When I turn on the laptop, I get an error message on a black page stating that the realtek ethernet failed. I took it to a reputable repair shop where they did a full diagnostic test ad other inquiries on the computer and they came up with a need for a new hard drive. We bought it in April of this year, so it's rather new. They installed the new hard drive and it still gave us the same error message. BTW, if I hit ctrl+alt+delete to restart at the black error page, it sometimes would start up normally with the windows XP page. The repair shop looked into the BIOS menu to see if the start Boot order was good, and sometimes it wouldn't even show the hard drive, just the realtek ethernet drive. I would then have to "load default settings" then save and exit, and hope that it would reboot correctly. That worked for about a month, ow it will not do anything but give me the error page and when I hit F2 to set the default settings, it it "DISABLED", so I can't even choose that option. What can I do????
Make sure you have all the latest updates found in the Acer site and Windows Update. Windows Update has the hardware update for the Realtek hardware in question. Also, make sure your BIOS has been updated. Make sure you are also running under a Verified XP OS. Aspire 5100 usually comes with Windows XP Media Edition with all the "bells and whistles" Acer has to offer. Unfortunately, most companies that sell "Refurbished" laptops, fail to include an installation disk. So, you'll have to create a Recovery disk via Acer Recovery Disk maker. Folks forget this process and end up with an expensive manila folder.
Ultimately, this is a common problem for a lot of Laptop/Notebook users, and it really just takes constant care and caution to make things work. Most problems arise when you stop caring.
Finally, do a Complete system Audit by using a very useful program called WinAudit. It will tell you EVERYTHING you need to know about your notebook/PC. It will also help your knowledge of what is running on your computer and how to fix them.
Also...
(Make sure you have Admin rights for this one.)
Check your Device Manager by holding the Windows button and pressing the Pause Break button (close to the DEL button on the upper right hand corner) Click the Hardware tab. Then the Device Manager button. When the window pops up, click View> Show Hidden Devices.
You will notice that a few devices with a "Caution" mark on them. These are the devices that end up causing problems with startup and system failure. If you feel adventurous, you could disable the devices with little or no problems. Unless you have a Parallel and Serial Port on your Aspire 5100, get rid of them for good.
But, it's not the ONLY problem. If you have no Device errors pop up, and the same problem occurs, then the best thing to do is to take it to a "Trusted Certified Professional."
Good Luck
I'M Having the same problem with realtek cable problem sometimes boot up after restaring like a thousand times and sometimes its working fine for a coupple of hours and then shutsdown, i dont know what else to try, I guess updating bios doesnt work.
If you're comfortable using torrents, the original Acer Aspire 5100 recovery DVD/CDs are located here: http://isohunt.com/download/88899749/aspire+5100.torrent
Use a program like BitTorrent at www.bittorrent.com to use torrent files.
I feel badly for anyone who bought one of these machines. I've never encountered a laptop with so many defects. The one I had was purchased new and lasted about 3 months before it failed, refusing to boot and giving a media failure error message. After much wrangling I finally got Acer to fix it under warranty. They replaced both the hard drive and motherboard. After I got it back it worked-sort of- for another few weeks and then the same problem all over again. If you have one of these and have any serious problem with better to save yourself a lot of time aggravation and just toss it. It's almost impossible to get Acer to do anything and if they do it doesn't help. I know I'll never touch another Acer product again.
The problem is with the actual plug itself on the back of the notebook, the foam spacer is useless you can take that out, go to home depot or lowes and buy a product called duct seal take chunks of duct seal and put it around the laptop's hard drive caddy and where the foam spacer was to make sure the drive is fully tightened connected into the plug. have had aspire 5100 boot and turn off at least over 100 times and had no problems for over 7 months now.
I got my Acer Aspire 5100 back in February of 2007 and all is working fine minus the DVD/CD drive which failed last yr, but i can attribute that to the hundreds of DVD's I have burned with it. I also installed Windows Vista Ultimate and its still quick and responsive
I run Vista Ultimate 64bit on an Acer Aspire 5100. I've had many an issue with this device and at the same time, it truly has saved me from financial ruin. Be all that as it may, the hardware of the Aspire 5100 is definitely flawed at it's creation when newer and faster notebooks were fishing out one every other day! Most developers have pretty much abandoned the older models completely, leaving hardware upgrades in the dust.
So...
What is the best solution for a laptop that just won't start-up and leaving you with a black screen showing your hard drive as failed? Relax and let the darn thing warm-up. Allot of the hardware components, unfortunately, need some time to simply wake-up! 10 minutes is a good start. I've spent frustrated minutes turning it off and on, reset after reset, battery in and out, shouting and throwing of hands into the air damning the very existence of ancient technology. None of these work.
Perhaps the OS is not the right one for the job, or you have a Boot Sector Virus. There are plenty of possible problems why the Laptop fail to start promptly. On a brighter side, laptops are getting better and a whole lot more inexpensive.
Here is another thought, when you feel like your gonna chuck it in the trash, mail it to Acer and ask for a replacement. Write a nice note stating that the computer as done all it could possibly do, unfortunately, it failed to meet my daily needs.
The worst that will happen will they will return it back untouched or fixed. Whatever, it's your call.
So bottom line has any of these things worked? why does the laptop lose its bios settings? has anyone tried to replace the CMOS battery before resetting everything?
will Acer do anything to solve this problem if you contact them?
The only solution:
Flash the BIOS to the latest version. Works a treat.
This can be faund at http://support.acer-euro.com
Good luck!
Lee
http://www.cambridgelaptoprepair.co.uk
Hi there,
i have acer travelmate 5510. bought on oct 2007.. when i start the system the acer installation process keeps running and cant get rid off ..everytime i have to go to task manager to end the process.. some times i can t use my mouse .. it hungs up
Do you have the xp cd or start up disks, maybe you can make some start up disks from a friends computer or another that you have.
Hi Friends,
Acer Aspire 5100 PC Notebook main problem is Connection Problem, Software Problem etc.
For these problem you can visit a link by just Click Here .
For any other problem with this Notebook you can Click Here
54sd
I took my battery out and only used plug, no problems since
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I have the restore disks that you are prompted to make when you intially turn it on after purchase. We installed them 2 times throughout this ordeal and it's no help. This should not be happening with an 8 month old computer. Acer has a really good reputation, I just hope the problem can be figured out.
Same problem. Laptop 13 months old.
same problem got new hard drive sitll have the problem now no empowering tec. on screen and no sound. 5100
My acer aspire 5102 WLMi notebook is giving me problems in start-up, it says 'error 0200: Failure Fixed Disk 0' it seems that it is not able to detect hard disk, the same hard disk was checked plugging in other comp with USB and seems to be fine . When we go in BIOS setting some times it shows corrupt name of hard disk (some thing like HTSt2q2qH9ATp0` ` `` ` ` ` ` ` )and is not even detecting the DVD drive, so it is very tuff even to reinstall windows again. Problem started after the changing the VGA card. I am not sure whether the problem is with the BIOS or with the hard disk or with anything else. PLEASE help me....
i have the exact same problem
no clue how to fix it
Hi Manu10,
I have the exact same model and exact same problem as yours. I have some acer authorized repair people working on it but cant figure the problem out. Do please let me know if you find a solution thanks.
Hi, I have the same HDD connector problem. It seems to be Aspire 5100 typical error. For my problem is no solution so far:( Look this forum here: http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthre...
I keep getting a shut down wrong message. I try the F2 button to get into setting, but comp won't even acknowledge that I hit that button. I just dont know what to do anymore.
I can't even get into my screenpage.
I Also have the exact same problem but when i was using my laptop acer 5100 windows would crash and begin dumping its memory the when it booted back up i got the same black my laptop is only 12 months old when i went into my bios the same thing my hard drive was not detected or instead it would just come up with a heap of jumbled up numbers and letters where the hard driv name should be i dont know what to do either i tried reinstalling my acer back up disk but windows continues to crash i tried formating the hard drive and installing genuine copy of xp no acer back disk uses the FAT 32 file system i tried formating HD with NTFS to see if that made any difference it didnt the only thing that if you need to get things of your hard drive is leave the acer disk in when its booting up somtimes it will pass the black screen
My 5100 has been presenting me not only with complete failure to recgonize the DVD-RW in POST, but also with two beeps of death from PCI conflicts and problems with the WLAN card.
The problems don't appear to be attributed to the BIOS, but rather, faulty chipset chips on the mainboard and bad MiniPCI slots.
Acer has acknowledged that it's no longer "thier concern" and was treating these issues as "abuse" rather than the defects they were. Several months of litigation resulted in nothing....they always had the money to get techs to say it was my fault.
Acer doesn't give two cents about thier customers...once you buy the laptop, you're on your own. Not even thier warrenty will help you.
No trusted certified professional will be able to fix the problems with this laptop. It is a "ticking timebomb" waiting to completely fail and there is absolutely nothing you can do about it except back your data up, wait for it to happen, and toss the entire unit in the trash.
Some former ATI engineers have stated Acer knew they had a batch of bad ATI chips and that they didn't flow the BGA's on most of the chips properly...compounding a problem.
Point is...these things don't last. You bought an Acer...the "disposable computer designed to last a month".
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