Originally Posted by Cettie

ok up date i was able to get my main pc back to boot to bios now it wont see my 2 hd's

both are set right 1 master the other cable select but i can see it in the bios but the mb wont boot to them???

How did you get it to even boot that far?

My laptop is doing the same thing. I've tried F8 and can't even get it to boot into safe mode. I have also tried to boot with command prompt and last known good. Sometimes it gets to the welcome screen, but usually shuts down before that. It wont boot from my recovery disc either. It's about 3 years old. Is this a hardware problem? PLEASE HELP!

Is you BIOS set to boot the CD drive prior to the hard drive?

What is the exact make and model of the laptop?

Originally Posted by jephree

Is you BIOS set to boot the CD drive prior to the hard drive?

What is the exact make and model of the laptop?

No, I can't get into the BIOS to change the boot preference, but it is a factory made bootable recovery disc that I tried to use. Once I was able to get into the BIOS, but not long enough to change the settings...it shut down again!

I don't know the exact model at this time because my laptop is at home and I have to use my office computer to write this. It is a Toshiba that I bought from Best Buy about 3 years ago.

This weekend I tried reseating the RAM (and everything else that was reseatable), but that didn't change anything. I'm not getting any beep codes and it has not been hit by lightning. It was not hot when it first shut down. Of course, since then, it hasn't stayed on long enough to get hot.

PLEASE, PLEASE, SAY YOU CAN HELP ME.

I don't know anyone else who has a laptop that I can switch the parts out to check things...and I certainly don't have the money to buy parts that aren't the problem. I don't trust a lot of these "so called technicians" who run computer shops. I've studied computer repair, so I know a little bit, but this has really got me stumped! I sent an email to the person who originally started this post, but haven't heard anything back.

I normally don't have internet, but sometimes I bring it to my office and connect via a wireless router. The last time was early last week when my son came with me to the office. It worked fine for about a week afterwards, but now I wonder if he may have gotten a virus on it. However the problem is that I can't get it to come on long enough to run a virus scan.

Toshiba has a pretty good support site: http://www.csd.toshiba.com/cgi-bin/t...su_sc_home.jsp

I see one suggestion to hold the F12 key while you power on in order to access the boot menu.

If you find your specific model we might find more definitive ideas.

Originally Posted by jephree

Toshiba has a pretty good support site: http://www.csd.toshiba.com/cgi-bin/t...su_sc_home.jsp

I see one suggestion to hold the F12 key while you power on in order to access the boot menu.

If you find your specific model we might find more definitive ideas.

It is a Toshiba Satellite A45-S150

I tried the F12 thing. It showed the little pictures of the different drives. I chose the cd drive and then it shut down. I tried this 4 times. At one point, it did show "starting windows 98.... before it shut down.

By the way, it's running Windows XP Home edition.

I'll try to get over to the Toshiba site, but it's hard to take much time here at the office because I'm suppose to be working. hehe

This is Toshiba's site for your model:

http://www.csd.toshiba.com/cgi-bin/t...odel&x=16&y=11

The '98 bit is strange. This model ships with XP Home.

Just to clarify when you powered on with F12 pressed was the boot Recovery disk in the CD drive?

Toshiba lists another option of just pressing C.

On some models this prompt reads Press F12 for boot menu. On others, it may say Press C to boot from CD-ROM.

If needed the latest BIOS is here:

http://www.csd.toshiba.com/cgi-bin/t...ngdgnn.0&ct=DL

The installation instructions are in the Read Me file after unzipping.

First of all, I want to tell you how much I appreciate the time you have spent trying to help me with this. Is this not the strangest thing you've ever heard???

Yes, the recovery disk was in the drive when I powered on with F12. I also thought that the 98 thing was strange, but then I remembered that I have seen that before on other recovery disks. I believe that, for some odd reason, Windows 98 is sometimes used for the formatting process. In any case, I have used this same recovery disk in the past to restore this laptop and it did install Windows XP Home.

I did download the latest BIOS from your link. I can make a cd from my office computer. I read the instructions and what scares me about it is that it says that if the power goes off during the installation, it can mess up your original BIOS, and with it shutting down like this, that's very possible! Of course, it's not like it's doing me any good now anyway. I guess I'll try it. If this doesn't work, my goose is cooked, because I sure can't afford to take it to a repairman.

I sure wish I could get in touch with this "cettie" person to see if they ever found out anything.

Today is Thursday, so I probably won't try this until this weekend when I will have more time to fool with it. In the meantime if you think of anything else, please let me know. I will be watching my email.

Do you think this may be some kind of hardware problem?

I just did another search to see if I could find someone else with a similar problem.

I found this: http://www.techspot.com/vb/topic31603.html

and this: http://forums.computers.toshiba-euro...essageID=48470

I don't know if it will help, but I just realized that I haven't told you how this began. I had watched a DVD and did some work on Excel. The computer was running good...no noises, not hot. I shut the top and left it in standby mode. About 5 hours later, my son opened it up and it came back on for a couple of minutes. Then it shut down by itself and started being mean to me. He had it in his lap and said it was not hot. That's why I don't think it was the fan, but after reading the above thread in another forum, I wonder if it is the motherboard. What do you think?

P/S. My son is 17 and has been taught about computers all his life, so I don't think he did anything that would have caused this.

That standard BIOS warning is in regards to a power failure during the Flash process.

With most BIOS flash programs you will need to initiate the process. It won't just boot into a flash but rather a command prompt. The exact instructions should be in the Read Me file.

The question would be whether or not this CD will even boot.

You could try removing the battery and then on AC trying the F12.