Compaq Presario R3000 power cord issue

[jondoe9]

Same problem - but I had a 2 year warranty, and was too lazy to get it repaired before it ran out (and got bad). grrrr

<< Before my story, I have a question/fix for someone who has the docking system some have mentioned. Could someone find out which terminals are the power ones? It seems like it would be simple to cut the end off the charger plug and glue them into an R-??? connector. And you'd have no mystery screws when finished. Anyone?>>

I used it in the car a lot with a 'street' program, and that couldn't have helped the connector. But it is a crappy design anyway, with little support around the plug.
I always thought it was the female connector, and that I'd eventually solder some wires to another connector. It didn't have to be pretty!. But after the last 3 months of serious cramming and futzing, the connector and the connection got worse.
I finally started to realize the problem was on the motherboard side - the one you can't easily get to. I found this site and was saved.
I foolishly called (India) and got the run around from an HP supervisor, then called corporate and just gave nonsense answers to the machine until I got a real person. Didn't get much further, but he did call back with an offer of 50% off the repair. I would have thought it was a nice offer, if it wasn't for all the others with this known/unknown issue (it was like talking to Rumsfeld!), and it should have been fixed for free. I guess $200 would have been a good deal for a new motherboard tho? (and new? Rebuilt??)
I did try something first - I tried heating up the center post from the outside. I was concerned about heating something critical, but when I put the battery and plug back in, it worked fine. Just as I was thinking ... those suckers... the charge light went out.
It took 40 min to take it apart. There were still some cables connected, but I just needed to get into that corner, and it slid over enough diagonally.
It is now working, but the connector is still loose (externally). I may try to get another connector online and do it right.
I was tempted to trim away the plastic to gain access, as it gets covered back up, but didn't. But that is an option.
Add me to the list of no more cheap laptops - even tho this one cost me $1500 at CompUSA, plus $350 for the warranty. OK, I was out of town and needed a laptop. I couldn't get online to find one, and bit the bullet. The sales guy even (gasp!) lied to me about the memory. I told him I would use Photoshop on it, and he assured me 500M was OK and that I could always add more. 500 is aggrivatingly slow, but what he didn't mention was that a quarter of that was used by the graphics card.
Still, except for the memory I have yet to add to, and the charging problem, it has been OK for the 32 months I've had it. It mostly sits quietly in the house, but it has had some rough miles on the road and in flight - a third of its life. And I'm not sure any other maker would have done any better on such a problem.
Thanks to everyone who has contributed!!!!!

 

[Riick]

Que-
I finally found a place which could test my memory and processor (by plugging them into their own laptop and seeing if the laptop still worked). They both worked. Thus, the motherboard is definitely the source of the problem.

I tested the voltage provided by the bios battery: I think it was 18.5 volts, but if this sounds way off let me know and I will test it again.

I am a little concerned that the dead motherboard may be the result of a bios-damaging virus (or bios-deleting virus?), in which case the virus could still be on my hard drive and could also destroy the new motherboard I am about to buy. There is some potentially relevant history here: a few days before the laptop died, my antivirus software (Trend Micro PC-cillin) sent up a pop-up window saying I had been infected with a virus. So I immediately ran a complete hour-long virus scan using the same software. Oddly, the scan found nothing. I figured maybe the anti-virus software had simply eliminated the virus, and I forgot about this incident until a few days ago.

Therefore, I am curious if you know of any way to determine whether the problem is a completely damaged bios or whether it is a hardware problem? I like your idea of trying to restore the bios via the USB port, but unfortunately the bios file I have found appears to be very different than what you have described. It is NOT a compressed (zipped) group of files, nor is it a single compressed file. Rather, it is simply a single unzipped executable. Of course, as you have mentioned, my motherboard may not even be well enough to read an external floppy drive even if I could find the right files to put on a disk. (I don't have an external floppy drive, so I can't easily test this.) What about the leaky capacitor idea? Would I be able to see some sort of resin coming out of the leaky capacitors even on a laptop motherboard? (To be honest, I'm not even sure what the capacitors look like on this thing. When I think of capacitors I think of cylinders or lentil-bean shaped things that stick out of the board, but I don't see anything like that on this board.)

 

[Que]

Hi, your bios battery should hold something like 3 volts. I don't think it is a bios virus, definitely hardware. About that rompaq file: it is indeed an exe file, not zipped, BUT THAT DOESN'T MATTER, just unzip it (if you have something like winrar installed rightclick and: extract to....) into a folder, it will give you a wph file, a flashing program, etc. Your capacitors are small black rectangular "matchboxes", flatmounted, 7 pieces marked NE* AA8, they are 100mfd conductive polymer tantalum capacitors. The * is a letter for the production date. I don't think they hold fluid like the larger ones found on desktop motherboards, the ones you will find with a burst top and dried residue on them after failure.

 

[tony808]

got round to registering to thank the contributors to this thread.

Found the thread searching 'power cord' for my Compaq laptop and what do ya know, this is common problem. HP/Compaq should be ashamed of themselves.

I followed the instructions of the first few pages of this thread and fixed the power issue on my pc.

You saved me a lot of time, effort and money.

Thanks. 8)

 

[Riick]

Que-
The bios battery tests as 2.7 volts; do you suppose this is OK? By the way, thank you for your clarifications about the extractions. I had to extract the bios exe twice, because the first extraction merely produced a second exe. Extracting from this second exe did basically produce the files you mentioned (the only difference is that instead of "phlash.exe" it is called "winphlash.exe"). Also, I had to do it with Winrar, because winzip was unable to perform the extraction, saying it was not a valid file to extract from. Thanks also for the interesting information regarding the capacitors.

 

[Que]

You are welcome. That bios battery voltage is low, has to be exchanged for a new one. Hope it makes a difference for you, but I'm afraid it won't. But, you never know! (If it does, it will give me at least one sleepless night, because I did not exchange mine when I had the same trouble, but let someone else ruin the mainboard totally by doing a very bad job when mounting new capacitors)

 

[Riick]

Que-
Thanks once again for the continued suggestions! I wasn't able to get a new CMOS battery (although I did look). Mine is not intended to be replaced by the user; the contacts are welded to the battery and then soldered to the motherboard. The battery itself is a Maxell ML coin-type rechargeable battery. (I think the contacts are probably custom-welded by Maxell for each manufacturer's bulk order.) Hard to know exactly what model, because the welded contacts cover the model number. According to Maxell's website, "Maxell ML (lithium manganese dioxide rechareable [sic]) batteries are available only for equipment manufacturers as a built-in part. Therefore, Maxell does not supply these batteries for replacement directly to users of equipment with these batteries. When built-in ML batteries need to be replaced, please contact your equipment manufacturer." But I couldn't find these batteries in HP's parts website. If I were really stuck I suppose I could find some other rechargeable 3V button battery and solder contacts to it. But I'm guessing that the CMOS battery probably isn't the problem. I suspect that the reason it is low is that it hasn't had a chance to recharge in the month that my computer has been broken. If it were the CMOS battery, then it seems that in the days leading up to the problem, the time and date would have been incorrect and some of my settings would have been changing. I've also heard that a bad CMOS battery can't result in the system not POSTing at all, and that as long as the battery is above 2.5 volts it still has adequate power. Do you agree with all these things?

I was able to borrow an external floppy drive, and I tried the bios restore technique that you outlined earlier. However, as you had predicted for my situation, the computer shut down without even trying to read the floppy disk.

 

[Que]

Riick, I think it is time you start checking ebay.com for a replacement board. Lots of them out there, check with your partnumber, but also with the specifications offered. I had two partnumber 370494-001 boards, one full- and one defeatured, so check the specifications in the ads careful if you intend to get one. I finally dared to spend another €156 shipp. incl. , on one from France, 3 days ago

 

[Que]

Que-
The bios battery tests as 2.7 volts; do you suppose this is OK?

Oh oh, I can't find a battery on 3 boards that goes over 2.75 Volts! I guess it is the max, because one that was at a lower voltage (1.3) showed 2.75 after a couple of hours on a board. Never higher.

 

[riich]

Your battery is totally empty by now I think.
I meant with the battery out, only on the adapter. If you can not start from there, and the power led is glowing dim, you probably suffer from leaking capacitors (condensators for europeans) and/or bad shottkey voltage barrier regulators on the mainboard. The capacitors are marked NE* AA8 - they are 100mfd NEOCAPACITORS - conductive polymer tantalum capacitors - there are 7 of them in total. HP should give you another motherboard, but they probably won't.

* = a letter for the production date.

No, i have two batterys and both of then has higher voltage then the marked output... ;P
Anyways, when i insert the adapted....witout touching anything else....the power light starts glowing...! But nothing else happens, even if i press the power button...

I've tried to look for any condensator that is faulty by measuring resistance over their pins...but I cant find anything that isnt as it should be!

I've tried for months now to fix the problem, but now I'm tired of trying! =/


Anyone knows where i can buy a new motherboard?
Cant find anyone on ebay who ships to norway....

 

[Que]

Anyways, when i insert the adapted....witout touching anything else....the power light starts glowing...! But nothing else happens, even if i press the power button...
Anyone knows where i can buy a new motherboard?
Cant find anyone on ebay who ships to norway....

Did you have your memory checked? Seems like a short circuit or a dead memory stick? Have you tried with the board out, just the frame with cpu and memory, and the lcd attached (or a vga monitor)?
I bought several boards off ebay,
got a dead board that was returned but never arrived back due to a wrong return address ($300 lost),
got one Intel board where I bought an AMD, returned it, and got money back only after a paypal claim, leaving bad feedback, and getting the shop closed temporarily with other buyers.
One board that would run off battery, but caught fire right away.
Now I'm in the process of returning a board from France, that has a desoldered bios battery, a broken keyboard connector securing latch, and no video on lcd or vga. Be carefull, a lot of people selling junk.
A search on ebay for R3000, put highest prices first, shows some. But I'm not spending that much, there are also complete working R3000's for those prices.

 

[jondoe9]

Here is the problem most of us are having - the charging stops working. The power cord is wiggled, wedged, whatever, and the charge light will come on again - for a while.
As stated above, the problem is the power receptacle connection. I finally looked for an answer, and found this great site. I found I could take the unit apart minimally, canting the top CCW to get to the solder connections. After I resoldered, it seemed to work fine. But that didn't last too long. When I went to resolder, I took the upper trim off and Dremeled through the plastic. [a series of small holes would also work] There is a hard piece of steel just below, so you can't drill too far. The metal can be bent out of the way to get to the solder points, but it is hard metal.
When the second try didn't work, I looked for a new receptacle, as suggested above. Mine was ruined. I found prices ranging from $25-85, shipping from $15-25. What crooks! On ebay, I found .. http://cgi.ebay.com/DC-Power-Jack-Toshiba-Satellite-A70-A75-M35X-1400-1800_W0QQi temZ220131417785QQihZ012QQcategoryZ116333QQcmdZViewItem
[this is not the seller I used. My seller was- http://myworld.ebay.com/parts_lee/ . But any should be OK]
for $8, $3.50S/H, and it arrived in a week from Hong Kong.

[the issue seems to be cold solder joints from the factory. I found a site that mentioned the problem was the poor air intake for the cooling fans - which exhaust under the power connecter, and the excess heat causes the solder to fail. Not too sure about that, but it was an interesting take. The repair was $90.
I also got nowhere with an Indian supervisor, but got to someone at Corporate tech support. I mentioned 'known issue', and he gave me all the arguments the other guy did. But he offered to put in a new motherboard for half price ($200). I guess it was a good deal, but passed (I should have asked if a new battery was included).]

I can fix this for $15 bucks! I thought. Well, now I have to do it - meaning I have to take the thing fully apart, eating the cost in time to strip it. (someone mentioned it took 8 hours, and I got it apart the first time in 40 minutes - but I removed as little as I could. Now I have to strip it to get the old connector out. grrrr)

There are great, illustrated photos above to fix this thing. Basically, there are 2 screw sizes. I marked the long ones with a silver marker. There are 4 extra short ones that hold the keyboard on. A few screws go under another piece of plastic, so if things aren't flat, it must be redone. I haven't taken the frame off yet, so there may be other oddities I haven't seen yet.
Best of luck to us all.

 

[alizarules]

For those that purchased the media cable, would any of you mind sending a picture of it? I'm curious to see how you connect it to the laptop.

Or if anyone knows of a newer model of the media cable that works, I would try that. The ones I find are near 100 bucks.

Thanks

 

[frustrated_canuck]

Hi everyone,

I have been having the same problem and own a presario r3240ca. I have taken the laptop apart two times, the first after visiting this forum. The first time I took the old solder off and resoldered it. That seemed to work for a while. Soon enough though, the problem crept up again. The second time I opened it, I had purchased another power connector to replace it with because I knew now it wasnt just the soldering joints.

But the problem for me was that I was not able to melt the old solder off (or even get it soft) in order to remove the old dc jack. Should I be using some force to take it out or does it easily come out? I have read other people who have gotten it to work. After the failed attempt, I gave up and just reassembled it.

What do you think the problem is here? Am I not using a soldering iron that is hot enough? I have been thinking of taking it a part again and taking the mobo to a repair shop to get it off and the new one soldered on.

Currently, I have been able to maintain a reliable power connection by wedging a piece of paper underneath the power connector and that seems to fill whatever gap there was and I do not get it going on battery. I have not noticed any problems with this temporary solution (i.e. no heating of the power connector, etc.). This could be a temporary solution for those for need to use their laptop and are waiting to get it fixed. Obviously, I would like to get a more permanent fix eventually.

Any advice is greatly appreciated.

Aliza: The media connector is the XC1000 I believe. There are some selling on ebay right now for around $50. Not sure what model laptop you have but there are others for different models. It connects to the port replicator which should be on the side of your laptop.

 

[Que]

It should come out easy, no force! Your soldering tool may need a cleaner tip, use some sandpaper. Don't think it will cost a lot if a repair shop does it for you. Shouldn't be much more than $25 if you show up with a bare board and a jack.

 

[frustrated_canuck]

Thanks for the fast reply and the great advice! Much appreciated. Good luck to everyone else still struggling with this.

 

[stupidguy]

I have an R3000 laptop that will not run on battery power. The battery monitor shows full charge and the led for battery charging only stays on shortly when started up or turned off. But when the ac power is removed it dies within a few seconds. I have the media adapter and have tried powering up with it, but it makes no difference. I originally thought it was the battery and replaced it with a new unit from Ebay, but no luck. Any thoughts or advise would be greatly appreciated. Laptops that aren't mobile really suck.

Thanks in advance,

Stupidguy

 

[Que]

Sounds like something in the loading circuit crapping out, lucky you can still run off AC, mostly that fails too after a while. Do you have a voltmeter, to measure the battery contacts (the ones on the laptop, not the battery itself) and see what voltages are on those pins?

 

[deijr1238]

yup, measure the contacts, and let us know what you get..

 

[stupidguy]

Thanks for the replies. Voltage read at outter pin was 1.36v and 3.46v at inner pins.

 

[Que]

There should be a contact reading 14. Volts, to charge the battery. Odd that you can not run with the media cable on the docking port, but can with the normal dc-in, because they use the same circuitry.
--Do you measure 19 volts on your most left and right copper contacts of the docking port, when the power adapter is connected to the regular dc-in jack?
--Were you not able to run the laptop at all with the new battery?(guessing that it came holding some charge?)

 

[stupidguy]

The laptop will run off of a/c power from the regular power jack or the media adapter power jack. When the new battery arrived it ran for a few minutes on battery and then shut off. You could watch the battery monitor drain very fast at about 25% at a time. But it seems that it will not charge the battery because now it will just turn right off as soon as the a/c adapter is removed.

 

[Que]

Seems board-level components are failing, capacitors maybe, maybe more. To have it fixed by a technician (if they even want to try) costs so much, another board from ebay is your best option, I guess.

 

[stupidguy]

Forgot to say that the power light only stays on for a minute when started up or when a/c adapter is first plugged in. There is 18v at the media adapter. I double checked the bios and it's up to date. I want to smash this $1,700.00 piece of crap. I'll never buy another HP/Compaq anything....

 

[Que]

Same here, never a new HP or Compaq, but a secondhand one, oh well. You might get lucky by upgrading the powerbrick from a 120 to a 135 watt model, if applicable. I get over 19Volts from the adapter itself, and 19Volts at the docking port. The 18V from yours, is this from the adapter itself too, and within it's specifications?