mup.sys is often caused by hard drive problems Download this and burn it to a CDR - it has all the drive diagnostic utilities on it, plus many other useful apps:

Ultimate Boot CD

[Magill]

Thanks for that Nick but I think i have gotten myself in real trouble.
Having discovered that my drive enclosure was in storage and I would not have access to it till today to check the drive, and (perhaps unfortunately) having found the missing recovery disks, I began the recovery process. 2% in I realised that I would lose my data so cancelled the recovery. I've now put the drive into the enclosure but when I plug it in to my other machine it does noty show up in My Computer. I'm now looking for a Fujitsu utility that might help me (it's a Fujitsu drive) but I am fearing the worst.

K

[Magill]

Yahooooooo!
Managed to recover ALL my data using GetDataBack. Absolutely amazing. Took all of 2 hours using my new HP dv2000 notebook to run the software with the drive from the dead Acer in a portable enclosure.
Awesome.
I'll look into reviving the Acer when there is time.

[SuperSparks]

I'm glad you hear that you rescued your data. I bet you'll never forget to back it up again

[Magill]

OK, 6 months, or so, later I'm back.
A few months ago I used the Acer recovery disks to reinstall XP Home. The computer started up and ran pretty reliably until recently. I was using it as an internet radio source for my home stereo.
The issue I have now is that it will boot up and run for minute or two but then shuts down. Its as if someone flicked a switch and the computer dies instantly. I booted up using the Ultimate Boot CD recommended by Nick although the machine shuts down before I can run any diagnostics.
I will try pulling the CMOS battery as suggested earlier but I does anyone have other suggestions?

[Train]

Sounds like the cpu is overheating to me.

[Magill]

Train, I actually wondered whether that might be the case. The fan runs for a few seconds at initial start up but then stops. Any guess on how to fix that?

[Train]

You can look to see if the vents are plugged up. I have cleaned them and that was all the lapper needed.

Other than that, I suggest taking it in and having someone look at it.

Opening up the lapper case and cleaning it out, I have done it. But I needed to find the manual on how to do it. It was a few years out of warranty or I would not have touched it.