I have a new Advent 4211. It’s an excellent little machine, perfect for working with a commute and on site with clients without breaking your back or your bank account.
However, after just a week and 3 charges, mine decided not to turn on this morning! ACK!
After much praying to various Gods, divining with tea leaves and generally getting ready for a big girly cry, I called tech support and the wonderful people at The Tech Guys had the fix immediatley:
Apparently, static affects Advent 4211‘s from the battery/certain mains charging (?)! To fix:
- pop the battery out, and unplug the power lead.
- hold power button down for 20 seconds – even though obviously nothing will happen.
- pop the power lead back in and turn it on as normal.
Et voila! A working 4211 again. Put the battery back in whenever – I waited until the full reboot and shutdown cycle had completed, just to be sure. It’s working perfectly now.
Thayer Prime's Blog 
Re: THANKS!
Pleasure! I guess you got a scare like I did 😉 Not fun, unless you know the fix and then no problem!
Oh dear – I was kinda hoping this was the problem plaguing my 4211.
Sadly not. I have tried your suggestion a few times now and my netbook will still only switch on when the mains are plugged in.
Guess I have to take it back. Gutted.
Oh bugger! Really sorry to hear that. If you *do* find a fix before you have to give up on it, do post back, just in case someone else who’s led here with the problem has the same one as yours – or post a link back to your blog if you have one.
Good luck!
Same happened to me
The same problem has happened to me today. I bought the laptop last week and it wont run at all on the battery. As soon as i take the lead out it turns off 😦
Re: Same happened to me
Make sure the battery is actually locked in place give a good overnight charge might help!!
Thank you x 1 trillion! I cannot believe that worked! I bought my Advent in UK and am now in Oz. When it didn’t turn on I was picturing huge postage costs and international phone calls to unhelpful sales assistants.. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
Yay!
That’s great news, glad the fix worked for you 🙂
ADVENT
Just had a similiar problem, my battery had died and when I got home and plugged in as normal, it would not come on. I tried this fix and now it will come on but it will shut down after a few seconds….any thoughts
Re: ADVENT
Really sorry, if this fix didn’t work I don’t have a clue. Very good luck though.
Thanks, fixed mine too!
advent 4211
cheers I had tried this already but lost patience..I had to do it several times count to 30 just in case…finally life again, thought my wee baby was a gonner!
The very same just happened to my son’s laptop. Before we called out the overly-expensive support I remembered something online. Thanks to your advice the laptop is now back up and running and the uni graduate can get back to his 5000 word essay. thank you for your very sound advice.
Excellent, glad to have helped 🙂
Didn’t fix mine
I had a similar problem, my netbook will turn on but only if the power is plugged in. The battery shows it’s at 100% but if you pull the power out whilst it’s turned on, the computer just dies. Tried your sugestion but didn’t work. Got to take the computer back to the shop.
Thanks
Ah, you are wonderful! Thanks so much. I was myself planning on a big girly cry, and then I read your post and it’s working like new again.
🙂
Re: Thanks
Pleasure! 🙂 Very glad it worked for you.
thanks my daughter is so impressed and so am i
excellent, glad I could help 🙂
Great tip. Worked exactly as described. Much appreciated !
Great, gratz on the new working laptop! 🙂
Thanks
worked for my Advent 7450 which i almost binned
WIN!
Oh, awesome, this worked like a charm on my Dell Inspiron Mini! You’ve just saved this starving college student $400. Thanks so much!!!
This works !!
Hi -thank you for posting just tried this and my laptop is back working you have saved me getting repaired. thanks again
So great!
Glad it’s helped a few more of you 🙂 Nifty little trick once you know it!
laptop saver!!
thanks so much for posting this, i was very worried when my laptop wouldn’t turn on there and nowi have it working again! much appreciated advice, cheers!
fantastic, great little trick, thought i would be buying a new one. wprked like a charm
Advent 4211 won,t start
Great tip wor
ked straight away.
I agree Advent helpline telephone costs are too much.
Tony
I actually knew about this solution and I had applied it many times without success, finally taking the notebook to PC World to be checked.
The technicians (2 of them) could not solve the problem and suggested that the motherboard was at fault and that it was too expensive to repair. I invested in a new netbook (not an Advent).
Several months later I came across your entry and gave it another try. Amazingly it worked – the static must have taken a long time to disperse. Does the problem with static originate from the battery? I intend to run it on AC power for a while to see what happens.
> Does the problem with static originate from the battery?
No idea I’m afraid, sounds likely though. Glad you’re up and running again, and sorry to hear you had to buy a new machine before finding out!
power issue
exellent advise thanks to people like u i have my advent back again! 😀
Power on problem
Thanks for your help, not a problem anymore.. Seem to only happen when re booting with battery low or flat if when plugged in.
Thank you. Was about to throw a hissie-fit and blame my husband – not sure why but he isn’t here to defend himself! – when I googled and found YOU! All working now and I can resume my life!!
Great, really glad it worked for you 🙂
Had to leave a post to say thank you so much. My advent 4211 is pretty old now and hates it when I let the battery run down completely. I really thought it was a goner this time but following your simple instructions it sprang back to life in under a minute. Brilliant!
Total pleasure, glad to hear it’s still helping 🙂
Sadly did not work for mine. When I switch on ( and for no reason) I get a boot up screen, ie start in safe mode etc, but whatever option I try it does not boot up, for a micro second i get some sort of what i believe to be an error message ( to quick to read) then it goes back to the boot up screen. Can anyone help ??