Toshiba Satellite A200 Random Shutdown

[Citori]

Hi There All!

I don't mean to be rude . . Computer Engineer here! . .but this is ALL BUNK! . . the problem with the A200 is simple . . . Toshiba dropped the ball on the fan exhausting into your desk, or maybe even lap! . . "Have you burned your thighs on this puppy yet?" . . In canada there was a very "Quiet recall" by certain retailers that were getting sick of these overheating complaints . . .Toshiba in its lets go the "extra inch" model, graciously repaired/replaced the fans in the laptops of it most ferverent complainers, thus absolving themselves from admitting it was a ridiculous design . .and those suckered into buying this unit from glossy well-hyped advertising should have had the refund/or rplace option! . . So there you have it! . . .if you stuffed insulation in the cooling coils of your refrigerator or radiator in your car, how well would they operate? . . So sorry to see so many trusting people duped by yet another mulinational swindler! . . . ."Hello Lenovo!" . .really too bad, Toshiba for years, was THE name in notebooks!

Best of luck all . . . no ill will intended by any of my comments!

RJ

I have a Toshiba Satellite A200 for two years, since brand new out of the box, it just randomly switches off suddenly, no shut down procedure, no warning, doesn't matter if it has a full battery and is on power.

When I got it, was pre-loaded with windows vista basic and 512 mb mem, which was rubbish, because it kept crashing and was painfully slow, couldn't use it at all for some weeks until I could afford to upgrade it, I upgraded it to 2 x 1gb toshiba ram chips, and loaded vista premium.

Much better, used it much more often, no more crashes and slowness, except noticed occasionally it just popped off, like the power had been cut completely, didn't use it that often back then so didn't really notice it too much. Apparently laptop repair experts insist it is likely an overheating problem, or possibly a power supply problem, however there are some problems with this theory:

1. fault since brand new out of box

2.can switch on immediately after shut down (was told that should not be able to restart straight away if overheated)

3. random, can have fault for days while downloading, can play games for hours without problem, can start up, within a couple of minutes will shut off, sometimes will do it several times a day, other times it can go many days without problem, possibly a week, however can still just pop off after just cold-starting it, and when only being idle on desktop only for 10 minutes.

4. I opened it up (don't recommend this) to check for dust, and it was clean.
Problem does seem to be more frequent these days, however could be that I use it much more often, though haven't ruled out overheating entirely.

Now I am not sure, but it seems to only do it when both battery and mains are plugged in at the same time. Battery is usually full, and charges fine, I use the battery every few days till flat then use mains, battery is often full while using laptop on mains for long periods of time, I haven't noticed the fault with just battery, but then I don't use just battery often. Recently I left the battery out for a week, to see if the fault would happen, and it hasn't, put the battery back in now, been going few hours, not had fault yet. Has anyone else had any success with this?

Ran speedfan to monitor. Cores run around 45C - 47C, jumps occasionally to 48C - 53C for a second.

Right now I am under the impression it does it only when on mains and battery is in. (could be wrong though not tested theory enough).

If it's a power supply fault why doesn't the battery prevent it from turning off, battery backs it up when power's switched off or unplugged suddenly.

I am more inclined to think it's a problem with the motherboard, although I do suspect ram as well, and I still suspect a fan problem too.

 

[trkaky]

Got the same problem! Anyone has any solution? Im goin crazy seriously!! PLEASE HELP PLEASE

 

[Guest]

even i am facing the same problem...its a toshina A 200 bought i india, only spec i am sure of is its got 1.73 dual core processor....while i was on windows genuine windows vista...same thing used to happen then one day macnine wont boot also and will give 3 beeps....i went to to two repair guys...one changedd grapichs card...then laptop worked fine...but then same problem...then i went to other repair guy he fixed mother board...then when i got it back i changed it to windows 7....now i am facing same problem again it just goes blank w/o warining....i have tried as some one suggested changing bios setting dynamic cpu frequency mode it didnt work....i tried running in safe mode where it dosent crash/ freeze at all..
Its hard to get exact specs of my machine as its not listed on indian toshiba website as well as international website....

 

[r13mus]

Hi guys, I have the same problem, the shutdown thing on my toshiba a200...

It's 3 years old and only recently the battery started to fail - it lasts like 40, 50% of the initial time. Since this happened the pc shuts down randomly if the battery and the charger are both plugged.

The rams are working properly, the cpu also, the graphical card also.

I suspect it is the motherboard, I just ordered a new one and I will try to see if it works. It might be the current 'thing' on the motherboard - the one which supplies it with current from the charger.

I bought meanwhile a new charger and it doesnt shutdown but it freezes instead 🙁
I hope until the new motherboard arrives I wont fry the rams or anything else.

I will post some fresh news as soon as I will test the new motherboard.

 

[r13mus]

Finally the motherboard was the problem - The current received from the charger was not distributed correctly and this caused an overheating of the other components.

I bought one on ebay with 50 euros and voila - the laptop is running perfect again.

 

[Kie itsjoep]

It seems to me that toshiba ows us big time with their faulty laptops. We shouldnt be the bearer of these troubles ans costs. I'm seriously planning on contacting them and force them to acknowledge the problem and help us/ repay us, for the trouble we went trough. This is no different than all those asian cars being recalled from the US. If nessecary we can blow this out in the open. Very very bad marketing for toshiba.... They might be willing to listen, but we do need to act as a group then. By that i mean a groupcomplaint of all of us at the same time. Also from te people who already have it fixed by now. Im quite willing to take a lead in this (live in the netherlands), but i do need back up to make my point and to be taken seriously. Anyone interested?? Please let me know asap. With kind regards, J. Kievits

 

[Phitherek_]

Ok, I am the another one to join the problem... I have an A200-23K. The first time random shutdown started was about half a year after purchase. So I found authorised Toshiba service here, in Cracow, and gave them on the guarantee service. They... just changed the motherboard and it worked... for next half a year... Then it happened again. The guarantee was still valid, so I gave it to them again, and they changed the motherboard again... This time it was three months until it happened again. Again changing the motherboard... Finally, the guarantee was over, so when it happened again, I gave it to non-authorised service that I was recommended as more professional and into the hardware. They changed just the graphics and it worked again... but unfortunately not for long. This most recent random shutdown started, when I started to carry my laptop... and I discovered, that it reacts to movement. So I gave it again to the professional service. And it started... They haven' t localized the problem yet. Everything I know is that shutdown occurs when motherboard is tapped or slightly moved. This is due to some electrical problems on the motherboard or between components and motherboard or somewhere else. This service is still fighting with these (they have now also second A200 with the same symptoms on service), but there is only a slight chance of success and I am afraid that I will have to buy a new laptop... Ok, so this is my story, maybe someone can help? It is a hardware-related forum as I can see, so I hope to get some help here...

 

[Phitherek_]

Just to add - I am running Arch Linux on my laptop, all set by me from the beginning, so not supported by Toshiba, but the problem is definitely with hardware, not with software...

 

[fermata]

It doesn't seem to matter whether it's on battery or mains power, it still shuts down.
It's been running now for about 5hours on mains (with the battery in) with no problems. I'm constantly monitoring the temperature and at the moment it's down to 66-69 degrees c.
I don't have another power supply or battery that i could test it out with.
Wish i did!

I have absolutely the same problem ):

 

[vadavada]

I've been having what appears to be a related problem. This is on a Toshiba A200 PSAF6A-07G01N, about 2.5 years old. A few months ago, the machine began spontaneously rebooting (presently at least a couple of times a week; it has been progressively more frequent, I think). The machine simply powers off briefly (1-5s or thereabouts), and then restarts. The power-off is instantaneous, with no blue-screen or other apparent software problem. It also occurs in Windows Vista x86, Windows 7 x86, and Ubuntu Linux x86 10.10.
I have tried running the system without a hard drive (from boot CD) - same problem
Fresh install of Windows - same problem
System restore - same problem

I have been monitoring the core temperatures while running burn-in tests. The cores reach 72ish degrees celcius (which they are on while I write this) and seem to operate fine at this peak temperature. Actually, it seems to be more frequent that the machine reboots when I am not actively using in rather than when I am. Mind you, that may simply be because it spends more time running without me actively working on it than with me working on it.

Anyway, after 1.5 continuous hours of burn-in testing the machine still hasn't rebooted during this process. Of course, that may be just pot luck.

Notable, the machine has *never* spontaneously rebooted while running on the battery. It does reboot with the AC power connected, with or without the battery inserted.

As I find more trends or patterns, I'll report them.
Also, the machine is running the most recent firmware (2.5?).

 

[vadavada]

Ok, so continuing - and running Windows 7 x86.

In the bios, I switched to only using one core, and 'always low'. Even when connected to AC, it has not yet rebooted on these settings (mind you, that's only about 4-5 hrs of testing) but the computer is appallingly slow to use.

When I set the bios to one core, 'Dynamic' the machine spontaneously reset within about 30s (during boot-up actually, which seems to be a particularly sensitive period for restarting).

Having now set the bios to two cores, 'always low', the machine is running of AC power and hasn't yet spontaneously rebooted (currently running performance testing software PerformanceTest 7.0 on it). CPU seems to be sticking around 53 degrees.
Performance seems to be (unsurprisingly enough) about double what was measured when set in bios to use only a single core, and 'always low'.

This is all rather frustrating though; it doesn't appear that the reboots are CPU-temperature dependent, or even necessarily load-dependent as reboots were not occurring during burn-in tests even with both cores on dynamic (they were occurring randomly, but certainly not as a result of high CPU, 3d, or drive load, or even during ram testing). Mind you, I can't actually remember if I did the burn-in tests on AC or battery. I *think* it was AC. I may run them again both with and without AC and see if reboot frequency is different.

 

[vadavada]

Ok, continuing.
Reinstalled the machine with Windows 7 x64
Set the machine to 1 processor, dynamic - still got reboots on AC power
Switched back to 2 processor, dynamic; booted into safe mode, opened Control Panel, Device Manager, expanded 'Processors', right-clicked on each processor and selected 'disable'.
Rebooted into normal windows mode, and the machine has not yet reset (after about 2-3 hrs so far).

I have run PerformanceTest 7.0 again on the system, and its performance seems to be as equivalent to when I was running Windows 7 x86 2 processor, dynamic on AC. Thus, I suspect the processor is running at normal full-speed.
I also expect this same approach would work in Windows 7 x86 - but I'm not presently excited by the prospect of reinstalling the machine so I'm not going to test it at this stage.

So it seems that booting into safe mode and disabling both processors in device manager *may* resolve the problem. I haven't really been testing long enough yet to definitively state that it *does* fix it. I don't know what the long-term effects of doing this may be, but if the alternative is having the machine randomly reboot when running on AC a short useful life is better than a longer useless life.

If the machine continues to randomly reboot, I'll post another update.

 

[vadavada]

So having reformatted the machine back to Win7 x86 just for the hell of it, I used CPU-Z to examine the consequences of disabling the processors in safe mode.
In Win7, x86, CPU-Z reports (and performance tests confirm) that the result of disabling the CPU entries through safe mode is that the CPUs run at minimum speed (~750Mhz in this case).

Based on performance tests on the x64 installation, this doesn't appear to have been the case then (because the performance was high - equal to when running of batteries or AC with both proc running at full speed when it was lucky enough not to reboot on AC).

Anyway, the point is that right now running with the processors disabled on Win7 x86 is a waste of time. Much like running with 2 processors on 'always low' the performance is garbage, and the computer is essentially not worth using.

I'll reinstall back to x64 and see if I can get that doing what is was earlier (running fast, not bombing out, with processors disabled under Device Manager and in bios running both processors on dynamic, on AC).

 

[vadavada]

Further continuing; in Win7 x86, if I re-enable the processors in safe mode, but explicitly set my power options to limit the processor max and min to 50%, CPU-Z again informs me that the core speed is 798 MHz. Again, the computer does not reboot when running of AC at 798 Mhz. If I increase the min and max to 80%, then the machine does start rebooting when on AC. Even if I set the min and max to 100% for when the machine is running of batteries, the machine does not crash when running on batteries.

I reinstalled Win7 x64, booted into safe mode, and disabled both processors in device manager (as I did previously). CPU-Z reports that in this case (when I boot back to normal mode) the CPU is running at ~1995 MHz. This explains the difference in performance identified using the performance testing tool between Win7 x86 and Win7 x64 when the processors are disabled in device manager in each case. There is a substantial difference (for one reason or another) between the processor speed.

Anyway, I'm now going to let the machine run for as long as I can (several days) on AC power, running Win7 x64 with the processors disabled in Device Manager (and so presumably with the CPU remaining stable at 1995 MHz). With some luck, it will not crash *and* it will be fast enough to be useful.

This doesn't really clear up what the problem is. I had earlier thought that the reboots occurred when CPU speeds switched (sometimes, often it switched with no problems at all). That would explain why reboots never occured when the bios was switched from 'dynamic' speed to 'always low', as well as when the processor was disabled through device manager. There would be no speed switching. However, I would have expected that explicitly setting (in power options) both minimum and maximum CPU speed to the same value (80% for example) would have prevented switching, and thus stopped the reboots (which it didn't). It is possible that setting both values to the same thing does not actually prevent switching, but I haven't checked that directly.
In any case, my suspicion is/was that switching the speed of the processor switches the voltage required by the processor and that a problem in the AC power system was causing insufficient voltage to be delivered to the processor, causing the reboot. Without spending a while testing every component on the motherboard using equipment I don't have, I can't really check this.


I also don't have an explanation for why the speed the processor runs at when the processor is 'disabled' through device manager differs between Win7 x86 and Win7 x64. However, as long as the machine is not rebooting under Win7 x64 and the processor remains fixed at 1995 MHz that'll do me for the time being.
What would really be ideal, though, apart from the problem not appearing in the first place, would be to be able to set the processor speed to 'always high' in the bios in the way you can set it to 'always low'. I suspect this would overcome the problem.

Best of luck to all, and if the machine reboots in Win7 x64 despite having the processors disabled in device manager, or I come up with anything new, I'll post again.

 

[vadavada]

Adding yet again to this seemingly endless saga:
The clock speed does *not* remained fixed at 1995 MHz in Win7 x64 when the processors are disabled through device manager. On next reboot, the CPU speed was back to ~750 MHz (which is clearly useless).

Since I still think it is CPU speed switching that is causing crashes, I'm now trying setting the CPU min and max speeds to 100% in power management, having re-enabled the processors through device manager, and hoping that switching between multipliers of 10x and 11x will not create enough of a change in CPU voltage (if that is the problem) to cause resets.

If I could find a way to lock the processor to a particular multiplier (e.g. 10x) then I'd be able to test it more directly, but the only program which appears to do that (RMClock) requires use of unsigned drivers and at one point gave me a bluescreen so unless some way comes out of the woodwork to lock the multiplier at a particular value (for the love of god, Toshiba/Intel, give me some way of explicitly controlling the multiplier in the bios) that doesn't seem to be an option.

 

[vadavada]

Finally, I found a tool to explicitly control the CPU multiplier & voltage, called ThrottleStop.
With my processors disabled (through Safe Mode), and ThrottleStop installed I'm now running the laptop with a multiplier of 10x and a Voltage ID of 1.175

Apart from needing to run from battery during the booting process (during which ThrottleStop has not yet started), the machine now *never* seems to reset. I am actually now using it like a normal computer again.

Finally, my config is Win7 Ultimate x64. In bios both processors are running as 'dynamic' (although if they are switched to Always Low *and* ThrottleStop can override that it may overcome resets during booting).

My only concern now is that because the CPU speed is locked, it may not cool down even if it needs to (as it probably will not slow itself down). Still, the computer was useless before, and is now useful so it is better than it was right up until the moment the machine bakes.

Good luck, all.

 

[Metroid_III]

I have a Toshiba Satellite A205-S5831 with similar problems. Random shuts down, sometimes in seconds, sometimes after hours, with dynamic cpu and dual core enabled, when plugged into the charger. On battery the problem is less persistent but is there and the battery life sucks (40 mins with MAX power saving) so that's not a good option. On always low it seems to perform much better, but random shutdowns still occur, sometimes before getting to windows. Until yesterday, I had found a solution to keep the computer running, for hours on end:

1)change cpu to always low (can leave dual core enabled)
2) place computer on lap so that both the side and bottom fan have absolutely ZERO obstruction (what i do is place the laptop so that it's supported in the middle by my right leg). This makes it work all the time, even when moving it around, just keep your hand off the bottom fan....at least until yesterday when i developed another problem.

Now, usually after watching 1-2 episodes anime on vlc, the computer will freeze and random multi-color blocks appear on screen. The computer just completely freeze and needs to be shut down using the power button. Afterwards, I can't turn on the computer for an hour or so. Could be overheating but i doubt it, even when i've gotten to work on dynamic for awhile CPU never goes above 53 degrees Celsius MAX. Intel GFX are right below the keyboard which only feel warm to me, not hot.

Sorry for the wall of text, just putting out my situation, hope my temporary solution will help some others.

 

[itayguy]

same problem for me with this rubbish A200 - I switched to low cpu (not dynamic) and now it doesn't shuts down , but it feels like it is working slow.

My guess for this problem is that when the cpu tries to go to full process power, and the vents starts to spin at high speed, there is a problem with the vent , and it uses too much amp's , and this makes the computer shout off.

I think we should all make a protest to Toshiba , and add this link as a proof that this is a major problem.

my guess is that Toshiba put a time bomb it this laptops, to increase it sale


Last Toshiba I am getting ever !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Guest]

hi, I have the same problem with my toshiba A305-S6898, in windows and with the charger plugged in freezes and in safe mode with the same scenario is ok. I found a temporary fix for that:

With the computer plugged in first set the bios to default. after that boot in safe mode, and go to device manager, look for the "procesors". choose any core and right click on in to disable it (no uninstall). After that restart the computer and boot windows in normal mode. Then in windows go to device manager and enable the core that you disabled in "safe mode". Now it should work with no freezes and restart, unless you install Windows update and restart again to complete the installation. for that scenario you have to do the whole process again. and if you want to turn it off, just put it to sleep or hibernate. hope its fix your problem!! WK

 

[Notsosure]

In another forum/thread I had seen the solution of disabling the processor cores in the device manager and hence tried it, which sounds weird but actually works. I have kept them permanently disabled and am not sure of the consequences. All windows updates have gone through smoothly so far though I have not tried any major updates such as SP1/SP2. My A200 J01 random restart problem became more severe with the battery draining out further and further. It appears to me that the processor tries to do some balancing act between the battery and AC power and causes random restarts when the battery is too weak. The solution lies in disabling the processor cores in safe mode (tried successfully) or perhaps using a new battery (not tried). Safe mode or running the notebook only on battery works probably because the processor is not required to do any juggling but strangely, only AC power does not seem to work. It is really surprising that Toshiba did not recall this product, which clearly has design flaws including high heat and random restarts.