Laptop won't boot up.HELP!!!

Kenno90

i just updated my dell studio 1557's BIOS. Everything was going well until it froze and turned off. I thought OK it's finished, Now it won't turn on:(:(.

the keyboard lights up,the power light is on , the fan and hard drive make noise as usual but the screen remains completely blank

I know it's a BIOS problem. Can anybody help

Adam

plug in an external monitor and see if you get an image

Kenno90

Adam wrote: »

plug in an external monitor and see if you get an image

No Nothing:(

JonathanAnon

Did the BIOS upgrade complete successfully before you rebooted? Are you seeing anything at all when you power on?

But I think it sounds like the BIOS chip hasnt taken to the firmware upgrade, obvious of me to say that I know.

Adam

just on an off chance, plug out the laptop, take out the battery and then hold the power button for 5-10 seconds to discharge all the power in the laptop, and then plug it in and try again.

corkcomp

Adam wrote: »

just on an off chance, plug out the laptop, take out the battery and then hold the power button for 5-10 seconds to discharge all the power in the laptop, and then plug it in and try again.

yep +1 and if not then ring dell

Adam

you could also try these steps, i know you have no picture but if you give it a minute between each step you should get the process done anyway:

-Press "F2" during the boot process to enter the BIOS. Press "F2" before the Windows loading screen. Certain models may use a different key. The key will be displayed during the boot process. For most Dell models, the key is "F2."

-Use the "Alt" + "F" key combination to load defaults.

-Press "Esc" on your Dell laptop keyboard to save and exit.

-Choose the "Enter" key to save all changes and exit the BIOS screen. Allow your laptop to restart for BIOS settings to reset.

http://www.ehow.com/how_5002463_reset-bios-dell-laptop.html#ixzz0ujFM7DnO

Kenno90

Thanks guys did all you said let the power completly drain from it . no luck .

Followed the steps the last guy gave(thnks for the advice) but it didn't work

conacur

Uh Oh...May need to refer to motherboard handbook (if you still have it) or contact Dell. They might be able to help. From what I heard though Dell have a BIOS setup permanently burned into the CMOS chip that can't be altered so if the flash goes bad, you have a working version to revert to.....

Kenno90

Don't think so.

I've found this link but i've trouble creating it

http://forum.notebookreview.com/dell-inspiron-dell-studio/420768-dell-studio-1557-a-135.html

corkcomp

check on dell site if your laptop is under warranty and if so they will replace the MB.. my advice is to be vague on details.. say you were flashing bios as per instructions on their support site and it died at reboot stage..

Kenno90

Ye i'm trying to use a bootable USB stick i'll let you know if anything happens.
I'll be ringing them tomorrow and giving them an earful.

Don't think the motherboard needs replacing all the USB ports working fine the HD, fan and lights all work

Kenno90

Looking Good so far................
pray for me

ricman

Put in a cd ,audio,does cd drive light come on,plug in a vga monitor.
Press fn key plus f6.f7,f8 ,some key with tv logo ,square logo to turn on vga out.try pressing fn and f8 simultaenously .
your gaurantee is 2 years for pcs,laptops under eu law.

Kenno90

ok guys problem solved :D
thanks for your help lads:D

I followed this post located on a laptop forum

Today I decided to update my BIOS from A03 to A04. Prior to updating the BIOS, I had the antivirus turned off, even restarting the windows (it always on) to "refresh" it & closing any other unwanted application. Once I'm satisfy, I execute the BIOS A04 updater utility & let the utility do the job. As usual, I see countdown from 80 (I guess number of block remaining to be flash). For unknown reason, the flashing process stop when the utility try to flash block 67. No error popup, it just hang. I can move the mouse though so I leave my laptop. I'm very very worried.

While leaving my dell laptop hoping the update process success (I doubt), I google how to recover from failed BIOS update. Fortunately there is a couple of people which owned Dell Studio (including Studio XPS) with Pheonix BIOS that faced the same problem as I am. The important thing is there is a way to recover from failed BIOS update & the required tools also provided. I need to:-
1) Preparing bootable usb drive (flash drive) with a utility provided
2) Extracting BIOS1.wph file from BIOS ver A03, to be put in flash drive. Probably need to rename to BIOS.wph but I put both file BIOS1.wph & BIOS.wph. Both is identical file, just different name.
3) Pheonix BIOS flash utility is required (I guess for DOS) - pheonix16.exe. Also need to be put in the flash drive

After preparing the flash drive, there is still no progress & this time windows freeze (mouse no longer can be moved). Since windows has freezed, I have to forced shutdown my laptop (by unplugging both power cord & the battery). After that my laptop can turn on but with blank display. I decided to try recover my laptop by using the flash drive I prepared earlier. By following step-by-step guide I found on another forum, I do like this:-
1) Unplug the battery
2) Unplug the power cord from the laptop
3) Plug in the flash drive to USB port
4) Press "End" button on the keyboard (at least 3 seconds)
5) Plug in the power cord to the laptop & in the same time release the "End" button. Laptop should automatically turned ON with battery indicator (LED) lit with amber light. During this time all button will not responding, including power button.
6) Wait for a while. Laptop will reboot automatically when the recovery process successful. In my case, after the reboot process, I need to unplug & re-plug the power cord to be able to turn ON my laptop.

This is very thrilling experience but with happy ending.

I'm now a happy owner of Dell Studio 1557 with BIOS ver A03.

kizwan

btw rang Dell customer support and the guy (who was trying very hard to be helpful) didn't know what to do so he'll ring me back tomorrow

Kenno90

BTW he never rang back:rolleyes:

Gotta love that customer service

thenightrider

Glad you got it working ill get a friend of mine in oz to try this on his dell laptop he was only telling me a few hours ago that the same thing happened his laptop

MunsterCycling

Good job posting the fix, most forget to do that.