Solved! ASUS laptop won’t turn on, power button and caps lock glow

[ConfusedProgrammer]

Hello all,

I’ve had my ASUS Q503U laptop for around four years now, and it’s been having battery issues for a few months (having trouble keeping a charge, not reading how charged it is correctly, etc.). Yesterday it finally refused to power on. When I pressed the power button, both the power button’s and the caps lock button’s lights turned on…and just stayed that way. I’m used to the caps lock button’s light coming on, the keyboard’s light turning on, and then the screen turns on with the ASUS logo, but it seems it’s stuck on that first step. It would stay there, caps lock and power button lit up, for hours, plugged in or not. The light on the f2 key (signaling airplane mode) would also turn on gradually, starting dim and reaching full brightness over the course of an hour. I left it charging like that overnight, seeing if it would ever progress to turning on, and there was no change. As of this morning it no longer turns on at all when not plugged in, and when plugged in it immediately tries to turn on again and the charging light no longer lights up.

This isn’t a huge issue, and I will be getting a replacement soon, but my last general backup was a while ago and there is some new data I would like to retrieve if possible. Does anybody here have any idea how I can get it to turn on just one more time, time enough for me to copy a few files to a flash drive? From googling I don’t think I can replace the battery (it doesn’t seem like the Q503U was built to be pried open at all, let alone having a detachable battery).

 

[AlHuneke]

There are a bunch of things that could be wrong. Here's the manual: https://www.manualslib.com/manual/1063322/Asus-Q503ua.html?page=108#manual. If you really don't want to fix it, remove the hard drive and access it externally. There has to be a way to get to it. Sometimes the case screws are hidden behind stickers or rubber bumpers. Rarely, there is a separate door that allows access to the drive or it can be slid out the side after removing a screw. Once the drive is out, get a USB adapter to mate with the drive and you can then read the files using another machine (unless they are encrypted, which is not likely). There is a small chance the hard drive is faulty because of some hardware failure in your machine. If the files are real important, I'd take the laptop to a repair shop and let them retrieve the files for you.

 

[ConfusedProgrammer]

Thank you for the link. I have now opened up my laptop and am in the process of removing the hard drive.