I do not use a stand or cooler, but I put it on a hard surface, not my lap or a pillow so it vents okay.

And I shut it down when not in use - dd did not and hers was always a problem.

I use it without a surge protector, but I would use a SP in your case, with a generator. House current can be oddball enough, I would not bet on a genny keeping a steady current, or the laptop's cord being able to protect it.

I wonder if you can get it to boot from disc if you go to the boot menu and manually set it to do so - I had to to something like that with mine when it crashed. It kept setting itself to some other boot sequence.



Which is how I learned they have a boot menu, lol.

My ds got it to come around just enough to save my files. But the hdd was toast.

I think when you first turn it on, you can hit f12 or something to get to that menu.

I'm pretty sure, if I remember right, that after I put the new hdd in, I had to do this, too. Would be nice if I could remember any dang thing.