Laptop issues

I Have a dell inspiron 8600, I'm not the owner I'm working on it for a co-worker. The laptop needed a battery to begin with. Battery replaced the puter does not boot. When you press the power button the "A" light flashes for about 7-8 seconds then goes back out. It has on several occaisions start to boot but reaches a certain place and freezes. I know the power cord is not an original dell and when I put an original dell power cord on it the light comes while charging(normal) with the other cord it does not.. The battery is fully charged but still same results...This morning I pressed the button..it did the same when i attempted it again..it started to boot..but reached a certain place and I had to restart ..back to square one...

 

If the cable (not Dell) has the polarity reversed it will have fried something inside.
If the voltage from the adaptor is not the same as the Dell adaptor then same result.

I did it once with a very expensive router by using the wrong adaptor.
http://www.clipartof.com/images/emoticons/xsmall2/771_smiley_being_punched_through_his_computer_monitor.gif

 

I don't know how long she used that power adapter...but I am wondering if it could be a power supply issue..problem is I don't know where to locate one in a laptop...I can do desktops all day long ..but laptops are much more complex...

 

I too am OK poking around inside my tower,where i have lots of room.
I have a laptop but have only ever changed the ram.

 

Can you get into the BIOS on it? I think you press the F2 button when you crank it up. See if you can get into it and check your RAM and hard drive. If that seems ok, try a bootable CD.

 

i came home from work and behold she fired ...i went into the bios and everything looked ok...but...i was installing a new O/S..because the owners son had installed umbuntu...or something...and i think one times to many...I am not thouroughly familiar with umbuntu i see it is a linux based o/s ..anyway i think it is causing some sort of conflict...while installing i got the blue screen of death...an error messege detailing that the bios needed an update and that i can bypass that during install by pressing f-7...so now i am back to the blinking letter "A":confused

 

I would try to figure out which OS you want to use. If you want to dual boot (forgive if I am wrong been a while.) Install the Windows OS, then the Ubuntu. Windows can trash a Linux install, and cause problems.

Install Windows, then the 'Nix. :cool

 

no just installing windows ..just can't get it to stay fired up

 

well...i believe it is the bios..because now it is just freezing when it does boot...so what i need to do is jump the bios...it is a dell inspirion 8600..how deep would i have to go to get to the jumping post for the cmos?

 

At what point is the computer locking up? If you can get into the BIOS, you should be able to restore it to factory defaults without reseting the CMOS.

 

at the point when you see the dell logo and the bios starts coming up...when you see the part that says to enter setup press f2 or boot menu press f12..right there it locks..I am work now but when I get home I plan on trying it ..again ...I will try to go straight to the bios setup...and restore the default settings

 

I understand that these laptops don't have the same type of battery that a desktop has .a cr2032..or something(can't think of the number right now but they have a soldered on battery type...so..i guess removing that is out of the question...the old battery has been replaced with the same one of its type it holds the charge well...what i see is the pattern of what it does ..it will boot by tonight or tomorrow morning after attempting to start today ..when it does start I don't have much time to fish around looking for settings..soon it will freeze on a screen...and with one more attempt...to start..the monitor wont even come up the next attempt..gets a flashing caps..letter "a" till the next day..

 

i had done that also with the same repsonse...