Everything seems to work like normal once it actually boots up. I can go through log in, surf the web, run applications etc. I can even reboot it!
But if I turn it off (and leave it off) for a couple of minutes, and try to start it up again, it returns to the blacked out state once more.
To be clear, I press the power button and nothing happens on the screen. The power button lights up and I can activate/deactivate the touchpad through a light-up button (though I can't verify that it works cause nothing appears on the screen.
My laptop does have a hard drive light-up icon that does NOT do anything when I hit the power button. Does this mean my hard drive is dying or near death?
Also... I have managed to reformat and reinstall Windows 7 without any issue. However, the problem popped back up again about 20ish-hours later.
About 10-30 minutes after I have pressed the power button, I hear the hard drive fans go off, the screen light up and it loads directly to the windows 7 os loading screen with the coloured bar scrolling across. So I don't see a BIOS/Manufacturer screen. I can use the computer like normal at this point until I shut off the computer for an extended time; at which point it returns to the screwed up booting state.