Laptop shuts down problem ... no its not the battery

[mach04]

I have a laptop Fujitsu Siemens, Amilo, is 6 years old and is running on Win XP Home. I have noticed in the past 3 months that it shuts down. The battery is not the reason as it stopped functioning after 1 year I purchased it and since then I have used it through the adaptor.
I regullary check for spywares, malwares and is running Avast antivirus on it.
Could the possible reason be that the motherboard is losing its power, and need to replace it with another one?

Any comments are highly appreciated.

 

[vacunita]

Heat maybe?

Is it getting really hot? Have you tried cleaning out the fans, and vents with some compressed air?

6 years can accumulate quite a bit of dust preventing adequate cooling.

Is their anything in Event viewer that may help?



----------------------------------
Phil AKA Vacunita
----------------------------------
Ignorance is not necessarily Bliss, case in point:
Unknown has caused an Unknown Error on Unknown and must be shutdown to prevent damage to Unknown.

 

[G0AOZ]

Be more specific about "...it shuts down.".

Is this a 'controlled' or 'automated' shutdown with maybe a message or something on the screen, or does the whole laptop suddenly go dead whilst you're in the middle of doing something?

Are ANY of the l.e.d.s still lit after this has happened?

Can you restart the laptop straightaway, or does it need some time before it is good to go again?

Check the Event Viewer to see if that shows any errors pertaining to the shut down.

Have you tried running the laptop in Safe Mode? Does it do the same thing?

Try booting up on a CD with say BART-PE or UBUNTU on it. This way you're eliminating the XP operating system and any foibles on the hard drive.

From what we know so far, it could be PSU, motherboard, or some OS problem...

ROGER - G0AOZ.

 

[wolluf]

Does it definitely shut down? (eg, its not going into standby?)

 

[mach04]

To Vacunita:
1- Yes I have cleaned the fans and vents about 6 months ago.
2-It doesn't warm.
3- A new hard drive was installed for 1 year ago.

To GOAOZ:
1- Shutting down is that it suddenly loses the power and I have to press the start button to start the pc. It is automated, I don't touch any buttons.
2- I can restart it right away, couple of times I expereienced that it happened 2-3 times in a row, next day it went well.
3-It doesn't show any error message before the shut down and no any messages after it is restarted.
4-I have also tried it in Safe mode and worked well.

 

[flyboytim]

Check out the adaptor power supply cables/connector - after running your laptop on this for the last five years, you may find they are wearing out.

Strain relief boots where wires enter connectors or transformer boxes are points of weakness where wires may break within their insulation, yet reconnect when flexed.

The power connector socket on the laptop is also subject to mechanical strain, and can cause a poor connection.

Without a functioning battery, an instant of power dropout will cause a shutdown.

Even if using a laptop only as a desktop replacement, a working battery acts as an UPS, enabling you to gracefully shutdown in the event of a power failure from whatever cause.

 

[G0AOZ]

Now you've indicated it's a sudden complete cut off, that points more towards a loss of power. However, not sure how persistent you've been with Safe Mode since you also stated, "...next day it went well."

It could be that if it's a power problem, then running in Safe Mode marginally reduces power consumption.

Have you tried booting up on a CD of some sort? You could then try waggling the wire from the PSU and the power jack to see if you can provoke the shut down.

ROGER - G0AOZ.

 

[BadBigBen]

It does not sound like it is a thermal related problem...

I've seen this behavior with bad RAM being the culprit, so check the RAM first... e.g. MEMTEST 86+ ...

NOTE: Six years for a Laptop is quite good, replacing the mainboard is not the smartest thing to do. The replacement could cost you close to or more than a comparable newer model...


Ben
"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."
How to ask a question, when posting them to a professional forum.
Only ask questions with yes/no answers if you want "yes" or "no"

 

[goombawaho]

Agreed - 6 years = time to sell for parts. Don't spend much on getting it going.