What is this laptop playing at?

reflux · 31 Dec 2011 at 10:58

My mate has a laptop that has very recently started misbehaving. Symptoms of its illness include:

Random blue screens
Random freezing
Not booting up (freezing before POST)
Freezing in the BIOS

It's a Toshiba Satellite A665 3D. So far we have tried:

Scan disk - says it's fine
MemTest - first run froze after 27 mins (no errors) but second run ran for 3 hours with no problems
Windows Memory Diagnostic - no problems
Swapping the RAM about
Taking the whole thing apart and dusting it out

And still the freezes prevail. Is it likely to be the motherboard that's borked? Weird thing is, sometimes it runs for hours with no problems.

Too Tall · 31 Dec 2011 at 12:11

I'd run core temp and or some other temperature reading software and check the readings, laptops aren't the easiest to diagnose faults with.

How old is the laptop?

reflux · 31 Dec 2011 at 14:11

Yeah, we ran Intel Burn test on max for an hour. It reached 95c but ran perfectly, no problems.

The machine's 13 months old, just out of its warranty period :mad:

Tee Hee Johnson · 31 Dec 2011 at 14:49

I had similar problems, yet it was on my old desktop PC... not a Laptop. After everything I tried it was the SATA cable :/

I'm leaning towards the RAM tho!

Too Tall · 31 Dec 2011 at 15:56

I'd try updating the BIOS too.

edscdk · 31 Dec 2011 at 15:58

reflux said:
Yeah, we ran Intel Burn test on max for an hour. It reached 95c but ran perfectly, no problems.

The machine's 13 months old, just out of its warranty period

If you are persistent and don't take no for an answer you may get it sorted under warranty..

Threepwood · 31 Dec 2011 at 16:22

^^ This, european law states that items like this must have at least 2 years warrenty from the seller.

Our own sale of goods act also covers you for upto 6 years! If an item is expected to last that long that is.

My alienware laptop blew its motherboard 4 months past the 1 year stated warrenty, when I rang them up they didn't even quibble with me, I didn't have to state the law, they just said dont worry, sent a 3rd party techy out and replaced it on the spot.

2 months laters the DVD drive broke down, same thing

mranderson · 31 Dec 2011 at 16:34

RAM problem. Try it with only one dimm for a while and see if the problems persists.

Too Tall · 31 Dec 2011 at 17:11

Shadesofgrey, is also correct regarding the 2 year minimum warranty on consumer goods sold in the uk, do a search on google regarding the subject. I think it is an EU law.

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/bills/article-1677034/Two-year-warranty-EU-law.html

Have a read of that.

reflux · 31 Dec 2011 at 17:37

Thanks for the advice guys, I didn't realise the law was like that, we will look into it