Tecra M4 Hangs at POST (startup) screen, no beeps...Suggestions?

[Fiterfly]

Hello everyone,

Currently my Toshiba Tecra M4 tablet PC shows the initial startup Power On Self Test (POST) screen with the Toshiba logo. It then freezes. There is no beeping, and I cannot enter the BIOS (nothing happens when I press Esc or F1).

The laptop did not have any physical trauma before this freeze-up started (literally sat on a desk between working and non-working as I will describe below). I hope it's not a hardware problem, but since I can't even get into the BIOS, I don't have my hopes up.

Here is what happened immediately before this symptom began to happen: I had the computer on (and it was working perfectly) and it went into stand-by mode on its own. When I tried to revive it, the screen stayed blank. After waiting around for a few minutes, I held down the power switch to force it to shut off. I then turned it on and there was a message saying "Resume failure" and it froze. After waiting for a few minutes (the Toshiba POST screen never shows up) I turned it off again.

After that, every time I turn it on now, the system hangs at the initial Toshiba screen and does not respond to any keyboard commands. After I press Esc or any other key 15 times (in an effort to get to the BIOS) the computer starts beeping anytime I press a key. Otherwise, there is no beeping that occurs before that.

I have tried the following:

1) This laptop has a factory reset option where it copies an image from a hidden partition to the main hard drive to make its contents the same as the factory state. I tried to access it several times (by holding down "0" and turning it on). Once I got lucky and it actually went into the factory reset screen. I took the opportunity to wipe the hard drive back to its factory state. The process was successful, but after reboot, the same problem remains. I have not gotten lucky at activating the factory reset screen again since.

2) I opened the laptop and checked all of the visible connections.

3) I have disconnected all power (the battery, power cord, and the little NiMH battery connected to the motherboard) overnight, but that did not help.

4) I removed the hard drive and checked it on a different computer. It seems okay (ran chkdsk on it with no issues).

Do any of you have any suggestions? Since I cannot even access the bios, how can I further troubleshoot this? Is there a way that I can make it display the POST process instead of just displaying the logo?

I am considering spending the ~$300 to maybe have it repaired by motherboard specialists (it still is a nice laptop), but I am very interested in fixing it myself if possible to use this malfunction as a learning opportunity.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions you might have!

[hughv]

Have you tried booting with an OS disk or your recovery disks?

Hello everyone,

Currently my Toshiba Tecra M4 tablet PC shows the initial startup Power On Self Test (POST) screen with the Toshiba logo. It then freezes. There is no beeping, and I cannot enter the BIOS (nothing happens when I press Esc or F1).

The laptop did not have any physical trauma before this freeze-up started (literally sat on a desk between working and non-working as I will describe below). I hope it's not a hardware problem, but since I can't even get into the BIOS, I don't have my hopes up.

Here is what happened immediately before this symptom began to happen: I had the computer on (and it was working perfectly) and it went into stand-by mode on its own. When I tried to revive it, the screen stayed blank. After waiting around for a few minutes, I held down the power switch to force it to shut off. I then turned it on and there was a message saying "Resume failure" and it froze. After waiting for a few minutes (the Toshiba POST screen never shows up) I turned it off again.

After that, every time I turn it on now, the system hangs at the initial Toshiba screen and does not respond to any keyboard commands. After I press Esc or any other key 15 times (in an effort to get to the BIOS) the computer starts beeping anytime I press a key. Otherwise, there is no beeping that occurs before that.

I have tried the following:

1) This laptop has a factory reset option where it copies an image from a hidden partition to the main hard drive to make its contents the same as the factory state. I tried to access it several times (by holding down "0" and turning it on). Once I got lucky and it actually went into the factory reset screen. I took the opportunity to wipe the hard drive back to its factory state. The process was successful, but after reboot, the same problem remains. I have not gotten lucky at activating the factory reset screen again since.

2) I opened the laptop and checked all of the visible connections.

3) I have disconnected all power (the battery, power cord, and the little NiMH battery connected to the motherboard) overnight, but that did not help.

4) I removed the hard drive and checked it on a different computer. It seems okay (ran chkdsk on it with no issues).

Do any of you have any suggestions? Since I cannot even access the bios, how can I further troubleshoot this? Is there a way that I can make it display the POST process instead of just displaying the logo?

I am considering spending the ~$300 to maybe have it repaired by motherboard specialists (it still is a nice laptop), but I am very interested in fixing it myself if possible to use this malfunction as a learning opportunity.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions you might have!

[Fiterfly]

Have you tried booting with an OS disk or your recovery disks?

I forgot to include that in my troubleshooting steps. I have tried to boot off of a Windows XP CD and also a USB with Linux in it. It was still stuck on the POST screen and did not seem to care for any other booting device. It does notice when I remove the hard drive though. It mentions that the hard drive is missing (I forget the exact language) and then returns to the POST screen and freezes.

In summary, I cannot boot off of the CD nor the USB drive. I am fairly confident the hard drive works fine (it is fresh off of a newly-installed factory image and has no bad sectors) and it is not booting off of that either.

Any other ideas for troubleshooting? Again, thanks for all of your help!

[hughv]

I don't see what else you can do. This sounds like a major hardware failure-motherboard, disk controller or something.

[jbennet]

bad memory?

if it is tied to a failed resumei think there is a way to force the OS to clean boot - try holding shift or space i think

[cguan_77]

hi, as jbennet said could be a bad memory? remove your memory stick and try to power it on without the memory stick

check if you can hear a beeping sound..

then clean the memory stick before putting it back.. in this process your CMOS should be reset..

if you can borrow a good memory stick..better try it out..check for any difference..

[Fiterfly]

Thanks for the suggestions.

Holding Shift/space etc didn't really do anything.

One thing curious is that if I turn it on while holding down TAB, the screen stays blank, the fan goes nuts, and the computer beeps at a rate of 1 beep every two seconds. This continues until I turn it off.

I tried replacing switching the RAM, inserting only one or the other, inserting none...etc but it didn't do anything.

I think I'm out of tricks. I'll probably start saving to have it sent in for a motherboard repair.

I did take the hard-drive out and connect it to a USB enclosure. The contents seem to be fine. No bad sectors.

I would welcome any other suggestions while I wait until I have the cash to send it to somebody. Thanks, everyone!

[sperron45]

I have the exact same problem with my Toshiba Satellite P305D-S8828. The problem first occurred the exact same way (coming out of hibernate after having the lid closed, I forced a shut down and now it always hangs on the Toshiba screen). Have you found a resolution for this?

[killminusnine]

Hello,
I have a quite similar issue with my Tablet PC Toshiba Tecram M4 : it boots properly but on any OS (WinXP, Linux, ...) it hangs after two or three minutes.

Guessing an hardware failure, I have opened it to inspect components like DDR memory and processor or to find short-circuits.

One thing is sure : memory is Ok : the same problem occurs after a memory replacement.

Finally, I have found the problem : the nVidia fan is simply out of order, then the computer starts properly until the temperature of the main component of the graphic card reaches a threshold.

The failure can be fixed replacing the fan with this part number :
Toshiba Tecra M4 Cooling Fan SMALL GDM610000251

In the Fiterfly's case, because the problem occurs directly during the POST sequence, I guess a CPU fan failure.
The part number is then :
Toshiba Tecra M4 CPU Cooling Fan BIG GDM610000261

Indeed, all functions seem to work fine during a while, so, major components aren't destroyed !