After replacing the system board in a Dell d420 using these instructions the Dell laptop would not boot. When attempting to power on the laptop the scroll lock, num lock, and caps lock key would flash once followed by the bluetooth light flashing once and then it would lose power.
The reason for the above issue is typically one of two items which are listed below.
- d420 RAM:It could be that the RAM has gone bad. If you have another stick of RAM to test this then remove the RAM and replace it with the spare stick. This may resolve your issue if for some reason the RAM had gone bad.
- d420 System Board: In my case i ended up being a bad system board. Dell had sent the incorrect part number though it looked the same. They also had sent a new WXGA screen that also ended up being the incorrect part number. So either the incorrect WXGA screen being plugged into the new system board fried it or the system board was DOA.
In my case dell is sending the replacement parts overnight again and I will qickly find out if anything else was damaged by mismatching the screen and motherboard they had sent for my d420.
If your laptop is still under a support contract then visit dell.com, login, click on technical support, and then click chat with a technical support representative. I have found that chatting online with technical support to be the most efficient way to get support and ultimately resolve the issue. If the done two steps above do not resolve the issue then technical support should be able to assist.
If your d420 notebook is not under warranty then replace the RAM first because the system board is much more expensive.
