You could either RMA parts of it, or, if you are within 30 days, you could ask for a refund and create a new order.
You already told them you can’t install the system, right?
@Alex_Uta
That is a good idea. Return the whole laptop and then just buy another one. There are a lot of steps replacing a mainboard and you might not have the time.
I expect that if you explain that is what you intend to do, support might instead agree to RMA the whole laptop.
Thanks to all of you for the advice. Last night after I explained everything they told me they’d send a new mainboard and power adapter. That was before the advice to return the laptop and place a new order so I already gave them shipping information. How long does it normally take to replace the mainboard?
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But my advice would be, try the new FW16 Power brick first. If it works, you can just send the new mainboard back without having to spend time installing it.
Hi @Eric_Dube,
Lots of great advice and suggestions to try and get your FW16 working. Ideally it would have been better if a replacement machine was sent so they could correctly diagnose what was wrong with it.
I did not see if you mentioned it already; was this a DIY model? They always test the components at the factory before they ship. So ideally it passed before being released for sale.
If the memory is defective it can cause the some of the same symptoms. Luckily it is getting past the POST so the basically functionality is working.
Like @James3 said, your power supply could be defective; however if you have tried other supplies (even a 30w charger) and the same thing happens; it may not be the charger. If the charging circuitry or the battery in the machine is defective then it will exhibit these same symptoms.
Disconnecting the battery (putting the machine in standalone mode) would be a way to do this, however it does not stay on long enough to get into this mode in the BIOS, save and reboot.
Other issues that happen when the battery is critically low is the embedded controller can get into a panic state because it is trying to shut the machine down so the battery charge level can increase to the point where it can be turned on again. This is a little bit of a cycle it could get stuck in. Resetting the motherboard should default everything and get it back similar to when it shipped originally.
If the motherboard is not actually charging the battery though, without it being in the standalone state it will power on then register that it doesn’t have enough power to continue because the battery is discharged and the cycle repeats itself by shutting itself down.
I believe your 70w charger and certainly your 140w charger are more than enough to power the FW16 without a battery.
As others have said, to narrow down which component is shutting the machine down, keep the SSD & Wifi card out of the machine for now until the replacement board and power supply arrive. It will get to the BIOS and you could try booting from a Live USB of Ubuntu or Fedora. Keep all other expansion cards out of the machine for now until you can get it to POST. The back left or back right ports are the ideal ones to power the machine. If the port on one side is not working; try the other side. There are two “sides” or circuits for each side of the machine.
Sorry you are having issues with your new machine @Destroya or @Matt_Hartley might have some other suggestions to help you get this resolved. I am glad you contacted support. It can take a week or more to get replacement parts depending on how busy the support team is. They are backlogged a little from a few months ago and are making progress though their team is small.
The FW16 is an amazing machine once you get it working. I hope your issue(s) get resolved quickly and welcome to the forum!
Did some digging, looks like this is being addressed in a ticket. Thanks for bringing this to our atttention.
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Quick update: mainboard replacement didn’t work. I asked them to RMA the entire laptop as suggested and that process has now started - I was able to bring it to my fedex spot and have it sent back today.
I’m still really curious what went wrong because I was pretty sure the problem had been narrowed down to the mainboard and power adapter (I didn’t plug the 180W adapter into the new mainboard at first, in case of cascading failure), but the fact that the new mainboard didn’t work seems to suggest otherwise.
Here’s a thought experiment I had which explains the observations so far: faulty power adapter (since it doesn’t turn on the charging light) damages battery (common between both mainboards) in such a way that it damages mainboards (because the laptop still doesn’t work properly with the battery removed).
While my thought experiment explains everything, Occam’s Razor doesn’t like it very much. The only other things I can think of are slight varations this, like maybe the battery was faulty first in such a way that breaks 180W power adapters and mainboards.
Other components that could have been the cause:
- the speakers. I don’t remember if I tried unplugging those.
- the display
- the expansion bay
Hopefully Framework lets me know what they find out in the end because I’m really curious. In either case, hopefully what I’ve written in this post will be helpful if somebody else encounters the same absurd issue that I did.
Just to clarify.
FW sent you a new mainboard and new power brick and it still won’t stay on?
They sent a new mainboard, but didn’t send the 180W power brick. Instead I decided to try with the 140W power brick first (in case the 180W brick was the source of the issue before) which didn’t work, then the 180W brick a few hours later (which still doesn’t turn on the charge light).
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Thanks for the update!
Good luck with the RMA and the new laptop 