Arch Linux

paul80

Member

Registered: 2007-09-06

Posts: 4

Not strictly Arch related but..

..I thought i would use the intelligent minds of the forum.:)

My laptop took a turn for the worse today. It was happily idling away (in windows) while I was sitting at my desk and then it simply stops in its tracks and turns off. As I was a bit rushed I just put it in my bag and decided to investigate when I got home.

It refuses to boot both Windows and Arch. Windows very quickly flashes up a BSOD (memory error it looks like, STOP: 0x000000F..etc..) just after the loading screen. Arch crashes when it tries to load the GUI (just artifacts on the screen).

I assumed it was a RAM issue. I ran memtest86+, which did indeed bring up errors. I opened up the laptop, noticed there were two 512mb sticks, and then tested them separately. One was naff, the other was ok.

Even with only the good one in, it still fails to boot (I've tried both sticks, same problem). So this has got me thinking it's another problem. I'm pretty sure it nothing to do with the hard disk, as the symptoms don't add up, but i was wondering if it may be the graphics card? It's a ATI Radeon 200m which uses RAM as it's memory, so it may have nuked one of the sticks if it threw a wobbler? But if it was the card, is it still possible to have the text output working (+windows loading graphic), which it does now, and then crashing when it encounters major load? Or would it just plain not work altogether? Does anyone have a better idea of what may be the problem.

I fear my laptop has seen its last game of Kgolf!

Thanks for any suggestions.

Paul

ralvez

Member

From: Canada

Registered: 2005-12-06

Posts: 1,694

Website

Re: Not strictly Arch related but..

Some computers, including some laptop models, require that two RAM banks be filled.
If you remove one of the RAMs your machine may not boot because of the empty bank.
If I were you I would go to the store, ask them to insert the RAM on condition that if it works then you will buy it. In most cases they will have not problem with that and will give you a better idea of where the problem is.
Also, if one of the RAM blocks is defective the unit will fail to boot or will but "part-way" and quit, which seems to be your case.

Hope this helps.

R.

paul80

Member

Registered: 2007-09-06

Posts: 4

Re: Not strictly Arch related but..

Hey, thanks for the input. That is an interesting point about not booting because of an empty bank. I had a quick look online to see if my laptop (Packard Bell W3301, just for reference) required both banks full. I couldn't find any definite proof, but did find a RAM website that indicated my model didn't. But still, it's probably a good idea to test it at a shop like you said, and I think I may try this weekend. If that doesn't work I wouldn't be surprised if it was on ebay for "Spare or Repair" pretty soon! Thanks again,

Paul

stylopath

Member

Registered: 2007-07-26

Posts: 112

Re: Not strictly Arch related but..

for voodoo under windows. please try to disconnect the notebook from every source of energy first.

This means remove the battery AND the Ac-plug, wait 20 seconds and try again.

Yesterday i thought my notebook was gone, but it was just an old silly win2k bug that affected the hardware under win AND arch. After disconnecting it worked again - one more reason to avoid running windows