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Question

Powering on a netbook without a hard drive

Apr 19, 2018 11:09PM PDT

I have an old Asus eeePC netbook that I removed the hard drive from. I'm charging it and trying to power it on but nothing happens (battery indicator is on). RAM is installed, but I'll check with another stick again. Should I be able to get on BIOS at least? What kind of sign should I see that would tell me that if I were to install a hard drive it would power on?

Post was last edited on April 19, 2018 11:10 PM PDT

Discussion is locked

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Answer
Re: power on
Apr 19, 2018 11:58PM PDT

Insert a bootable USB or optical disc. Does it boot from those?

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I tried it...
Apr 20, 2018 1:05AM PDT

....with the original Asus CD and my external DVD drive, nothing, no power to USB ports it seems. It's completely dead. It was working when I took out the hard drive a couple of years ago. I'll try to insert another RAM stick, I have he right DDR2 sticks.

Thanks Kees.

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Answer
We had a few Asus Netbooks
Apr 20, 2018 7:35AM PDT

And the HDD is not required for power up or even operation if you boot off USB or CD/DVD.

Your story sounds like a dead machine instead. Remember that used these are now under 99 bucks here and in fact folk won't buy them at that price today (at least here.) If this costs anything to get working it should be sent to the recyclers.

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Thanks Bob, just saw this
Apr 24, 2018 6:33PM PDT

So you mean the motherboard might be dead?

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Looks like it from here.
Apr 24, 2018 6:41PM PDT

This model appears to have a CR2032 CMOS battery. Is that reading well over 3 Volts? If not replace and try again.

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Oh yes the CMOS battery, I forgot about that.
Apr 27, 2018 7:26AM PDT

I'll take it out and see or just replace it.

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Bob, this is a battery soldered on...
May 1, 2018 5:41AM PDT

...with the wires and the plastic cover. I took it out already. I don't think it's possible to test this. Have to find a replacement.

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Such a battery is testable.
May 1, 2018 8:19AM PDT

All technicians I have met can test that battery.

Also, all technicians I know can clip the wires to solder to a new CR2032 with solder leads and then wrap it with electrical tape or shrink wrap. Ordering the exact replacement isn't done often since time to repair is often important to the owner. So while we do order once in a while, 99% of the time we just clip the leads and solder them to a new battery.

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Answer
Well you need as OS to boot
Apr 27, 2018 5:24AM PDT

any PC. The OS is installed on the hard drive. There are computer that have OS built into RAM but they aren't readily available to the public.

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Thanks, but shouldn't I be able to boot from the Asus CD?
Apr 27, 2018 7:02AM PDT

I get no power to USB ports, so I can't run the CD either. With this CD I've been able to reinstall Windows on the hard drive before.