[SOLVED] Asus n56vz black screen no bios

[Samwise89]

Hi all,
I decided to boot up my old Asus n56vz/VM which hasn't been switched on for a good couple years. It was working, all be it slow last time I had it out.
This time was different plugged in power button lights up when pressed, backlit keyboard flicks on. But shortly flicks off again. I can hear the fan run and the little clunk of life from I presume the CD drive.
But the screen stays black. I've tried holding f2 for bios. And mashed every key multiple times. But no luck. I've popped the little bios battery out and popped it in my mouth for a test and seems like it's good. I've popped the ram in and out checked the display cable is connected correctly. All seems good.
Reading other places maybe it could be graphics drivers? Or shagged graphics chip? Could be bios chip needs replacing, could be shagged motherboard.
To be perfectly honest I haven't the foggiest. Just strange the bios doesn't work. Any clues would be extremely welcome.

Thanks a bunch in advance.
Kind regards you bloody legends.

 

[lga1156_ftw]

try to get smallest usb drive you have , download latest bios version here (the EC update one) : https://www.asus.com/Laptops/N56VZ/HelpDesk_BIOS/

format the usb to fat32, move the downloaded file to your usb stick (N56VZAS.217)
Also make few copys of it, rename it to AMIBOOT.ROM and also N56VZAS.bin N56VZAS.rom N56VZ.rom N56VZ.bin
Move all those files to the USB

Now remove power cable, plugin the USB to usb 2.0 port (no usb 3.0) then start pressing CTRL + HOME keys and while doing it with other hand put in power cable, keep still pressing the keys and with right hand press power button, keep pressing the ctrl+home for another 20sec or until you see bios recovery start (high fan speed etc you notice it)

 

[lga1156_ftw]

tested with external monitor ?

Try to boot it without battery connected only power cable

Test the DC jack and charger for right voltage with multimeter

Check if any USB port is shorted (externally look for messed up looking pins)

EDIT: doubt its the gpu since its nvidia 650 gt , usually amd gpu / chipsets are dying 24/7 on these.
If none of that work , you can try boot it barebone, disassembly the whole motherboard out of the case, remove all connectors only leave heatsink on (disconnect even fan) and powerbutton connector too. Leave the motherboard to non conductive table like wooden and remove CMOS coin battery, after that connect to external display and plugin power cable, it should boot without pressing power cable since cmos is removed, if it doesnt boot remove power cable and add only power button connector then plugin power cable again. This is just to make sure no part in your laptop is shorted and preventing POST.

 

[Samwise89]

Hey LGA,
I tried the first thing you said with the usb drive. I grabbed an old 512mb popped on the four identical files with different names. And held the home and ctrl keys while switching on.
It jumped to life and showed 'a' blue bios page but it was waiting for a battery to plug in before it would start loading. I messed around abit with plugging battery in and out and making sure it was charged for a while before trying again, no luck.
At this point I figured mrs motherboard was hungry for more power from the CMOS battery so just swapped him out and she was happy to start loading the updated bios.
In a jiffy she was purring like a beauty.
I've been doing Windows updates for what seems like a week but she's back up and running so I'm super happy with your response.
Thank you so much you really are a legend.

 

[lga1156_ftw]

Nice that you got it working. I guess we never know what was the right filename. I read that your model has problems with bios getting corrupted so this might happen again. You can Mark the thread solved.