Prostar 5654/5600D
It’s come time for me to sell my Prostar 5654/5600D laptop. I’ve had it since mid to late 2002 and it has been an OK laptop for me with a few problems. I talked a little bit about the problems I’ve had with it in the past. In short, I had to replace the motherboard; which Prostar has been really helpful in doing.
The Prostar 5600D is made by Clevo, and is the same laptop as the Alienware 51-m and the Sager 5600, as well as many others I’m sure. I am currently having problems with a cracked lid; and apparently many have had these same problems. The causation for the crack is the tight hinges on the lid. I found a good tutorial for fixing this problem; if it’s not too late.
Edit 7/18:
The laptop has been sold.
Teh Blarg » Prostar Sold! / Hinge Fix Said,
July 18, 2005 @ 12:20 pm
[...] My Prostar laptop had some problems with it. Cracks in the lid inspired me to stop using it and eventually buy another laptop. [...]
twinedge Said,
September 23, 2005 @ 12:47 pm
hi.
i have a sager 5600d…and it shuts down,i leave it for a while,and i could turn it back on…but shuts down again,after a minute…fans are on heat sink seem to be working fine too…
any idea as to what the problem might be?
evrything seems to be working fine except for the shut down problem…any help would be apreciated…
thanx….
Raybdbomb Said,
September 23, 2005 @ 1:31 pm
Does windows report any hardware failure?
Daniel Alexander Said,
October 7, 2005 @ 1:29 pm
I am currently debugging the same problem on one of my Sager laptops (5600). I suspect that the system voltage regulator card is bad. However, I’m not a hardware person so I could be wrong.
Basically, if I let my system sit around unplugged for a good while (sometimes it takes 2 days or more) the system will then boot again. This lead me to believe that the battery needed to be removed so that it could boot sooner, but even with the battery removed it takes a day or two to reset itself so that it can be booted again.
Once it gets to the point were it can be booted up I can run the system for a number of hours. Sometimes it will run all day without any problem. However, eventually it will shut down and I’ll have to wait a day or two before booting it again.
This kind of made me think that the system voltage regulator was bad (there is a card under the mouse pad that I think is the voltage regulator). I thought that maybe the system had to recharge the battery to a point and then when it reached that charge the system would crash. So, I have removed the battery and all of my tests are now off of the wall outlet.
The processor runs pretty cool. I have greased it up and I don’t suspect that it is a heat issue related to the Processor (which was what I originally thought it might be). Mind you it could still be a heat issue with some other motherboard component. Still, it should not take more then 2 days for the system to reset itself so that I can reboot it (if it is a heat issue).
I also noticed that the system lights would all work OK when I tried to reboot. However, it would not boot the hard drives or turn on the monitor. So I thought maybe it had something to do with the system Standby. I thought this because the system seemed to always shut down after I walked away from the computer for a while. That is it would shut down the first time after I went away for a while and then it would get into that state where it either would not boot or it would boot for a few minutes and then shut down again.
So, I removed the battery and unplugged the computer and let it sit around for 2 days until it was able to boot again. I then let the battery out and boot the system from the wall outlet power. I turned off System Standby and Hibernation and ran the system for a number of hours (booting and rebooting and letting it sit cold and then rebooting etc…). I then turned system Standby back on and set it for 3 minutes and waited. After 3 minutes the system went into system Standby just as suspected. However, it could not be rebooted. I unplugged the system and plugged it back in and it could not be booted. I waited for a day and still it could not be rebooted. I waited for another 2 days and it finially booted.
Ok, so I should probably try that test a few more times to see if it is repeatable and I will do that. However, right now I am trying a different test. I have turned off system standby and hibernation and I am running the system without the battery. I will let it run for a few days (on and off) and see if I can get it to crash again. If not then I will turn back on system standby and see if that causes the problem. If it does then we can assume that the problem has some relation to system standby (and/or hibernation). Then I think I will put the battery back in and see if I can crash the system with System Standby off, but this time with the battery in the computer.
I am posting this message so that it might help people to solve their problem even though I don’t have any real solution as of yet. I’ll try to keep you informed about anything I discover. Maybe you all can post what you are trying (or have tried) and with enough information maybe we can narrow down this problem. Or at the very least maybe we can get the systems running in some state (without battery and system standby turned off or some such state).
Daniel Alexander Said,
October 8, 2005 @ 2:18 pm
OK…I think I figured it out. While testing that last test from my previous post I got the error again. However, this time it locked up on a blue screen. I saw the blue screen pop up on other occasions but I could not read it fast enough and nothing was written to the windows or BIOS logs. But this time it had an error related to the memory.
I downloaded MemTest86 (do a websearch for it) to test my memory. I have two memory modules in my computer so I tested each seperatedly. To remove the memory modules on the Sager 5600 you need to pop out the keyboard by pushing a screw driver down into the top of the keyboard above the “Prt Sc” and F2 keys (you should see a little latch there. Be careful not to put the keyboard too far off or you will disconnect the cable. Just tip it forward and lay it over the mouse pad. Then remove the 4 screws hold the plate on under the keyboard. You can leave those screws off while you test, but you will need to replace the plate and the keyboard each time you test it.
Ok. So, now on my Sager (while looking at the computer in the regular way) the bottom slot is slot 1 and the top slot is slot 2. I have both slots full. If you have the same situation then you will need to pull out the top memory module and leave the one that is in the lower slot. Then after you test that memory module you will swap back in the one that you removed (putting it in the bottom slot replace the one that you already tested).
Now, if you only have one module then this is probably not going to work for you. This is becuase you need to boot the system in order to test the memory. So, hopefully you have at least one good memory module so you can distinguish which of the two is good and which is bad. Otherwise you will have to go buy another module and you can’t be sure that you are having the same problem so it might be a waste of money (mind you I think it is worth the risk if you can get the computer running again).
To test the modules you can simply boot the computer and if it boots then that module is probably OK. Or, you can run the MemTest86 program from a boot floppy.
I think that if you can get it booting on one of the memory modules and it does not boot on the other then that is probably a good enough test. Give it a try and tell us if it worked for you as well.