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I bought a presario 1500 that I had assumed had a problem with green lines that were on the lcd and external monitor. The lady who owned it had taken it apart and sold it to me that way. I bought it today and tested it when I got home. I powered it on and I saw that the fan will move slightly but won't start and the hard drive will start but shuts down after about 5-10 seconds. The power light always stays on but nothing else. I noticed when I unplug the hard drive and battery inverter board(see link) it will shut off the power light. Could that be the problem? I don't see how the motherboard could break when it was never used. Anyone have some advise?

http://cgi.ebay.com/COMPAQ-PRESARIO-...ayphotohosting

This looks like a power supply controller card issue. Also some systems will not run if the CPU fan is not working. You need the battery inverter board in place to power the system and light the light.

Ok is the power suply controller on the motherboard? The only other card that connects to the motherboard is the inverter board. If the inverterboard turns on the lights is there something that could be wrong with it still? When I push the power button the fan will just jerk a little bit, does that indicate a broken fan? Thank you for your help, I would feel alot better knowing I can fix this to what I thought I paid 100 for easily.

Back to the beginning - the green lines indicate graphics card failure or possibly memory errors.
Fan not working could be broken fan or power controller failure.
Personally I would not waste any more time and money on this but if you want to get it to work I would take it to a repair shop. There is not much you can do with laptops unless you can carry out board level repairs.
Sorry.

yea that makes sense. I wish I did know how to do board repairs, do you need to go to school for that sort of thing or can you pick it up from reading a book or something?

Nope - not for the amateur - you need some serious skills in diagnosis, component matching, fine resoldering together with a decent workshop with all the right kit. Forget it and chuck the thing away before you spend any more money on it!

I still am going to repair it. I can probably still make a hundred if I just replace the motherboard and sell it for like 280. Can you learn that stuff on your own or would you have to go to school for electronics or something like that?

Not only do you need some serious training, but a workshops full of expensive equipment. I admire your enthusiasm but I would not waste it on this project - try something simpler.

hmm just curious what equipment they use. Could you show me a website that shows them?

Nope - your best bet is to find one and ask to be shown the workshop. Not many will let you, I'm afraid.

I found what I needed. A tracker 2000 and a hot air thing that pulls the chips out. I guess the tracker 2000 is about 1,000 and the chip puller(which also puts new chips in) is 1500 to 2000.

That assumes it is a removable chip that has failed.

oh! Didn't do your homework! http://www.techspot.com/vb/topic55208.html

If the laptop won't turn on with power to the motherboard then it is toast. That thead is useless.

You use the tracker 2000 to find the problem. It takes some know how about electronics. I think you use it like a voltage meter by finding a pattern or map in the board that goes thru the resistors and hunting for the chip or whatever that is bad.

Although some of the posts here might sound mean / rude, it was probably foolish of you to buy the parts disassembled like that from someone that was not trained in computer repair, and said that they had a problem in the first place.
If the motherboard has power to it, and it still doesn't turn on, it's pretty much toast. I wouldn't waist any money on it.
If you really wanna repair it, it'll probably cost you several 100 to take it to a repair shop and have them diagnose the problem, fix it, and a lot of repair shops will tell you right off "We don't fix problems like that on laptops." because of how complex it is.
I'd forget about it.

not necessarily.

While there may be a way to fix it, the question is if it's going to be worth the cost of fixing it.

how the motherboard is the main thing that connects all the parts. Granted if you hear the fan kick on and off then you could have a display, hard drive or maybe ram problem. But like in my problem with the fan not working and it powering down after 10 seconds it would have to be the motherboard. Can you tell me a reason it wouldn't?

Well actually it can be even if it is a motherboard. On ebay you see motherboards for a presario 1500 with buy it now at 130-150. I got mine from a guy for 60. It isn't profesionally tested but it did power up to the compaq display. Thats enough proof that it works for me.