Faulty acer aspire timeline 4820T. Shuts down after minutes.

groumf

Honorable
May 30, 2013
3
0
10,510
Hi guys,
I'm having trouble with my aspire timeline 4820T. It boots ok, but 3-4 minutes after startup I hear a weird noise which I'd describe as the noise of short circuit coming from inside the laptop and then it just switches off. I've opened it but I didn't manage to find anything burned(simple visual inspection). One interesting thing to note is that after cleaning the cooler and replacing the thermal paste, the machine worked for around 2 weeks and then started having the same issues. I've also removed the memory sticks and replaced them with known working ones, removed the cd drive and wireless card, the issue persists. It happens both when running on mains, battery, or mains & no battery.
Has anyone else had a similar problem, or any ideas as to what it can be? I really don't want to buy a motherboard to find out it was the power key or the cpu.
Thanks!
 

groumf

Honorable
May 30, 2013
3
0
10,510
Hi guys,
Thans for your answers.
I haven't seen any capacitors as described. The motherboard doesn't seem to have many electrolytic capacitors. There are 4 obvious tantalum ones but I thought that they were quite reliable. I'm attaching a picture with the aformentioned caps.
fmjki9.jpg






 

groumf

Honorable
May 30, 2013
3
0
10,510
It is electrical noise. It sounds like a low buzz, "tzzz tzzz tzzz". I guess one of the components is gone. It's not really worth the trouble fixing it as i'd need to start buying spares. What I don't understand is why it worked for a couple of weeks after opening it up and cleaning it.
Any way thanks guys.