I put Acer laptop to hibernate, now it won't turn on

Euklid

Member
I have 1.5 year old Acer Aspire 5551-2384. Been working great all this time. Yesterday I put it to hibernate as I went to sleep. When I got back from work today, I turned it on, but nothing is happening.

The power adapter seems to be working - blue battery light is on when power is connected. Battery is full - I never remove it from power. I tried a second adapter, that didn't help, so it's not adapter.

I tried the Acer laptop reset (remove from power, hold 30 seconds, put battery back in and try). Tried that a couple times. Not working.

I opened up the case and tried to remove CMOS battery. There's no removeable CMOS battery - it's sauldered in.

Any ideas?
 

gamblingman

VIP Member
Does the computer go through BIOS booting? Or does it come on as a blank screen and nothing happens? And you say there have been no problems, like ZERO problems with the computer?

What OS are you running, and do you have diagnostic and//or OS reinstall disks?
 

Euklid

Member
When I click power button, the regular behavior is for the blue light in the power button to come on, and the computer boots. Right now, when I click power button, nothing happens. The blue light in the power button never comes on.

I haven't had any problems with the laptop to date. Definitely not a virus/trojan - I always use sandboxie to open unknown files.

Could be a motherboard issue, but I doubt it.

EDIT:
I think I know what happened. Must have been a remote Acer killswitch. I bought the laptop EXACTLY 2 years ago. They allowed it to live through the 1-year warranty, then allowed it to live through the extended 1-year warranty I got from my mastercard, then they killed it.
 
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Euklid

Member
I was wrong! Says 2 years is in August 2012. Wooohooo! Getting free repair or replacement!!! The joy of credit cards.
 

Euklid

Member
More good news!!! My laptop is fixed! I knew there was nothing wrong with it. I was getting ready to file a claim with Visa to have my laptop repaired, I sent an email asking Acer about repair costs. But I read somewhere that when you're using your laptop on power adapter, to save the battery, you can remove the battery and just use power adapter. So I removed the power adapter and battery to keep them in good state until I can fix the laptop.

I left for shopping, and I came back a few hours later. I figured - what the hey, let's try booting up the laptop one last time. I put just the battery in, and what do you know - IT WORKED!

So it did have a static charge build-up, but it needed a few hours to discharge properly. When I tried the solution recommended by Acer - remove adapter and battery, hold power button for 30-45 seconds, replace battery and try turning it on - it never worked because it wasn't long enough in my case.

As the computer booted up, Windows showed me error message that "the last time your computer went into hibernate, there was a crash". When it got into Windows, my wifi wasn't working and there was noticeable lag. I restarted Windows, and this time it refused to load. I restarted computer, went into Windows in Safe Mode, did a restore to the last point Windows worked properly - it spent 10 minutes fixing itself - restarted... and now everything is back to normal!

When I contacted Acer, they said since my computer is out of warranty, I will have to send it to their repair center. I would have to pay for shipping, plus $199 repair fee, plus taxes, plus shipping fee back to my house. So altogether, I was looking at $250+. Worst part is they refused to give me any advice through email just because my warranty was expired by a few months. They probably knew I could do a discharge by removing battery for a few hours, but they preferred that I paid them $200 to learn that.

But the good news is - I asked if I could buy a motherboard somewhere for this laptop, and they sent me link to this website. They carry replacement parts for Acer Aspire 5551 (maybe other Acer laptops too). So in the future if I have trouble, I can buy a replacement motherboard for about $110.00. Not that bad - compared to sending my laptop to them.
 

Ishythebest

New Member
Help

Well i have a Acer aspire 5551 and i its the exact same thing, ( hibernated, not turning on, etc.) but it still dose not work, help please!!
 
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