Solved! Water Damage

[MWarnerCA]

I've been given an HP dv5000 laptop that will not boot. There was a small amount of water spilled on the laptop's keypad. The computer was turned off immediately but not permitted to dry out before being turned on again. Once on, a slight burning smell was evident, I'm told, but it would not start. About 4 weeks have now gone by. When I now turn on the laptop there is a 2, 3 second whir of the fan, the LED lights glow steady, it sounds as if there is an attempt to boot, then a click. Then everything stops with a black screen and no further sounds.

The computer does not respond to any F-key during the re-start process. I have disconnected the ac adapter (there is no battery), held the power key to drain any residual charge. I have inspected all internal parts for damage (none evident), reseated the CMOS battery, RAM, hard drive, connected a USB keyboard and replaced the AC adapter. No progress. I suspect I'm now due to change out other parts.

How do I determine which part is affected?

All I know about the computer is that it runs Windows XP, 512mb memory, and a Celeron M Processor. No external hardware.

Help is appreciated.

 

[Guest]

Could be anything. There's a lot of circuitry under the keyboard and shorting that out with water could affect any other part of the computer up to and including the onboard power supply components. Unless you can identify a removable component or board (and source a replacement) it's probably a waste of time.

 

[frozenlead]

fihart is correct.

If there was a burning smell, though, there is almost assuredly something that's melted. That should give you a hint.