Hello. I am trying to diagnose a laptop. It is a laptop I used daily about 1 or 2 years ago, util I bought another one. So I set it aside and let guests use it. Before setting it aside, it worked perfectly, I could play my normal games on it (MTG Atrena) which isnt too demanding, and it would never fail.
Now, when using it, I will get random power offs, it just powers completley off, kind of what happens when a laptop overheats, but I can rule out overheating, I'll explain in a minute. It turns off completley randomly, normally it was always used by a guest to play MTG Arena with me, so when it shut off we just thought it was overheating, waited then started it up again. But now we use it for more than just games, and we have gotten shut offs while just writing a word document, so I can see it isn't just because we were playing.
[How I ruled out overheating]
I can rule out overheating after various tests. I have changed the thermal compund to arctic mx4, then while running a stress test, I probed the back of the processor (at the motherboard) and the heat sink (by the fan) and both temperatures were within 1°C, indicating that the heat sink is in fact working. Plus during stress tests, I never get a power off, if it passes a certain temperature the screen will go blank, that's another issue though, this never happens while gaming, only with stress test at maximum power.
Now I am good at finding faulty components, I can read a schematic and have tools to do so (I repair video game consoles and occasionally laptop motherboards), but I just cant find the issue since it is completly random. If it were persistent I could trace down the issue, but being that it's on for a random time then shuts off and can be immediatley turned back on, I just can't find the issue. There seems to be no power loss from the adaptor since the "plugged-in" light never turns off. But the computer has no battery, so that is the only thing I can not rule out since I have no battery as a backup power source. But I have yet to see any power spikes or outages on the oscilloscope.
Is there anything you can suggest to check?
Thanks for any help
Now, when using it, I will get random power offs, it just powers completley off, kind of what happens when a laptop overheats, but I can rule out overheating, I'll explain in a minute. It turns off completley randomly, normally it was always used by a guest to play MTG Arena with me, so when it shut off we just thought it was overheating, waited then started it up again. But now we use it for more than just games, and we have gotten shut offs while just writing a word document, so I can see it isn't just because we were playing.
[How I ruled out overheating]
I can rule out overheating after various tests. I have changed the thermal compund to arctic mx4, then while running a stress test, I probed the back of the processor (at the motherboard) and the heat sink (by the fan) and both temperatures were within 1°C, indicating that the heat sink is in fact working. Plus during stress tests, I never get a power off, if it passes a certain temperature the screen will go blank, that's another issue though, this never happens while gaming, only with stress test at maximum power.
Now I am good at finding faulty components, I can read a schematic and have tools to do so (I repair video game consoles and occasionally laptop motherboards), but I just cant find the issue since it is completly random. If it were persistent I could trace down the issue, but being that it's on for a random time then shuts off and can be immediatley turned back on, I just can't find the issue. There seems to be no power loss from the adaptor since the "plugged-in" light never turns off. But the computer has no battery, so that is the only thing I can not rule out since I have no battery as a backup power source. But I have yet to see any power spikes or outages on the oscilloscope.
Is there anything you can suggest to check?
Thanks for any help
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