(slightly off-topic) Sony Viao GRX520 woes...

[Fred]

I have a problem.

My laptop is giving me grief. When I try to cold start it on power-on,
it seemly gets hung up in the initial bootstrap from what I can tell --
never even makes it to the little Sony logo and short melody it plays.
Screen is blank and dead. I have to make several attempts to get it to
boot. Notice that the CDROM drive will spin and then stop as well.

Went online and Googled the GRX520 and came across lots of horror
stories about bad connections with the plug-in memory and the like --
which always seemed to fail just after warranty. Funny that.

Once I DO managed to get it booted, it is fine until I shut it down and
put it in the breifcase. Almost as thought it's got a thermal
instability issue on the cold side, but can't be sure.

Some reports say that rebooting issues get progressively worse then it's
total deadsville, so my laptop is moored for the time being at home --
totally defeating the purpose. :-) All the T-Mobile WiFi time I paid up
for a year for is going to waste. :-(

So, any suggestions? Anything would be helpful. I'll even re-solider
connections if I have to if someone knows of who might have the proper
equipment to do this.

Needless to say, I'm never buying another Sony product ever again.
Nearly everything I've ever owned with the Sony name on it failed in one
form or fashion just after the warranty period. 

-- 
Fred -- fred at lrc.puissante.com -- place "[hey]" in your subject.
The mass of humans on planet Earth -- regard them as the ebbing 
seas in the winds of change. They ebb, they flow, they know not 
where to go.