Acer Aspire A515-51G blank screen on start-up

petersenm
petersenm Member Posts: 5

Tinkerer

I made a change to the BIOS to disable VMD, upon rebooting the laptop, all I get is a blank screen, not even the logo.

I've tried:
 - unplugging and putting a paperclip into the battery disconnect hole for 30 seconds. 
 - blindly typing the BIOS reset keys (F2, bios password, F9, F10)

without any success, can anyone suggest any other options?

Thanks

Best Answers

  • JackE
    JackE ACE Posts: 44,869 Trailblazer
    Answer ✓
    (1) Press and hold power button shut machine off.
    (2) Unplug charger
    (3) Remove one screw from ramdoor and left off door
    (4) Remove RAM module
    (5) Look for jumper JCMOS1 in corner of RAM socket bed
    (6) Short jumper with a screwdriver blade for 10 seconds to try to reset BIOS defaults

    Button it back up. Try it again.

      

    Jack E/NJ

  • petersenm
    petersenm Member Posts: 5

    Tinkerer

    Answer ✓
    Brilliant thanks that worked

Answers

  • JackE
    JackE ACE Posts: 44,869 Trailblazer
    Press and hold the power button till the laptop shuts off again. Re-do the paperclip thing with the laptop unplugged but also press the power key at the same time for about a minute.

    Then plug the charger back in but wait for the battery charge LED to turn steady blue. Then press and hold the F2 key. While still holding the F2 key, turn the machine on to try to get a BIOS menu screen again to reload defaults..

    Jack E/NJ

  • petersenm
    petersenm Member Posts: 5

    Tinkerer

    Tried that still have a blank screen
  • JackE
    JackE ACE Posts: 44,869 Trailblazer
    A blank screen with some visible backlight leakage? Or a totally black screen with no visible leakage whatsoever?

    While you can't just disable VMD without first loading standard AHCI disk drivers via SafeMode, disabling it any other way should not affect the basic integrated video output. Unless of course the BIOS was also somehow modded to try to use the discrete GPU at startup.

    Jack E/NJ

  • petersenm
    petersenm Member Posts: 5

    Tinkerer

    Blank screen with visible backlight leakage

    only change made was Ctrl + s on main tab and disable VMD
  • JackE
    JackE ACE Posts: 44,869 Trailblazer
    OK. Shut it off again. Then turn it on. Then IMMEDIATELY start tapping the F2 key rapidly.

    Jack E/NJ

  • petersenm
    petersenm Member Posts: 5

    Tinkerer

    No response, still a blank screen
  • JackE
    JackE ACE Posts: 44,869 Trailblazer
    Answer ✓
    (1) Press and hold power button shut machine off.
    (2) Unplug charger
    (3) Remove one screw from ramdoor and left off door
    (4) Remove RAM module
    (5) Look for jumper JCMOS1 in corner of RAM socket bed
    (6) Short jumper with a screwdriver blade for 10 seconds to try to reset BIOS defaults

    Button it back up. Try it again.

      

    Jack E/NJ

  • petersenm
    petersenm Member Posts: 5

    Tinkerer

    Answer ✓
    Brilliant thanks that worked
  • JackE
    JackE ACE Posts: 44,869 Trailblazer
    Congrats on your success. Thanks for reporting back. VMD, like Intel's other not-so-good ideas (iRST & optane), can be a problem for some setups. If you want to disable VMD, and install standard  AHCI disk drivers that work with just about everything. do so by disabling VMD only after enabling safe boot in msconfig. Once safe boot has loaded the AHCI drivers, you can then safely change to regular boot in msconfig.

    Jack E/NJ