I have an HP Pavilion dv6810us laptop, and earlier today, I left my computer running while I left the room. When I came back, the monitor displayed only a black screen. I tried everything I could think of, but it wouldn't respond, so I forced it to shut down by holding down the power button.

Since then, when I try to boot it up, its lights briefly come on and I can hear the fans spinning and the DVD drive (or maybe the hard drive?) clicking, but it shuts itself down after just a couple seconds. Nothing ever appears on the screen. After a few more seconds, it boots back up and does the exact same thing. This cycle repeats itself until I hold the power button down for a long time to force it to stop.
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My computer has also been having other strange problems for a couple months now. These include the following:

Windows (neither 7 nor Vista) won't recognize my DVD drive. The light on it won't come on, and the button doesn't open it. However, the DVD drive will open at the HP boot screen (I'm not sure of the technical name, but it's what used to appear when I first turned on my computer).

The computer performed its turn on/shut down cycle once before, but I left it alone for a few hours and it magically fixed itself.

Sometimes, my laptop doesn't recognize that it's connected to the AC adapter even though the blue ring surrounding the power input is lit. The blue light on the front left that indicates that the computer is charging does not come on, and Windows tells me I'm running on battery power. I have to jiggle the cord for quite a while to get it to work, and even a slight bump can sometimes cause it to stop charging again.

I have had multiple freezes where my screen turns slightly paler, and little columns of horizontal green lines are superimposed on my screen.

The laptop once said "OS not found" when I tried to boot.

After shutting down the computer, it often took me multiple attempts to get it to start again. It would usually freeze at a flat black screen or the HP startup screen a few times before I would finally get it to work.
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I've googled a bit, but nothing I've tried has worked so far. Someone mentioned that hitting delete/escape/f10 while booting might help. Nothing happens when I press delete, and when I press esc or f10, the computer stays on and keeps whirring, but the screen never comes on and it never makes any noises. I have also tried removing the battery and holding down the power button, but this didn't work either.

It seems like whatever the problem is, it could be pretty serious, and unfortunately my warranty has run out (bought the computer in June 2008).

Any ideas for what I could try to fix it? Thanks!

Is there a way to edit posts here? I can't find anything.

Anyway, I found a post here where someone says that installing a new BIOS from a USB drive might help. However, I cannot figure out what kind of motherboard I have. Any tips for this?

The additional info you've now provided (wrt your other thread) is key information. If you have to jiggle the power input, there's an internal hardware condition that needs fixing.

That's the end of it really. Whoever fixes it can check that the other symptoms disappear.

If you have the funds, dump this HP crap and never buy another, IMHO. But if you keep it, you can't get round having to fix the power supply problem.

Is there any way to tell what part might be broken? If it isn't too expensive, I'd like to try to just fix this one instead of getting a new one.

Well, the starting point is the inside power connector and avenues off that might flex when you wiggle the connector. I suspect you've either got a naff power socket in the laptop or some dry joint behind.

Cure that and we'll see what else is cured.

No guarantees, obviously. You're there and we're a long way away.

I've been messing around with it for a little while now, and I think I may have made some progress.

I tried to open up the case to look at the insides where the power cord connects, but I couldn't figure out how to get the case open there. So instead, I tried doing a couple things I know how to do. I removed the hard drive and RAM, and it still did the exact same thing, so we can definitely rule out those.

Then I tried removing the RTC battery. I took it out, waited 10 minutes, and then put it back in. Now when I try to start the computer I can hear it whir to life, the lights come on, and it beeps four times. After that, the fans/hard drive/whatever else was making noise turn off, but the lights stay on. After the four beeps, the power button and the power indicator on the front both flashed on and off until I held the power button to shut it down.

Any idea what this could mean?

The information in the link mayhelp you to understand the codes and proceed further with your investigations.

http://h30434.www3.hp.com/psg/board/...essage.id=2310

4 Beeps sound like RAM to me - depends on which BIOS you have. I suspect that these are secondary symptoms (possible motherboard damage) caused by the power cord problem.

When you took the RTC battery out, you prolly reset the CMOS which POST can then re-populate. So now the Boot ROM is working properly and has found faults indicated by the beeps and LEDs. Hopefully the link I've given you takes you forward.

I found the beep codes for my computer here. According to that, it's a graphics issue. Any ideas what I can do to try to fix it?

I found out something else while I was browsing the HP site. According to the site, I should be able to run my computer off the AC adapter without the battery. However, my computer does not get power unless the battery is plugged in. The indicator light that turns on when the power cord is plugged in only lights up when the battery is in also, which I guess means I have a power issue also.

Well, after doing a bit more digging I came across this. Apparently, it's a pretty common issue. Something to do with a bad connection on the GPU.

Assuming I have the same problem as all those guys, I guess it's time to start looking for a new laptop. Any suggestions for a laptop that might have decent longevity? I've heard Thinkpads are good, but they're also pretty pricey.

For what my opinion is worth, if price is an issue, DELL laptops (other than the very cheapest) do not suffer the quality issues of HP.