I have an HP-Compaq Presario F761US that started to hang during post. What I discovered was that if I remove the CD-Rom it will boot fine. I replaced it with another and again it will hang. It will eventually boot though but takes a lot longer and sometimes the CD-Rom won't even show in the OS. The LAptop is running Vista Home Premium.
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HP Laptop Post Issue
- Thread starter dberg35
- Start date
First guess, it sounds like the cable connecting your optical drive to the mainboard is bad, or the IDE or SATA controller on the motherboard you're connecting to is bad.
Easy tests:
1. Try a different cable if you have one.
2. Try connecting to a different location on the motherboard, if one is available.
Easy tests:
1. Try a different cable if you have one.
2. Try connecting to a different location on the motherboard, if one is available.
On the cable, if you don't have one, and don't have a friend you can borrow one from, then you can find the online for cheap. It'll be either IDE - fat, ribbon, cable, or SATA - small, looks kinda like USB on each end.
Either one is cheap to buy.
Either one is cheap to buy.
- Thread starter
- #4
Actually, there is, but you'd have to open it up, and you'd have to go online most likely to get a replacement cable. Depending upon your model (unless it's universal - that's one I've yet to check into), it should still be pretty cheap.
But your better option may be to just go with USB, unless you WANT to go digging around inside your laptop. Compared with a desktop, that takes a lot of patience. I didn't realize it was a laptop, b/c I didn't look up the model #. And apparently I overlooked the keyword in the subject on that.![[blush]](/data/assets/smilies/blush.gif "[blush] [blush]")
Anyway, it's your choice. Depends upon your skill, desire to dig, and resources. Also, a USB optical drive will be a far cheaper replacement than most any laptop internal optical drive.
But your better option may be to just go with USB, unless you WANT to go digging around inside your laptop. Compared with a desktop, that takes a lot of patience. I didn't realize it was a laptop, b/c I didn't look up the model #. And apparently I overlooked the keyword in the subject on that.
Anyway, it's your choice. Depends upon your skill, desire to dig, and resources. Also, a USB optical drive will be a far cheaper replacement than most any laptop internal optical drive.
rclarke250
Technical User
Actually there isn't a cable on most laptops. Everyone I have replaced motherboards on, Dell,IBM,Toshiba,Acer,HP,Compaq Has had the IDE or Sata connector soldered on the board. I have seen small cables for the hdd's in some like Sager and Alienware, but again that is unusual. The first test to make is to boot into BIOS, and see if the cdrom is seen in BIOS, if it is not, then suspect the motherboard. If it is, remove the hard drive and use a bootable cd to test the system, like a linux livecd, or something similar. May need to make this on another PC to rule out the OS on your system. If you do not have access to another pc,and do not know how to create a bootable cd for test, go to Barnes and Noble and look in the magazine section for a linux magazine with an included linux distro, for 10 dollars, you have a great bootable test OS, and you may even learn to like another OS. 
True, the type of connections depend upon the laptop model. But some definitely have cables as well.
It looks like the laptop in question does not have any cables, other than for the USB board.. See pages 16 to 20 at above link if you want to pull some detailed info on it.
This would be a painful reminder to look up the specific model first, to be sure.
It looks like the laptop in question does not have any cables, other than for the USB board.. See pages 16 to 20 at above link if you want to pull some detailed info on it.
This would be a painful reminder to look up the specific model first, to be sure.
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