Laptop stopped working

[laurelelizabeth]

My laptop was working flawlessly, until yesterday when it froze up, the screen went dark, and it started whirring like an airplane taking off. Is this a normal occurance? What should I do about it? Please don't answer to press the off button, or pressing ctrl+q for quit.

When it first stopped working, the keyboard would still work--you could still change the volume and if you pressed caps lock the light would still go on. Now after sounding like an airplane all night, even that doesn't work. Will i lose everything if i take out the battery?

 

[sammich]

I think this happened to me once. You may have important stuff running before it stopped working but it seems like the only option for you is to hold down the power button.

BUT...
if computer is still responding, try and go through all your open programs (command-tab) and try and quit them. If things aren't saved then the program should ask you to save before you quit, so simply press enter a few seconds after asking to quit (you obviously can't see this happening, but you can imagine that a save dialog has appeared with the options "Don't Save", "Cancel" and "Save"). When you think everything is saved, either hold the power button or press the power button and press "R" for restart, or just enter for shut down.

What you can do (if you have a laptop), you could get a bright light and shine it through the Apple at the back of the screen. The centre portion of your screen will be 'backlit' and you should see your screen in that little apple area.

 

[laurelelizabeth]

I think this happened to me once. You may have important stuff running before it stopped working but it seems like the only option for you is to hold down the power button.

BUT...
if computer is still responding, try and go through all your open programs (command-tab) and try and quit them. If things aren't saved then the program should ask you to save before you quit, so simply press enter a few seconds after asking to quit (you obviously can't see this happening, but you can imagine that a save dialog has appeared with the options "Don't Save", "Cancel" and "Save"). When you think everything is saved, either hold the power button or press the power button and press "R" for restart, or just enter for shut down.

What you can do (if you have a laptop), you could get a bright light and shine it through the Apple at the back of the screen. The centre portion of your screen will be 'backlit' and you should see your screen in that little apple area.

Thank you so much for the reply, but actually I just took the battery out and put it back in and now it works fine.

 

[Sherman Homan]

Glad the problem went away. Now is a good time to think about a backup schedule!