Laptop Won’t Turn On? The Hard Reset Is Different on HP, Dell, Lenovo, Acer and Asus
Unplug everything, hold the power button down, plug the charger back in and try again. That is the fix for most dead laptops, and the reason it often fails is that people do not hold the button long enough. The correct time is different on every brand: Lenovo says 10 seconds, HP says 15, Microsoft says 30, and Asus says 20 or 40 depending on the model. On many Acer and Lenovo machines the button you need is not the power button at all. It is a pinhole underneath.
What is your laptop doing?
- Nothing at all, no lightsStart with the power drain. The 30 second version
- Tell me the time for my brandHP, Dell, Lenovo, Acer, Asus, Apple. The brand table
- Lights come on, screen stays blackA different fault, and often fixable. Black screen
- It will not charge eitherTest the charger before the laptop. Charger or laptop
- Mine is a MacBookApple has its own combination. MacBook steps
- I want to know why it happenedThe five usual causes. Why it died
- Nothing here workedWhat is worth paying to fix. When to stop
We are a UK technology retailer. There is nothing for sale on this page and no prices from our shop on it. Every button combination and hold time below was read on that manufacturer's own support pages on 17 August 2026, and all of them are linked at the bottom.
- Start here: the 30 second fix when your laptop won’t turn on
- HP, Dell, Lenovo, Acer and Asus: the hard reset when your laptop won’t turn on
- The pinhole reset most people never find
- Why won't my laptop turn on
- Is it the laptop or the charger?
- Laptop turns on but the screen is black
- What the lights and the noises are telling you
- MacBook won't turn on
- When it is not fixable at home
- Quick answers
A laptop that will not turn on is not usually broken. Most of the time it is stuck, and it is stuck because a small amount of electricity is still sitting in the machine and confusing the power circuit. Clearing that costs nothing and takes a minute.
The advice everywhere is “hold the power button”. What almost nobody tells you is how long, and that the answer is different depending on who made your laptop. We read the support pages of HP, Dell, Lenovo, Acer, Asus and Apple to get the real numbers, and they range from 10 seconds to 40.
Start here: the 30 second fix when your laptop won’t turn on
Do this before anything else. It fixes a large share of dead laptops and it cannot damage anything. Dell calls it a hard reset and recommends it as the first step when a machine will not boot, and it does not touch your files.
- Unplug the charger and remove every USB stick, dongle, drive, SD card and second screen. A faulty peripheral can stop a laptop starting.
- Remove the battery if it comes out. Most laptops made in the last few years are sealed, so skip this if yours is.
- Hold the power button down for the time your brand specifies. If you do not know it, hold for 30 seconds. Longer does no harm.
- Put the battery back if you removed it, plug the charger in, and wait a minute before pressing power.
Why it works: the capacitors on the motherboard hold a residual charge. Dell calls it flea power, and its own documentation notes the board can keep it “even if the computer is turned off, disconnected from the AC adapter and without a battery”. Holding the power button with no power connected is what bleeds it away.
If the machine starts, you are done. If it does not, the time you held the button may have been wrong for your brand, which is the next section.
HP, Dell, Lenovo, Acer and Asus: the hard reset when your laptop won’t turn on
If you searched because your HP laptop won’t turn on, or your Lenovo, Acer, Dell or Asus laptop won’t turn on, this table is the part you came for. These are the manufacturers’ own numbers, not a rule of thumb. They genuinely differ, and holding for 10 seconds on a machine that wants 40 looks exactly like a laptop that is dead.
| Brand | What to hold, and for how long | The bit that is easy to miss |
|---|---|---|
| HP | Power button for about 15 seconds | On business laptops, hold Windows + V and press power at the same time. On an HP Chromebook the procedure is different again: hold Reset, then press Power while still holding Reset |
| Dell | Power button with everything disconnected, to drain flea power | Dell is explicit that residual charge survives with both the adapter and the battery removed, which is why simply unplugging and trying again does nothing |
| Lenovo | At least 10 seconds on machines with no reset hole | Many Lenovos have a pin hole reset, and some IdeaPads have a Novo button that opens recovery. Lenovo also notes that if the reset works, your power button may be the faulty part |
| Acer | Power button, or the Battery Reset pinhole underneath for 10 to 15 seconds | The hole is labelled and needs a paperclip. Acer says to insert it “until you feel the button inside the hole press down”. It temporarily disconnects the internal battery |
| Asus | 20 or 40 seconds, depending on the model | For a full EC and RTC reset Asus wants 40 seconds with the charger connected and everything else unplugged. On 20 second models the power light flashes rapidly for 3 to 5 seconds after about 15 seconds; wait for the flashing to stop, then let go |
| Apple | Power button for about 10 seconds | On MacBooks with Touch ID, the Touch ID sensor is the power button. Hold that |
If you do not know which camp your laptop is in, hold for 40 seconds. That covers every machine in the table and no manufacturer warns against holding too long.
The pinhole reset most people never find
This is the step that rescues laptops people have already written off, and it is missing from most guides because it is not on the keyboard. If an Acer or Lenovo laptop won’t turn on after a normal reset, this is the next thing to try.
Turn the laptop over. On many Acer and Lenovo machines there is a tiny hole in the base, roughly the diameter of a paperclip. On Acer it is labelled Battery Reset. It is not a drainage hole and it is not a screw.
- Turn the laptop off and unplug the charger.
- Flip it over and find the hole. Check your model’s manual if you are not sure which one it is, because a microphone hole looks similar and does nothing.
- Straighten a paperclip and push it gently in until you feel a button click under it.
- Hold it down for 10 to 15 seconds, then take the clip out.
- Plug the charger in and press power.
What it does, in Acer’s words, is “disconnect the internal battery temporarily and reset the power circuit”. On a sealed laptop it is the equivalent of pulling the battery out, which is the one thing you cannot otherwise do.
Why won’t my laptop turn on
Five causes cover almost everything, roughly in the order you should suspect them.
- Stuck power state. Residual charge confusing the power management. The most common cause and the one the reset above fixes.
- The charger, not the laptop. Cables fail at the ends, where they bend. Bricks fail silently. This is worth ruling out before anything else, and it is covered next.
- A completely flat battery. A laptop left for months can drop so low it needs 20 to 30 minutes on charge before it shows any sign of life. Plug it in and leave it before deciding it is dead.
- A peripheral holding it up. A USB stick or an external drive can stop the boot before the screen ever lights. Unplug everything.
- Hardware. Failed RAM, a failed drive, a failed board. This is the one you cannot fix with a button, and the last section covers how to tell.
One that is easy to overlook: if the reset works but the machine will not start with a normal press, Lenovo’s own guidance is that the power button itself may be at fault. A button that has stopped making contact behaves exactly like a dead laptop.
Is it the laptop or the charger?
Test the power supply before you conclude anything about the laptop. It is the cheapest part of the chain and the one that fails most.
- Look for a light on the brick or the plug. No light with a known good socket means the charger, not the laptop.
- Try a different wall socket, ideally in a different room, and not through an extension lead.
- Feel the cable where it enters the plug and where it enters the laptop. Kinks, a hard bend or a warm spot mean a broken conductor inside the sleeve.
- Borrow a charger of the same type and wattage. On USB-C laptops almost any modern USB-C laptop charger of similar wattage will do for a test.
Be careful with bodged replacements. On the Reddit thread that ranks for this problem, one owner’s charger was assembled from several other chargers after a cat chewed the original. A charger that delivers the wrong voltage can leave a laptop that appears to charge but never gathers enough power to start.
If your laptop charges but will not run, or runs but will not charge, that is a different fault to a dead machine, and our guide to charging problems covers the same cable and port checks that apply here.
Laptop turns on but the screen is black
If you can hear fans, see a keyboard backlight or catch a power light, the laptop is running. What has failed is the display, or the machine’s ability to talk to it. That is a much better position to be in.
- Shine a torch at the screen at an angle. If you can faintly make out a desktop or a logo, the panel is alive and the backlight has failed. That is a repair, not a settings problem.
- Plug in an external monitor with HDMI or USB-C. A picture there means the laptop and its graphics work, and the fault is the screen, its cable or the hinge the cable runs through.
- Force the display output. Windows + P cycles the display modes. If something switched it to “second screen only”, this puts it back.
- Wake the graphics driver. Windows + Ctrl + Shift + B restarts it. The screen blinks and the machine beeps if it worked.
- Check the brightness. It sounds too simple, and a stuck brightness key has convinced plenty of people their laptop is dead.
If the panel shows marks, lines or patches rather than nothing at all, that is a different problem again, and we go through which of those marks are faults in our guide to screen marks and dead pixels.
What the lights and the noises are telling you
Before you decide the laptop won’t turn on at all, look and listen carefully for ten seconds with the room quiet. A machine that is doing something, however faint, is a different and more hopeful problem.
| What you get | What it usually means |
|---|---|
| Nothing. No light, no fan, no sound | No power reaching the board. Charger, battery or the reset in this guide |
| Charge light on, nothing else | Power is arriving. The board is not starting. Try the reset, then the pinhole |
| Fans spin, screen black, no logo | It is running but not posting. Suspect RAM, or the display path |
| A pattern of beeps or a flashing light code | A diagnostic code. Count the pattern and look it up for your model, it names the failed part |
| Starts, then dies after a few seconds | Usually power delivery or overheating protection |
Those beep and blink patterns are worth the two minutes it takes to count them. Every manufacturer publishes what they mean, and it turns guesswork into a named component.
MacBook won’t turn on
Apple’s version of the same fix is shorter. Hold the power button for about 10 seconds, then let go and press it normally. On any MacBook with Touch ID, the Touch ID sensor is the power button, so that is the one to hold.
Two things specific to Macs:
- Leave it on charge for a good while first. A deeply discharged MacBook can look completely dead and still recover.
- Use a known good charger and cable. USB-C cables that only carry data, not power, are a common and confusing cause. A cable that charges your phone will not necessarily start a MacBook.
If the Mac chimes or shows an Apple logo and then stops, that is a software or drive problem rather than a power one, and it needs recovery mode rather than the button.
When it is not fixable at home
Stop and get a quote when any of these is true:
- You have done the correct brand reset and the pinhole, and there is still nothing.
- It got wet, or it was dropped just before it stopped working.
- There is a burning smell, or the case is swollen. A swollen battery is a safety issue. Stop charging it and do not press on it.
- It beeps a code that points at the board rather than at RAM.
Before you pay for anything, get your files. A repair shop can usually pull the drive and copy your data even when the laptop will not start, and that is a much cheaper job than a board repair. Ask for it as a separate quote.
Our advice on whether to repair or replace: if the machine is more than about five years old and the quote is more than a third of what a comparable new one costs, replacing is usually the better deal, and if you are at that point our guide to choosing a laptop covers what actually matters.
Quick answers
Unplug the charger and every accessory, hold the power button down for the time your brand needs, then reconnect the charger and try again. Lenovo says at least 10 seconds, HP about 15, Asus 20 or 40 depending on model, and Microsoft's generic advice is 30 with the battery out. If you do not know, hold for 40.
Hold the power button with no power connected, which drains the residual charge Dell calls flea power. If that does nothing, look for a pinhole reset on the underside. Acer labels it Battery Reset and many Lenovo machines have one too. Push a paperclip in for 10 to 15 seconds.
Power reaching the machine and the machine starting are two different things. A charge light with no other response usually means the board is stuck rather than unpowered, which is exactly what a hard reset clears. If the reset works but a normal press does not, Lenovo notes the power button itself may have failed.
First check it is actually off. Listen for fans and look for a keyboard backlight. If it is running, shine a torch at the screen: a faint image means the backlight failed. Plug in an external monitor to confirm, and try Windows + P for display modes and Windows + Ctrl + Shift + B to restart the graphics driver.
If it has no reset hole, hold the power button for at least 10 seconds with the charger unplugged. Many Lenovo laptops do have a pin hole reset, and some IdeaPads have a Novo button that opens recovery. Lenovo documents all three routes.
Hold the power button for about 15 seconds with everything unplugged. On an HP business laptop, hold Windows + V and press the power button at the same time. HP Chromebooks are different again: hold Reset, then press Power while still holding Reset.
Most often a stuck power state after a crash or a bad shutdown, and the reset in this guide clears it. Next most likely is the charger, which fails at the cable ends. A laptop left unused for months can also be flat enough to need half an hour on charge before it shows any sign of life.
No. None of the manufacturers here warn against holding it too long, and several ask for 30 or 40 seconds. Holding the button with the power disconnected does not erase anything either. Dell states plainly that a hard reset does not affect your personal files.
How we know
We are a UK technology retailer. There is nothing for sale on this page. Every hold time, key combination and reset procedure above was read on the manufacturer's own support pages on 17 August 2026, not gathered from other guides, and each one is linked below.
That mattered on one detail. A commenter on the Reddit thread that ranks for this problem suggested pressing Windows + B for HP's recovery and said themselves they were not sure of the letter. HP's own documentation says Windows + V, for business laptops. We have used HP's.
Sources
- HP, Performing a hard reset: the 15 second hold, the Windows + V combination for business laptops, and the separate Reset button procedure for Chromebooks.
- Dell, How to perform a hard reset: flea power, and why residual charge survives with the adapter and battery removed.
- Lenovo, Troubleshooting no power issues: the power drain, the pin hole reset, the Novo button and the at least 10 seconds figure.
- Acer, How to reset the internal battery: the Battery Reset pinhole and the 10 to 15 second hold.
- Asus, How to reset the Embedded Controller, RTC and hard reset: the 20 and 40 second variants and the flashing power indicator.
- Apple, If your Mac does not turn on: the 10 second hold and Touch ID as the power button.
- Microsoft Learn, My laptop does not turn on after pressing the power button: the generic 30 second drain with the battery removed.
