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Inspiron 4150 -- Fried Motherboard (?)

post #1 of 8
11/12/07 at 3:29pm
Thread Starter 
Hey,

I have a 4150 laptop that I inherited from my father; but it turned out to be broken. The laptop does not turn on or display any signs of life -- no LED, no noises, no fans.

Turns out this is a repeat problem. The cause is a "bent" power cord; the wires inside the cable were bent much too often. The part that's 1-2 inches from the laptop apparently broke inside. This could have caused a short circuit, I don't know.

The first time we sent it back to Dell (still under warranty). They replaced the motherboard for free. The second time the warranty was out and it was the exact same cause/problem, so we didn't send it back. (motherboard is ~1000$).

I opened up the laptop but didn't find any fried MOSFETs/transistors/etc.

... is this a common problem? What can I do to fix it?
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post #2 of 8
11/12/07 at 6:57pm
Hello,

This is Richard from Dell's Online Community Outreach group. You indicated that there is no life in the computer. I have a few questions about the behavior of this computer.

Is the battery still working or is it nonfunctional. I was also wondering if the AC adapter has a power indicator light to show that it works.

Please reply back with the status of your equipment.

Regards,

Richard B
Dell Online Community Outreach
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post #3 of 8
11/12/07 at 8:36pm
Thread Starter 
Thanks for the reply Richard,

The AC does indeed have a green light that shines -- I believe that it works. The battery should work since it was working fine just before the motherboard gave up. I would charge the battery (it has an onboard charge indicator that lights up if it has charge), but I can't since the motherboard is fried. I tried leaving the battery inside the computer while it was plugged in -- no luck, doesn't charge.

In general, there are no power indicator lights that are lit up ANYWHERE. The only power indicator light is on the AC brick.

Thanks,

Tim
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post #4 of 8
11/13/07 at 2:08pm
Hello,

Have you checked to see if all of the screws are in the system? Look underneath the system make sure that all the screws are present and screwed in tightly. Make sure that the battery and AC power has been removed first before doing this.

See if that makes a difference.

Regards,

Richard B
Dell Online Community Outreach

Quote:
Originally Posted by aridese View Post
Thanks for the reply Richard,

The AC does indeed have a green light that shines -- I believe that it works. The battery should work since it was working fine just before the motherboard gave up. I would charge the battery (it has an onboard charge indicator that lights up if it has charge), but I can't since the motherboard is fried. I tried leaving the battery inside the computer while it was plugged in -- no luck, doesn't charge.

In general, there are no power indicator lights that are lit up ANYWHERE. The only power indicator light is on the AC brick.

Thanks,

Tim
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post #5 of 8
11/13/07 at 2:42pm
Thread Starter 
Thanks Richard,

I tightened all the screws and it doesn't help the situation. I believe that the laptops motherboard may be somehow fried. What components would the short circuit fry first? Are there any transistors/resistors/diodes that would be effected that would be easy to replace?

Thanks,

Tim
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post #6 of 8
11/14/07 at 1:53pm
Hello,

You could visual inspect the board for obvious physical problems. However, I have seen boards that like perfect and they are dead. Something like that may be a dead cap, which is hard to test because the components are ground to the board.

Regards,

Richard B
Dell Online Community Outreach
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post #7 of 8
11/20/07 at 3:20am
Due to the presence of so many chips on board, the combinations make hundreds of charge "gates". If any one of the gates fail, the mobo could fall flat. usually, its the charger board that gets fried first, since it is the first to take in the power and distribute it. Power surges are the most common cause that fry up mobos. But since the charger boards are not seperate, the entire mobo needs to be replaced...

Quite a large and heavy paperweight u got there at the moment.

Soul
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post #8 of 8
7/28/08 at 9:37pm
I understand your problem. My daughter spilled some soda on the keyboard and used condensed air to try to clean it out. Shorted out the motherboard to some extent that I can not reload an operating system into the hard drive because of short in the motherboard.
Good luck.

CWG
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