Hi All,
A brief introduction to my problem.... I purchased a Sony Vaio PCG-K86P with a nice config in December 2004. It has a nice 15" widescreen, 1GB RAM, 60GB HDD, built in ethernet/wifi, DVD-burner, 3.2GHz P4. After 3 months the DVD burner died. It could only read a few movie DVD's, no burned discs (either music or data backups). I had only written 2 data dvd's and a few CD's with the burner. I purchased it in Hong Kong from a Sony authorized retailer brand new. I live in India, and even after purchasing an international warranty, the @$%&s in India said they dont honor international warranties and refused to even look at it (even with me paying). So that was that, I made do with an external burner. Now, the laptop's giving me troubles because windows XP pro has become so overloaded, that it's time to reinstall. Since the drive doesnt work, its been a nightmare trying to install XP. I had to finally create a win98 boot disk buy an external usb FDD, install that (since it refuses to boot from the external CD-rOM). Everything was going fine (fdisked, formatted, etc.) and then I was transferring data from my external hard drive (USB) when the laptop just went DEAD. I mean, it rebooted from the fdisk, then just went dead. Power switch is dead, no lights, no sounds nothing.
I put it aside, and then brought out my backup laptop - an Acer travelmate 280, was working on it in XP and then I had to reinstall something, which required a reboot. Once again, my external 7200 RPM Samsung 40GB HDD was connected, along with a 2.5" laptop HDD external casing with a 30GB 4800 RPM Toshiba HDD, and THIS laptop just went dead.... Both laptops have been dead in the span of 2 hours. Neither function on batteries, and neither starts, nor makes a sound. The external power supplies of both laptops have their green light on as usual.
My question is basically - is there a chance the entire machines are both fried? or do laptops have some kind of 'fuse' mechanism that prevents damage by blowing the fuse. 2 of these laptops with the same symptoms seem too much of a coincidence. The Acer has been my backup and has worked fine since 2002. OR is it possible that some problem with an external USB device (the samsung 40GB HDD has its own power source, whereas the small 2.5" casing draws power from the USB) could cause a short or fry a laptop? Both laptops were running on AC power when they died. Batteries are fine.
Help!
Thanks in advance!
A brief introduction to my problem.... I purchased a Sony Vaio PCG-K86P with a nice config in December 2004. It has a nice 15" widescreen, 1GB RAM, 60GB HDD, built in ethernet/wifi, DVD-burner, 3.2GHz P4. After 3 months the DVD burner died. It could only read a few movie DVD's, no burned discs (either music or data backups). I had only written 2 data dvd's and a few CD's with the burner. I purchased it in Hong Kong from a Sony authorized retailer brand new. I live in India, and even after purchasing an international warranty, the @$%&s in India said they dont honor international warranties and refused to even look at it (even with me paying). So that was that, I made do with an external burner. Now, the laptop's giving me troubles because windows XP pro has become so overloaded, that it's time to reinstall. Since the drive doesnt work, its been a nightmare trying to install XP. I had to finally create a win98 boot disk buy an external usb FDD, install that (since it refuses to boot from the external CD-rOM). Everything was going fine (fdisked, formatted, etc.) and then I was transferring data from my external hard drive (USB) when the laptop just went DEAD. I mean, it rebooted from the fdisk, then just went dead. Power switch is dead, no lights, no sounds nothing.
I put it aside, and then brought out my backup laptop - an Acer travelmate 280, was working on it in XP and then I had to reinstall something, which required a reboot. Once again, my external 7200 RPM Samsung 40GB HDD was connected, along with a 2.5" laptop HDD external casing with a 30GB 4800 RPM Toshiba HDD, and THIS laptop just went dead.... Both laptops have been dead in the span of 2 hours. Neither function on batteries, and neither starts, nor makes a sound. The external power supplies of both laptops have their green light on as usual.
My question is basically - is there a chance the entire machines are both fried? or do laptops have some kind of 'fuse' mechanism that prevents damage by blowing the fuse. 2 of these laptops with the same symptoms seem too much of a coincidence. The Acer has been my backup and has worked fine since 2002. OR is it possible that some problem with an external USB device (the samsung 40GB HDD has its own power source, whereas the small 2.5" casing draws power from the USB) could cause a short or fry a laptop? Both laptops were running on AC power when they died. Batteries are fine.
Help!
Thanks in advance!
