Laptop Shutdown Caused By Overheating?

I was searching feverishly for possible solutions for the computer turning off and on repeatedly. I found that perhaps overheating was the reason!
Although today I am using a different solution (SpeedFan), it is actually very similar to the one given below...

I found this helpful advice by JimmyT1988 at kioskea.net:

-This is to avoid your cpu being damaged.

You can check if this is happening to you by downloading "coreTemp":

32Bit Windows http://www.alcpu.com/CoreTemp/CoreTemp32.zip
64Bit Windows http://www.alcpu.com/CoreTemp/CoreTemp64.zip

If the temperature is 90 degrees during your gameplay or infact if it is around 75 degrees whilst just using your computer... This is probably the issue you are coming across.

Laptop Solution:

Buy a cooler for laptop

Jimmy agrees with me that buying a cooler for a laptop is the way to go. If that was the reason for my laptop turning off and on repeatedly, the temperature must have gone up pretty fast! Maybe in a week's time, enough dust has collected to cause overheating??

Anyways...

I downloaded CoreTemp, the 32Bit Windows Version. I installed CoreTemp and it works superb. I keep it in my system tray. My temperatures vary between 56 C and 60 C and I set it so that it puts my laptop to sleep if the temperature reaches 90 C. By default it will not send computer to sleep or shut down in case of overheating. You can tweak the settings to change the display to Fahrenheit. If you just want to check the temperatures you do not need to change anything and just stick with the defaults.


RELATED LINKS

Laptop turning on and off repeatedly, won't boot. Solved!

Protect your laptop in style: Buy a cooler for a laptop.

I also found Speedfan, and I like that too. It can show and regulate fan speeds, and shows hard disk temperature as well.

Vista Laptop Not Booting - Again! (Part 2)

CONTINUING SAGA...

As I was telling you earlier, I managed after a few attempts to get my laptop to boot and work just fine from the state of turning itself on, blinking and disk spinning, then turning itself off again! That was really weird. I also told you I did not run a disk check!

THE NEXT MORNING, A RUDE AWAKENING


The next morning I was up for a rude awakening. Previous night I left the  laptop in the hibernate mode. I pressed the on button and, darn, it got even worse than last night! This time, the "on" light, and the "caps lock" light, and the "numeric lock" light came on, but not the disk light, and there was NO SOUND from the disk either! Wow. It got even worse than last night! The computer is not booting up! What to do?

COMPUTER WILL NOT BOOT, SHOWS BLANK SCREEN, NO DISK LIGHT

This time, computer did not get turned off by itself. It just stayed on, and on, and on, with the blank screen and disk not making any noises. Just silence. That was terrible. Luckily, I knew from past experience about laptop not booting and showing blank screen that patience helps and that I needed to wait until I hear the fan come on and I may be able to fix the computer not booting. Or so I hoped.

A HALF HOUR LATER, THE FAN!

It took over a half an hour before the sound of the fan announced something has changed. The DVD player ( with no DVD inserted ) started to do its light show with the DVD light. Best of all, the hard disk light came on! I pushed the DVD eject button and the tray did come out. So that's different. A positive change. What next? I turn the computer off and back on, still nothing, this Vista is not booting up.

IF YOU HEAR A CLICKING SOUND FROM A HARD DISK...

I keep it on and, lo and behold, 3 minutes later, the hard disk light and the sound of the hard disk came on. That was good as a sign of life, however the sound of the hard disk was like a click. That can not be good.


BACK IN THE SAME GAME OF TURN OFF TURN ON

In fact, I got back to the game reported earlier, computer shutting itself off, by itself! Then back on, just like last night! The DVD light was blinking, even though the tray was out. Wow. The F8 didn't help this time. Weird! Now, the computer turned itself off just about once a minute. Then right back on! I just let it be. Just let it be.

PATIENCE HELPS, AGAIN

Remarkably, after about one long hour of waiting, the laptop came back up, took up the hibernate file, and restored the Vista as if nothing happened in the last couple of hours! Quite amazing. Yet, not quite unexpected as such miraculous healings of my laptop occurred previously, just about a month ago. As you may remember back then computer wouldn't boot after I turned the computer off during a disk check!

LAPTOP IS BACK UP, WORKING FLAWLESSLY

After giving thanks to the lord of miracles, I immediately executed disk checks of both my C: drive and the D: drive.  The checks showed nothing wrong. So far my computer is running flawlessly. Just another day in the la-la land of laptop happenings and just another simple yet exciting and quite miraculous resurrection of an almost dead computer.

WHAT ABOUT YOUR COMPUTER?

What about you? Did you have similar symptoms with your computer? I'd love to hear from you. Did the story above help you solve your "windows computer not booting" problem? As simple as it may be, it may not be the obvious choice of trying to solve the problem. As one of the younger commentators says, they TRIED EVERYTHING to get his laptop to boot ( and he really needs it as it's hard to NOT play a video game after playing for five years, pretty much daily ). And his mom won't call the HP as the laptop is out of warranty! This example, and others, show that instead of trying EVERYTHING, sometimes you must do almost NOTHING instead. To solve this problem I just listened to what was happening with the machine and allowed the computer to come back up. All I did was patiently wait. Hardly the stuff video games are made of. Let me know if  you had similar symptoms and if this story helped you get your computer to boot! Just leave me a comment below, either way!

P.S.: Although I trust miracles will happen again and my laptop will be safe, I'm diving into the land of backups. I am starting to be serious about making backups. More later!

RELATED POSTS

Part One of This Post - Computer Not Booting, Turns Itself Off And On

Vista or Windows 7 Computer Will Not Resume From Sleep, Suspend or Hibernate

An excellent guide to POST (power on self test) and cleaning your computer to prevent boot problems

Computer Turns On and Off: Booting Problem Resolved! (Part 1)

NICE TRIP TO MEXICO

I just got back from a super nice trip to Cancun, Yucatan, Mexico. The trip was about a week long. I really enjoyed the warm weather, much warmer than LA, and warmer Caribbean sea. I didn't take my laptop with me, I decided to travel even lighter than usual. The place where we stayed was pretty touristy, there were 3 Starbucks within walking distance, gosh! So maybe next time I will take the computer along. I wonder how high humidity would affect the laptop if the laptop was in Cancun?

BACK IN LA: LAPTOP AWAITS WITH A SHOW: TURNS ITSELF ON THEN OFF REPEATEDLY



As I landed back home in LA, I was in for a light show and an unpleasant surprise from my laptop. The laptop computer was in a very bad shape. As I pressed the "on" button, the "caps lock" the "numeric lock" and the "hard drive" lights, as well as the "on" light would come up, the hard drive would spin, and there would be a clicking noise from the hard drive. Then, suddenly, after about 5-10 seconds, the hard drive would spin and click for the very last time, and the computer would turn itself off. The screen never even came up. Then after a few seconds, the laptop computer would turn itself on again, and go through the same motions, again. And again! My laptop computer keeps turning itself on and off! There was no end in sight of this light show and the disk spinning and clicking show!

WHAT I TRIED, WHAT SEEMED TO WORK

I tried pressing F2, F12, and finally F8. Yeah! The F8 seemed to help and the laptop remained turned on but with a blank screen. I waited five minutes and the "Resuming Windows" sign pops up! Great! Not quite there yet! The computer won't boot up, it got stuck again! I turn it off again and back on. Now it comes up all the way. Started some programs, yeah! It works fine now! It was late, so I set it to hibernate and went to bed. Was that a mistake? Should I have run disk checks?

BUT WAS THIS A PERMANENT SOLUTION?

The next day: The saga continues...


P.S.: I keep wondering what could it be to cause this problem with my laptop just sitting on my desk for a week. There were some very strong winds in the area, probably low pressure... indeed on my way back to LAX there was some extremely strong turbulence in the air due to strong winds..quite scary. Was laptop feeling alone and abandoned? Did the temperature drop? Was there internal condensation? Who knows?

P.P.S.: Read on to find out if my Vista Computer was booting the next day!

RELATED POSTS

Vista Computer Not Waking Up From Sleep

The Battle of Two Softwares: Microsoft vs Firefox!

[UPDATE: As interesting as the development between Microsoft and Mozilla Firefox may be, see below, it does NOT correct for the occasional blinking and dis-funcionality of the Minimize, Restore, and Close buttons in Firefox. Bookmark the page about workarounds for the Close Button Blinking problem or FOLLOW through Google Friends Connect below to stay updated.]

The plot thickens. According to the analytics data from this and a few other blogs, the usage of Microsoft Internet Explorer had another few % drop in September. Firefox is holding its ground while Chrome gained about 2-3%. It looks like a Battle of the Browser, the Battle for Your attention among the "giants"! But back to the case at hand:


Several Firefox users Matt, Jae, and Hanna among others have recently reported their Firefox browsers misbehaving badly. The symptom was a blinking (flashing) Close, Minimize or Restore Button in the window frame of Firefox. The blinking buttons flashed on and off upon pressing them. The functionality of the buttons was nil. They didn't work.

Today, a pop-up has appeared through my Firefox. I had never before received such a pop-up from Firefox! Quoting:

FIREFOX:

These Add-ons Have been blocked:

• Microsoft .NET Framework Assistant 1.1 [Blocked add-on]
• Windows Presentation Foundation 3.5.30729.1 [Blocked add-on]
  

These Add-ons have a high risk of causing stability or security problems and have been blocked. Restart is required.

Incredible! I checked and yes, I had .NET Framework Assistant 1.1 Extension installed in my Firefox. And yes, I had the Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) Plugin installed in my Firefox. You can indeed find the .NET Framework Assistant and WPF in my original problem report to Firefox. I have yet to see if this will be a solid workaround for the problem described. Firefox is quiet about the details.

Let me know in a comment if you had a similar problem with your Firefox and if this workaround (Workaround #4) of disabling the two Microsoft Add-ons or if any other 3 workarounds given here helped you or maybe NOT! Let me know either way! Just leave a comment below.

Solved: Address bar not working in Firefox on Vista

[UPDATE 11/6/2009: Today, I upgraded Alexa Sparky to Version 1.4.5 and re-enabled it. If there are no problems with the FireFox toolbar, it means that probably, Alexa fixed the problem and you can go ahead and do the same, update Alexa Sparky to 1.4.5 or higher and enable it. Let me know in a comment if that worked for you. I will keep you posted as well.]

[SOLVED: This is a quick, 2 minute solution. I found out that Alexa Sparky Version 1.4.4 Firefox Extension/Add On which I downloaded today was the culprit. Do you have Alexa Sparky AddOn? I disabled Alexa Sparky 1.4.4. under Tools/AddOns and the address bar in Firefox 3.5.3 works again. See details below to make sure your problem gets solved this way too!]


Previously, I reported blinking Close, Minimize and Maximize button in a Firefox 3.5.3 frame using Windows Vista SP3 . Shortly after I observed that problem, the address bar functionality has been severed. I can not navigate to any websites, not even google.com. I can not see the URL of any website in various tabs that I have open. That is true even after restarting Firefox. I am about to downgrade to Firefox 3.0.14. I've downloaded it and ready. I got importan work to do online! And Firefox is my main window to the internet. If you have found any solution to this, please let me know. I could not find a solution on the internet as of yet.


SOLUTION (SAME DAY IN THE EVENING)

I found out that Alexa Sparky Version 1.4.4 Firefox Extension/Add On which I downloaded today was the culprit for the problem with the address bar described above. I went ahead, disabled Alexa Sparky under Tools/AddOns and the fabulous address bar in Firefox 3.5.3 works again.

P.S. Before downgrading to 3.0.14. I will still see if closing some of the Firefox tabs might help. I have 2 windows open with Firefox with about a dozen tabs each.

P.P.S. For future benefit, I'll post a link to Mozillazine.org's Standard Firefox Diagnostics and Troubleshooting process. A bit over the top for this case. Especially as I wanted to retain the valuable tabs opened. Here is the link: http://kb.mozillazine.org/Standard_diagnostic_%28Firefox%29

WORKAROUND for Firefox on Vista: Close, Minimize, Restore Buttons Blinking and Not Functioning

Please see below for Six (6!) Possible Workarounds to this problem! #6 is the most promising so far.

[UPDATE: I have later on reported Firefox Address Bar not functioning. That problem was resolved, and the culprit was apparently Alexa Sparky v. 1.4.4 . I am waiting on further information whether the bug with blinking close, minimize and maximize buttons is going to reoccur or not. But we know now that this is an problem independent of Alexa Sparky]


PROBLEM

When trying to use one of the Minimize, Maximize (Restore), and Close Buttons in Firefox 3.5.3, these buttons start blinking erratically and do NOT function. When I click on all three, there is quite a display of blinking, seemingly somewhat correlated. However, the Firefox is hosed and needs to be killed and restarted. Still seeking solution for this problem. Let me know in a comment if you found a solution or at least a workaround!

[UPDATE 2: Previous claim that changing Windows Personalization Properties solves the problem was not true. In fact, the buttons did stop blinking. However, when pressed they went blinking again and were not functional.]

WORKAROUND

Currently, the workaround is to kill the Firefox 3.5 process through Task Manager. Possibly you could close it through the Task Bar click on the Firefox icon and hitting F4 to close. I have not tested this yet.

WORKAROUND 2 (POSSIBLY)

[UPDATE: This is the most promising workaround so far. I noticed TODAY 10/21/09 that when I got blinking minimize button, I also got unresponsive Firefox window frames. All three of them. I indeed counted the number of tabs and it was 40 exactly. It was possible to close one tab, and guess what, the same second, the blinking of the minimize button stopped!]

[UPDATE 2: 10/30/2009: Got the same problem today. Some of the tabs were unresponsive when I got the blinking minimize button syndrome. Some were responsive. I closed a few of those and the problem went away. Again, this is the easiest most promising workaround so far. Close some tabs.]

I found that the problem has not occurred after I reduced the number of tabs open in my Firefox Windows. This could be a workaround - reducing the number of tabs may be a good idea anyways.
I got another independent confirmation that reducing the number of tabs works by Jae

Jae
Firefox user

Hmm... I haven't paid attention to the specific number of tabs open, but it does seem to help when I clean up my tabs (meaning go from 40-ish to 15-20). I'll be sure to keep an eye on the number of tabs open next time it happens.

So after you've restarted FF, quickly reduce the number of tabs open. I have not yet had the problem reoccur since I reduced the number of tabs.

Let me know in the comments below how many tabs and how many FF windows you had open when you saw the problem. Thanks!

WORKAROUND 3 (THANKS TO COMMENTER HANNA)

Hanna, below, found that switching to another, non-flash tab made buttons function again.
[Update: I just had the same "blinking close, maximize, and minimize button problem" today, and switching tabs showed a different tab content, but did NOT make the problem with the buttons go away. The problem disappeared by itself later, much later. So this is NOT a universal workaround.]

WORKAROUND 4 (Potential, Thanks to a TIMELY Firefox PopUp Message)

I had never before received such a pop-up from Firefox! The pop-up has appeared through my Firefox today:

These Add-ons Have been blocked:

• Microsoft .NET Framework Assistant 1.1 [Blocked add-on]
• Windows Presentation Foundation 3.5.30729.1 [Blocked add-on]
  

These Add-ons have a high risk of causing stability or security problems and have been blocked. Restart is required.

There you have it. That is a potential Workaround #4 for the problem.

I checked and yes, I had .NET Framework Assistant 1.1 Extension installed in my Firefox. And yes, I had the Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) Plugin installed in my Firefox. You can indeed find them in my original problem report to Firefox, below.

I write about this very peculiar possible workaround in the post titled The Battle of Softwares: Microsoft vs Firefox.

[Update: I just had the same "blinking and non-functional Close, Restore, and Minimize button problem" today, after disableing the above Add-ons and restarting Firefox. Disabling the above Add-ons will prevent future surprises from Microsoft in Firefox. However, it did NOT make the problem with the buttons go away. So this is probably NOT a workaround.]

WORKAROUND #5 (POSSIBLE, BASED ON A HINT FROM FIREFOX)

Disable Firefox Skype extension!

[UPDATE: Anonymous reports in the comments below that problem still persists with Skype extension disabled. See below. This workaround needs to be thrown out the window! ]

Today Firefox popup came up suggesting to disable Firefox Skype extension 2.2.102 because it causes instabilities. Could that be a solution? Everyone, please help: If you are reporting this blinking close, minimize, restore buttons problems in the comments below, please include: #1) How many tabs you had open in FF when it happened #2) Do you have Firefox Skype Extension enabled, and what version. That would be great. I have disabled Skype extension for Firefox today and we'll see if the problem reocurrs.

WORKAROUND #6 (most promising so far! Thanks to an anonymous commenter, below.)

If you have more than one Firefox Window open, Close All But One! Move your tabs into one single window (just click and drag will do). Then close all windows but one. If you are having this problem and are commenting below, please let us know how many windows you had open.

WORKAROUND #7

Posted separately in a new post! See you there!

SOLUTION

There is no proper solution to this problem just yet. You'll just have to use one of the WORKAROUNDS above for now. If you have this problem and are sick of needing to kill Firefox and restart, click on Follow with Google Friend Connect on the bottom left and I will let you know when I find the solution. Probably the SAME DAY as it becomes available! The other thing you can do is whenever you see this problem occur, disable one of your AddOns and see if anything improves. Then let me know in the comment below, which AddOn did you disable! Thanks!

REPORTING PROBLEM TO FIREFOX DEVELOPERS

Below the problem I reported today to Firefox developers: If you have a solution please let me know. Before I reported the issue, I searchd all over the internet. No solution. Googled for firefox close button not working, firefox problem, firefox minimize button not working, firefox restor button problem, firefox unresponsive, firefox frozen, firefox not working, firefox stops working. No solution.

I am planning to downgrade from Firefox 3.5 more specifically Firefox 3.5.3 down to 3.0.14.

Shortly after this problem which happened even after restarting Firefox, I was not able to get any URL to display or to navigate in Firefox to any website. In fact I am writing this using Google Chrome!

PROBLEM DESCRIPTION SUBMITTED

Here's the problem report submitted to Firefox: http://support.mozilla.com/tiki-view_forum_thread.php?locale=en-US&forumId=1&comments_parentId=471517

Sometimes The Close, The Maximize and The Minimize Buttons are Blinking   

 Issue

Firefox is having problems with certain web sites

Description

The Windows Vista: Close, Maximize and Minimize buttons in the top/right of the windows frame start to blink and become disfunctional for an extended period of time. This happens on random websites, one of them being "Google hiring workers from home" site which is triggered in a popunder.

URL of affected sites

http://any.com but see above

Extensions installed

several, other reports say it happens in Safe mode as well.

Firefox version

3.5.3

Operating system

Windows Vista

User Agent

Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 6.0; en-US; rv:1.9.1.3) Gecko/20090824 Firefox/3.5.3 (.NET CLR 3.5.30729)

Plugins installed

[-]

• IE Tab Plug-in for Mozilla/Firefox
• LogMeIn, Inc. Remote Access Components
• npmnqmp 07076007
• QuickUpload Plugin (1.0.0.47)
• Default Plug-in
• RealJukebox Netscape Plugin
• RealPlayer(tm) LiveConnect-Enabled Plug-In
• 6.0.12.69
• Adobe PDF Plug-In For Firefox and Netscape
• BitTorrent Plugin 1
• 1.7.0059.1
• npunagi2
• np-mswmp
• Office Plugin for Netscape Navigator
• Google Update
• Shockwave Flash 10.0 r22
• Delivery Network Acceleration by BitTorrent™
• 3.0.40723.0
• Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) plug-in for Mozilla browsers
• MetaStream 3 Plugin r4
• Java Plug-in 1.6.0_03 for Netscape Navigator (DLL Helper) 

SOLVED: Computer Goes Back To Sleep After Wake Up

This post will show you how to prevent your computer from falling asleep too soon.

PROBLEM: COMPUTER FALLING ASLEEP TOO SOON AFTER WAKE UP


PROBLEM: COMPUTER GOES BACK TO SLEEP SOON AFTER WAKE UP


PROBLEM: COMPUTER FALLING ASLEEP TOO SOON AFTER WAKE UP

I've been telling you how I resolved the problem of Windows Vista not waking up from sleep or hibernate. Now that this problem is solved, I encountered another one: Laptop computer goes back to sleep soon after wake up or resume.

This only happens when I don't touch the keyboard after the computer is back up. It is annoying because resume from hibernate takes quite a while, maybe 2 minutes. I leave to get something else done while waiting. I come back and find computer has fallen back to sleep/hibernate again. I lost 5-10 minutes that way.

Others schedule their computer to awake at a certain time for a scheduled task. Their annoyance is that the computer goes back to sleep before the task is completed. I will show here how both problems are resolved. The same solution applies to both.

SOLUTION

It turns out (credit for reporting this goes to http://vista64.com) that Vista will fall back asleep or hibernate after a specified amount of time if not physically interacted with. Such as by typing or moving the mouse. This amount of time is set to 120 seconds or two minutes. The value is stored in registry.

If you are uncomfortable changing registry, please ask someone else or just keep in mind you need to be there within 2 minutes of Vista computer waking up and need to touch the keyboard.

HOW TO CHANGE THE TIME BEFORE COMPUTER FALLS ASLEEP

Here's how to change the appropriate key in the Registry: Click Start, then in the box on the bottom type regedit. If prompted by UAC, click Continue.

Registry editor comes up. Follow the tree: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Power\PowerSettings\238C9FA8-0AAD-41ED-83F4-97BE242C8F20\7bc4a2f9-d8fc-4469-b07b-33eb785aaca0\DefaultPowerSchemeValues

In the left pane, click on the triangle to expand DefaultPowerSchemeValues into three subvalues. They correspond to Balanced, High Performance, and Power Saver options. To be safe, just change all three values, under both AC and DC values. So total of six. I changed from the default 120 seconds to 300 seconds. So long as I'm back in 5 minutes the computer won't fall back to sleep or hibernate.

If a scheduled program is waking computer up from sleep, make sure you set the value to longer than the maximum anticipated duration of the run of the scheduled program.

THIS SOLVED MY PROBLEM. WHAT ABOUT YOU?

Have you found this solution workable, and useful? Are you now able to get back to your computer before it falls back into hibernate? Or, are the programs that are waking up your computer getting enough wake-up time to complete their jobs? Let me know either way, ok? Just click on the "Leave a Comment" link below!

Recurring Laser Printer Paper Jam Problem - Recurred

ANNOYANCE: RECURRING LASER PRINTER PAPER JAM

I was just telling you two days back about the persistent recurring laser paper jam problem. Every time I attempted to print the first page would print fine, but the second page never printed. Sometimes even the first page only came out of the printer 2/3 of the way. I fixed this problem by finding manufacturers directions, followed them, and, voila, the problem was solved.

SYMPTOMS NOT GONE, JUST TRANSFORMED

Two days later, I find that the problem of recurring printer paper jam is still not gone, only transformed. Today I wanted to print a larger document. I found that printer stopped printing after the first page, blinking a red "Paper" light and refusing to print further. All I needed to do was to push the big print button on top and the next page came out. Or, if that didn't work, I had to pull the paper tray open and push it back in, press the big print button and printing would resume. See below to understand why this worked. Not as annoying as before but still, not quite functional.

FOLLOW DIRECTIONS TO SOLVE THE PROBLEM AGAIN

As this problem could still be classified as a paper jam problem, I followed the same manufacturers (Brother) directions again. I opened the printer up, removed the tray and the drum, cleaned the rollers thoroughly with a wet cloth and I made sure I cleaned all of the rollers. Replaced the tray and the drum and went for a test print.

Heavens!!?! Now printouts came out just terrible, there were big black smudges on paper and the second sheet even got stuck in the printer, causing a massive paper jam. Not great. I pulled all the jammed paper out and retried. It did come out better, and after the third printing, the smudges and the jammed paper were not recurring again. Next time I should have let the rollers dry before the test print!

NO SOLUTION...

However, my problem with the second page not printing was not gone. However, this time it was different. When I needed to print two or more pages, printer would print the first page fine. The second page, however, would not be printed. I inspected the tray and saw that the second sheet of paper would consistently be lifted out of the tray and lay on the "separation pad". Never made it any further. I tried several times.

ONLY THEORIES...

From all the materials that I read about the problem I concluded that the worn out pickup roller was the culprit. It did appear smooth and slippery in places indeed. Tried cleaning it again, even with alcohol (the manufacturers directions do not suggest that because of the fire hazard). I even "roughed it up" using a sharp knife and at one point I was able to print two pages at the time, but not three. I gave up. My current theory is that I was able to fix the dirty separation roler and dirty separation pad but the pickup roller was beyond repair.

MY SOLUTION: PULL OUT A SPARE PRINTER

So finally, I replaced the printer. I had previously bought another HL-2040 so that was easy for me, I had a spare one. I'm okay.

WHAT ABOUT YOU? WHAT WILL YOU DO?

If you do not wish to buy a new roller or Buy new laser printer, the workaround is to print the first page, then open and close the paper tray (this pushes the second sheet back into the tray), press the Go button, and print another page. Quite annoying but at least you don't have to remove stuck paper from underneath the drum as before.

Another workaround is to print using manual feed. That still works, one sheet at the time. You may even want to set your print software preference to "manual".

MYSTERY REMAINS

What is still unclear is why the first page from the tray always prints???

OTHER SOLUTIONS

Do you have a better solution? Let me know, just leave me a comment below! Here are a few suggestions which I haven't tried. If you do, let me know if they worked for you!

First other solution would be to buy a rubber roller rejuvenation can. That could extend the life of your rollers.

Second solution could be for you to buy a new roller. See this website. You'll have to contact the company by phone.

Third solution:  Buy a new laser printer. In fact, do like I did. Buy Two New (or Used even) Identical Laser Printers. They are not that expensive. This roller problem was not the first problem where spare parts from the second laser printer came in handy. I had issues with the drum, the toner, the toner refills, you name it, before. All easily and successfully resolved with spare parts from another printer. And the reason I bought two laser printers at the same time? The price was right, and I knew the laser printer models change quickly so the model may not be available when you need spare parts. And the last reason: The cost of repairs of laser printers in the USA is quickly approaching the cost of a new printer. So there you have it. Buy two!

Either way, leave me a comment if you found a solution that worked for you!

REFERENCES

Original Brother page for paper jam problems at Brother Solutions Center.

Techrepublic post on printer troubleshooting, see chapter on Clearing Paper Jams

Buy Rubber Roller Rejuvenator Can from fixyourownprinter

Another descritpion of the same problem I had from fixyourownprinter. The poster could get one step farther toward the solution if he knew of my post here.

Another article from Techrepublic, see chapter titled "Clearing Paper Jams"

Page where you can buy printer rollers at kejia.com

Buy new or used laser printer from Amazon.com

RELATED POSTS

Solved: Persistent laser printer problem: Page stuck under the drum, causing paper jam.