AAO Will Not Boot

Hi all. My AAO will not boot this morning (it's running XP on the 160 gb hdd). I haven't been tinkering with it. I haven't installed anything new. I haven't done anything other than take it to London and come back home.

When I press the power button, the light turns green and I can hear the fan inside the unit. The caps lock and num lock keys do not get a response from the indicator lights. It does not seem to matter how long I let it run.

I'm not much of a Windows guy, so I have no idea how to proceed. Can someone walk me through the steps of diagnosing this issue? I do NOT want to just do a recovery, as I have just come back from a research trip and there is a file and some pictures on it that I need to get off.

 

This procedure should get it booting again.
http://macles.blogspot.com/2008/08/acer ... overy.html

After you have it booting again, update the bios again with this procedure.
http://macles.blogspot.com/2008/07/flashing-bios.html

I recommend Bios v3309

 

Can't speak to the BIOS solution above, but it doesn't sound like you have a Windows problem, if the screen doesn't even light up.

 

OK. That's helpful. I'm reformatting a flash drive now. In the meantime, are there any connections I can check without totally disassembling the thing (RAM, HDD, etc)?

 

WOOT! That did it! Everything is back as it should be. Thanks, guys!

 

My second One wouldn't boot either, just a flash of the capslock, and numlock....spinning fan. The USB bios install worked fine. The machine now works as it always has.

 

I was about to ask the same question, just subscribed to the forum to do that, and the answer was already here.

Now that my AA1 is TURNING ON I feel I can contribute to the forums before simply throwing questions at the everyday users.

Thanks so much for this thread and the detailed instructions!

Best,
Diogo