20 Most Recent Gateway 400SD4 Notebook Questions & Answers

boot menu should come up with a list like cd hdd maybe backup or other strange names just try them one at a time and one should be the factory reinstall

Sounds like a virus. I would have somebody check it out.

just pull that battery off the board for a couple minutes, the also may be a little button you will be able to push on the board

Did she spill something on it? Have you tried to make sure it's not an issue with your bright and dark buttons or keys on the keyboard?

Shine a flashlight on the dark screen to see if you barely see the icons on the desktop. If so, then the LCD Inverter is bad. Plug in an external monitor and see if the display shows up on it. It can be any kind of monitor even the old big fat crt monitors as long as it has a vga cable to connect to your computer's vga port. If so that proves your video card is ok. The video will show on most systems when you reboot without you having to do anything. Some systems will require you to hit the FN (Function key) + F1 thru F12. Hold down the FN key then hit the correct key for displaying on the monitor (F1 thru F12). The correct key will normally have CRT/LCD on it or it will have the icon of a display. If you see no icons by shinning a flash light and the external monitor works, then your screen is bad. If you see no icons by shinning the flash light and nothing shows on the external monitor, then most likely your video card is bad.

have you tried re-installing the operating system?if not try it.good luck

If you forgot Windows password, try to download some password cracker for help, which allows you to reset your forgotten password to blank in minutes without data loss, See the guy use Windows Password Key to reset password in minutes. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VRpw9ygSEys

I believe the DC jack is soldered to the board on that model. It must be unsoldered to remove (from the bottom of the board) and the new one soldered on. A soldering iron and a solder sucker (to cleanly remove hot solder) can be bought at Radio Shack, HOWEVER if you've never soldered before I would NOT ATTEMPT TO DO THIS REPAIR MYSELF! It's very easy to toast the motherboard if you don't know what you're doing. I would suggest finding a local electronics/computer repair shop that knows how to work with SMT components. Ask them for an anti-static bag for the motherboard and just bring the motherboard and new jack down to them to have the new one installed. It shouldn't cost more than $40 to replace that way and more like $20-30. Good Luck, El Duderino

The factory service manual is available at http://www.mpcdrivers.com. Just contact the webmaster at [email protected] for info on getting the manual.

Am presuming you're referring to antennas for use with a WiFi card that fits into the mini-PCI slot under one of the covers on the underside of the laptop. I've done this on the same model, but have not been entirely pleased with the performance -- mostly due to weak reception. I'm not sure of the reason, which may be because the antennas used weren't up to the job, or if there are inherent reception limitations even when the antennas are properly installed. It's certainly better than no antenna at all, but nowhere near as good as a USB 2.0 dual-band Wireless-N WiFi adaptor. I may try a different internal antenna to see if that improves reception.
All that being said, this is not a job for an amateur, and should only be attempted by someone with good technical skills and some experience in computer/laptop repairs. These antennas are flat, either square or rectangular, and are intended to be placed inside the top cover, behind the LCD display, between the foil backing and the top of the lid. The cables are routed through the right side of the left hinge, then under the cooling fans and motherboard. Of course all disassembly & reassembly should be done with power disconnected and battery removed. To do all this, you'll need to:
-- first remove the panel with the power on/off button and status LEDs (Gateway calls it a "keyboard cover;" use a thin, flathead screwdriver to pry up the right side, just above the Insert & Delete keys, then lift up so that the snaps release), then
-- remove the keyboard (remove 4 tiny phillips-head screws just above the keyboard, lift the rear of the keyboard and lift the tabs to the ribbon-cable connector on the motherboard),
-- remove the 3 screws holding the keyboard retaining panel (above the two cooling fans), and slide it toward the front to remove it, then
-- remove the 4 screws to the left fan assembly (NOT the fan itself), unplug the cable, and lift the front side first to remove it, then
-- unplug the power cable ane remove the 4-5 screws holding the right fan and heatsink assembly, and remove it, then
-- remove the 2 plastic hinge covers, and the 4 screws to the hinges, and disconnect all the cables connecting the LCD to the motherboard, then
-- remove all the rubber/plastic "bumpers" on the LCD bezel, and the screws beneath, and use your fingers to gently pry the bottom of the bezel from the screen, and progressively pry the remaining snaps loose to remove the bezel, then
-- remove the screws holding the LCD panel in the top cover.
Once all this is done, you can install the new antennas under the foil (i.e. between the foil and the top cover) so that they will be at the top when the computer is open and operating, run the cables through the right side of the left hinge, replace the LCD screen with all the screws, and the bezel. When you put the top cover back onto the base, route the antenna cables around the right side of the left fan, and through the hole in the motherboard, so that the cables appear in the mini-PCI card slot area. Reassemble everything else in reverse order from disassembly, connect the cables to your mini-PCI WiFi card, replace the cover, and test it out.

I suspect your problem is with the drivers for that WiFi-B card. You didn't say what the make & model is of that card, but most manufacturers have not updated their older products for Vista (older WiFi-B & not-so-old WiFi-G cards included). If you're trying to force some older Windows 2000 or XP drivers to work in Vista, you're bound to have issues. You may need to replace that card with a new WiFi device that has drivers for Vista. If that device is USB 2.0, you'll need a USB 2.0 PCMCIA card because the built-in USB ports are only 1.1. You should be aware that this laptop supports only 1 PCMCIA card.

There are other problems with your setup, as the hardware of this system just is not up to running Windows Vista well. First, the graphics hardware does not support the shading instructions and DirectX 9.0+ needed for the "Aero" interface included with the Home Premium version of Vista. Second, Vista might run with only 512MB of RAM (the max this laptop will support), but not well; it really "likes" around 2GB of RAM or more. Third, the BIOS of this system (even the latest and last update) does not support 48-bit LBA (logical block addressing), so it can only "see" hard drives up to 137GB. Any hard drive capacity above that will not be seen by the system, and may result in some drive corruption. At best, you will not have use of the full capacity of that 160GB drive.

Lastly, even if you can get all of the Vista drivers needed for this system's chipset and such to work properly, you will probably not be pleased with this system's inability to run the "Aero" interface, or with the performance limitations when running under Vista. My suggestion would be to remove Vista and install Windows XP. That is what this system was designed for, and all the appropriate drivers are readily available -- possibly including the correct one for your Wireless-B card.

Hi,

According to Gateway, you can request a Recovery CD here, but if you are out of warranty it will cost you.

But the Gateway website has all the drivers available for the SD4 here, so if you can get windows installed onto it, you can install the drivers one by one..

Also, here is the main SD4 webpage if you need any more documentation, etc.

To change the password:
Enter password and then go into security settings. Enter your password again and then you can change it to anything you like. Password settings can be found in Control Panel.
Hope that helps.

re instal os

You can try removing the keyboard from the device manager and restarting the computer.

If that doesn't work then you'll need to swap out the keyboard. Ebay is the cheapest and easiest place to get one ;)

You can download a .pdf service manual from here: http://www.eserviceinfo.com/fulltext.php?search_ft=400sd4 It is a multi-part download so make sure you get all four parts to the manual before you try to open it. (if you need WinRAR to unzip the files you can get a demo at download.com) The service manual has instructions and photos on how to disassemble your laptop. Good Luck, El Duderino