Notebooks & Netbooks

[stephr1]

Hi all,

  I wonder if anyone has encountered, or heard of, this problem.

  I have an Acer Aspire 5745 laptop w/640GB HDD and 8GB of memory running Win 7 Home. I've had it for ~3 years.

  A year or 2 ago it started developing a power-on problem. I noticed it mostly on cooler mornings (tend not to heat my house anymore than necessary). Sometimes it makes it up to the Win 7 power on screen (Windows 7 and swirling colors creating a window) and stops somewhere along the way. Other times it may not even make it past the Acer splash screen. Occasionally it will make it to full start up (Windows desktop) only to hang. I may have to restart the machine more than a few times to get it up and running. However, once I have it fully powered up, I can shut it off and reboot without any problems.

  I did reseat the HDD and thought it helped, but only for a bit. The problem returned. Battery seems to be in good shape.

  One thing I noticed this morning is that if I unplug the PS, the computer booted up just fine. I still need to do a few more tests to confirm or deny this...but it was a new and interesting discovery.

  I've read in a few places that the PS/charger may be a source of problems like this.

  Any insight or feedback is greatly appreciated.

  Thanks and cheers....

[finlux · Accepted solution]

Hi stephr1

Yes, it sounds as if the charger is at fault. If it boots & works fine on battery - it is the only thing it could be!

Buy a replacement charger - one that gives the same output/input as the existing one, then that should solve your problems!

[stephr1]

Hey finlux,

  Thanks much for the input. I suspected that might be the case, but hadn't done enough testing. I've since done a few more tests and, while I can't say to a complete certainty, it does seem as if the P/S-charger is causing problems. I also noticed that power-on is much quicker (again) w/out the P/S plugged in. Another point against the P/S.

  Do you (or anyone) know if this is a wide spread problem with these P/Ses? The unit I have have is a HiPro (Model HP-A0652R3B). I checkled voltage (no load) and it looks spot on. Maybe it's an "increasing" noise problem. Be interested to know.

 My temp solution is to leave the P/S connected for charging, power up on battery only and then plug in the P/S once it's running w/no problems. Just a pain. I think I have 1 or 2 other P/Ses with the right ratings so I'll see if those fair any better. If not, then it may be a chip related to the P/S circuit on the motherboard (read that on some other postings).

  Anyway, again, I appreciate the help.

  Cheers and regards....

[finlux]

Not heard of any particular problem with those chargers/power supplies...

Post back, if I can be of any further help!

[stephr1]

Well, since you offered... It might be more appropriate to open another topic for this.... I am having difficulty getting the power monitor icon to show. When I go into "Turn System Icons on or off" the Power "pull-down" button is grayed out (doesn't matter whether the P/S is plugged in or not). I think it may have shown (in the system tray) at one time but cannot now seem to bring it back. I read a variety of suggestions (one included changing/deleting some registry entries related to explorer that I tried but did not work) and have not been able to bring it back. Any suggestions or pointers on this? On a related note....any suggestions for a good batter monitor widget? Thanks and cheers.....

[finlux]

If I'm being honest, I've never heard of that one before, but see here for some advice!

I'm not going to be much help with your second question either. I've not used Windows 7 gadgets, since Microsoft discontinued them due to vulnerabilities, but there are sites that offer them despite the known problems - see here.