Vaio PCG-K23 laptop won't boot.

This may be of no use to you at all, but I'll tell you anyway.

I tried to upgrade my Vaios hard drive to a larger capacity model. It didn't work properly because the Vaio was not expecting to ever encounter a drive bigger than, I think 80Gb. (not sure of this max figure) On boot it didn't recognise the drive and switched to some sort of limp home access mode which was very slow. Something to do with DMA not able to work I seem to recall Perhaps yours is doing something similar but not letting you boot at all?

I cured my problem by installing a different driver after asking questions on the Net.. Now the Vaio thinks it has a SCSI system, when it doesn't, but the large hard drive works no problem at all!

Has your drive been upgraded?

Gareth.

FWIW, in the case of a HP laptop I have here...yes definitely. Screen failure probably the inverter (common problem).

Sending these along just in case you aren't aware of them:

It's the original 60GB hard drive. Keep in mind I couldn't even change drivers if I wanted to because I can't boot the system.

Thanks for your reply.

The first link talked about the display going very dim. That is not what's happening. It's not coming on at all. But then again, when it does work, it comes on at full brightness. So maybe an intermittent inverter might explain that?

Thanks for your reply.

Just some thoughts....

Tried booting from CD, floppy? If the BIOS isn't set to boot from either of those before the harddrive, this isn't going to work but it maybe worth a shot to try.

Have you tried accessing the BIOS during bootup (ie press F1 key...which actual key combination depends on the manufacturer/model and so you might have to read the docs for the actual sequence)

Some laptops have an "external monitor" or S-video connector (Usually, IIRC, F5 will switch the display to external...again you might have to go to the docs for the actual key combo).

That said and done, none of these proceedures worked while I was troubleshooting the HP laptop with a failed video display that I mentioned in a previous message.

I can't access the BIOS when the screen doesn't light up. You have to press F2 while the Vaio logo appears. Again, when the screen does light up and it doesn't hang on the logo screen (the hanging happened very infrequently) the system boots fine and there are no subsequent problems. I am familiar with the key sequence to switch to an external monitor but you need to get past the boot screen for that to even come into play.

Thanks for your reply.

I would try another hard drive, to eliminate the possibility or to diagnose that the hard drive is faulty.

I have accumulated several faulty hard drives in my time, most of which turned flaky rather than stopped working altogether.

Gareth.

But first you might want to check that your Mater Boot Record is OK and repair it if not. (Google it)

My Vaio once refused to boot and I thought I had lost everything, Turned out my MBR was corrupted and I managed to restore it.

Good luck.

Gareth.

That's all well and good but in order for the system to boot, the BIOS has to be "activated" so it can select which device to boot from.

Thanks for your reply.

Actually, it would be more accurate to say that the system won't p.o.s.t.

-- David Farber David Farber's Service Center L.A., CA

Yep....sent those urls along not specifically directed at your particular problem but rather just as a general reference for troubleshooting laptops.

It's not coming on at all. But then again, when it does work, it

One other thing that came to mind after posting this....have you checked the lid switch to make sure it's not intermittent?

I've had similar problems with an older ThinkPad. You might check the lithium cell that backs up the configuration memory. Make sure you have the configuration written down somewhere before removing the cell.

This is worth mentioning, particularly if you have modified the default.

Might be a bad RAM socket. Try using one SIMM and switching it to either socket. My Intel based Asus laptop acted similar and it turned out to be the bottom socket.

I've been through the SIMM switching operation many times. Never helps. When I upgraded the ram with some incompatible brand last year, the system still posted and went to a bsod with a memory error. If I got that far now, that would be an improvement.

Looks like a new (used) motherboard will be the next step.

Thanks for your reply.

This just happened to mine again yesterday. Freeze solid in XP, no post upon reboot. Remove bottom 512 SIMM and up and running. And it's not the SIMM as it works fine in the other slot under the keyboard.

Sometimes it will work without problems for months. Forget about trying to fix it though, must be something peripheral to the socket as under magnification all the connections look perfect and the socket "innards" look the same.

Good luck with the Vaio. I really hate working on laptops at that level.

I have since bought a used and tested motherboard from eBay ($73 including shipping). That fact that it was advertised as "tested" sealed the deal for me. (-; Not much to my surprise when I installed it and turned it on, nothing. Same problem. But after three power on attempts, it finally came on reading only one of the two 512MB ram sticks. The OS worked fine after that. Then I randomly selected one ram stick to remove and then it booted on the first time. I swapped ram sticks and then it wouldn't boot at all. I called the online company that sold me the ram sticks and asked about the warranty. I was told it had a lifetime warranty. Not only that, they would pay for the return shipping. It took about 3 days to receive the replacement ram sticks.(They even agreed to replace both sticks even though only one was definitely bad.) It's not even been a week since I got the new ram and much to my surprise, the laptop will boot every time on the first time and read the full amount of ram.

Thanks for your reply.

Do you get any P.O.S.T. Beep Codes when it doesn't 'boot'?

No display, no beeps. Just the power l.e.d. illuminates and you hear the drive spin up. When it boots properly, it beeps once.

If you didn't see my message from a couple of days ago, the replacement of the motherboard and ram has made everything good again.

Thanks for your reply.

I'd like to amend my previous statement about the startup beep. There is no beep even when it starts normally. The only time it beeps is when the cmos battery has been removed and you are alerted to check the bios settings for time, date, etc.