Dell laptop 3 long beeps and screen goes blank

[afidelino]

My dell Inspiron laptop which was working undoubtedly reliable for last 3 year has now developed its first substantial problem. When powered up it gives a system error of 3 long beeps, and suddenly screen goes blank. The cpu remains on and is unable to shut off without directly disconnecting the power supply. I'm thinking the BIOS became corrupted or something via improper shutdown due to the outage. Any ideas on a fix are highly appreciated.

[Sadashiva]

It could be either a video card error, RAM error, or keyboard error from the 3 beeps I believe. Open up the chassis, remove the DDR memory modules, clean out the dust bunnies thoroughly with compressed air, and reseat the memory modules one at a time, attempting to power on the system with each added module. If you take the memory out (all of it), and the beeping is the same, the problem is likely the memory. If you take it out and the beeping is different, it is likely video.

[Sachit]

If you have two memory modules you can swap out one and then the other to identify the bad one. Some BIOSes beep three times when there is a problem with the video card. Try another video card or try taking the video card out to see if there is any change with the beeping. or you may also tried cleanning out the dust bunnies thoroughly with compressed air, and reseat the memory modules one at a time, attempting to power on the system with each added module.