Recently, my laptop shorted out. There is a small black line on one of the connectors leading from the power jack. This is causing it to short out, not power on, and have a terrible smell, which I believe is the motherboard shorting out even more. The worst smell comes from right under the DVD unit. Even as I tried booting directly from the battery, no AC, the computer hangs when it looks for the DVD drive. Is it possible that, due to the original short, the DVD unit is fried now and prevents the computer from booting? If so, is it possible to remove the DVD unit and try booting from there, and if it does, is it safe to connect the AC powerafter to try to transfer some files from the hard disk? Thanks for your responses. PS: The laptop is an old Compaq Presario 1200 series laptop, the same series that had problems with the power jacks.
Thank you. I have tried this, but it appears that the hard disk is shorted out as well. Since there is next to no hope to retrieve the data (without paying a large sum of money for it, although the data isn't worth it), I would ask if it is worth trying to sell the laptop or anything inside it for parts somewhere.
