The Downlow on Changing Your Laptop Processor

Ask most laptop experts and they’d   tell you that changing a laptop processor (or CPU) is a breeze once you take the laptop apart. The tricky part about working on laptops is dealing with the delicate and smallness of the laptop components. So tricky that you could end up placing the wrong component in the wrong place. Lucky for you, most laptop manuals have detailed diagrams showing you, step by step where each component fits. The laptops manuals   furnish you information on the type of processor you need for your laptop. You have all the information at your finger tips.  So here is the lowdown on changing your laptop processor.

Things You Need For The Exercise:

•          Laptop Manual
•          Assembly Guide
•         New Laptop processor
•     Thermal Compound
•         Small screwdriver

Onward:

•         Turn off the laptop and unplug it.
•       Remove the battery, CD/DVD drive and the hard drive. In case you don’t know the hard drive is located on one side of the laptop
•         Use your screw driver to remove the screw that holds the laptop cover, and then pull the           hard drive out.
•        Turn the laptop over and then use the screw driver to remove the screws holding the keyboard.
•          Flip the laptop over, open it and then remove the keyboard.
•          Unplug the keyboard connecting the keyboard to the motherboard.
•         Unplug the heat sink fan.
•         Unscrew and release the old mechanism holding the old processor and then remove it from the laptop.
•          Apply a small layer of  Thermal Compound  to the  the new processor.
•         Make sure the processor is tightly secured and aligned in the processor compartment and then replace the heat sink  fan.
•          Connect the keyboard to the motherboard  temporarily , restart it then, following your manual instructions, enter the system BIOS.  Hopefully, the new processor should be recognized by the processor.
•          Once the BIOS   recognizes the new processor, turn off the laptop, unplug it and remove the keyboard.
•       Reassemble the laptop. Just don’t tighten  the screws to hard while putting the laptop back together.

If you're looking for new processor(or CPU) for your laptop ,Amazon.com  will be a good place to get it from.

Well, that’s a wrap on “ The Downlow on Changing Your Processor.” The exercise is a bit challenging but so long as you take your time and get every component in the right place you should have no problem replacing your processor.

If you are a laptop owner looking to learn how to fix  your laptop including replacing your laptop processor try  te following laptop repair products:
,

• Laptop Repair Videos.
• Laptop Repair Made Easy
• The Laptop Repair Workbook: An Introduction to Troubleshooting and Repairing Laptop Computers.

Time to Replace Your CD/DVD Drive

You are working on your laptop and you decide pop a DVD into your laptop. When you pop the DVD all of a sudden you hear this strange noise. You are like ”What is going on here?” You try to pop in the DVD one more time and this strange sound rings in your ear again. Then a still small voice tells you ”It’s time to replace your CD/DVD drive. You need to get a new one.” Then you fire back with another question” What could possibly have caused it to make such a strange noise?” Then the still voice responds saying” Well, it could be a virus or that the drive itself just jammed.” So now that we’re through with the formalities let me show you how to replace your CD/DVD drive.

• First turn off the power on your laptop and pull off the power plug from the bag.. Unscrew the screws holding the case cover of your laptop and open the case of your laptop. You now have access to the screws holding the drive 
• Now locate the CD/DVD drive. Unplug the cable transmitting sound to the sound card and label ti for purposes of reference. Next. Unscrew the four screws in the side of the drive . 
• Then remove the power plug from behind the drive and disconnect the cable for the drive. Keep track of the location of the red wire . In some drives it connects to the power connector and in some drives it is adjacent to the connector. 
• Now that you’ve unscrewed everything, remove the drive jumpers and take note of the settings: You should see Slave Master, and Master Only 
• Now take your new CD/DVD Drive drive and set the jumpers on the back of the drive, similar to that of the old drive. 
• Reconnect the drive cable and align the red wire with the pin on the drive connector. 
• You then connect the power cable and slide the drive into the drive compartment and tighten it with the four screws. Finally plug in the sound cable you disconnected earlier. 
• Close the laptop screws and tighten the sides with the screws you removed earlier. Then reconnect the power cable to the laptop and restart the laptop. 

Well, that’s a wrap on ”Time to Replace Your CD/DVD Drive.” Hopefully you should be able to change you’re your drive so long as you follow the above instructions. So if you’re a laptop owner hoping to learn how to fix your laptop including your CD/DVD drive, Download Laptop Repair Videos.

What To Do When Your Laptop Overheats

You are working on your laptop one day and for some weird reason your laptop is placed on your lap. All of a sudden, you get this weird sensation that your thighs are about to catch fire. And then you scream out saying” Gosh, my thighs are burning up!” Well, I have good news and bad news. The good news is yours thighs aren’t burning up. The bad news is your laptop is overheating and your laptop is the cause of your laptop overheating. Overheating is probably the biggest threat to the survival of your laptop.  It can do serious damage to your laptop not to mention permanently disabling it. Oh! and placing your laptop on your lap or any other uneven surface accelerates the overheating of your laptop.  Let me show you what to do when your laptop overheats. But first let’s answer some pertinent questions..


First Question

How Do You Know Your Laptop is Overheating?

Anytime your fan is operating at an unusually fast speed, get worried. Because your laptop is heating up, the fan has to overcompensate by  over-spinning. As a result, it puts your hardware in harms way. Consequently, the CPU has to fend for itself by cutting down on its clock speed to escape the rising heat as well. And when that happens, it could cause the laptop to shut down to protect the hardware from further damage.

Next Question:

How Do You Prevent An Overheating Laptop?

Before  I answer this question,  please do the following

•    Shut down the laptop
• Remove the battery
•      Unplug the AC/Adapter
•      Make sure  your hands are dry to avoid electric shock

Now to the solution:

Clean The Fan

The first thing to do when your laptop is overheating is to clean the fan. The fans provide cooling to the CPU and the graphics card. Over time layers of dust and dirt build up in these fans causing the laptop to overheat. So here is how to clean the fan.

·     Carefully, clean the fan with a cotton swap dipped in a drop of alcohol. Make sure the laptop     has completely evaporated before you turn the  power on.

·         You can also use a vacuum cleaner to remove the dust and dirt which clog up the fan. But make sure your fan is not spinning in the wrong direction or else it could get damaged.

·         You can also use compressed air to clean the fan by holding the fan down.

·         Next you clean the exhaust port by sucking out air with the vacuum cleaner. The exhaust port is located on the side of the laptop and it is the opening where the hot air blows out of.

·         Next spray the intake grills with the same compressed air. The intake grills are the small openings where air is sucked into the laptop by the speedily revolving fans.

·         Finally, apply thermal grease  to the interface between the CPU and the graphics card.

Keep The Laptop on a Flat and Even Surface

Most laptops cool down through their behinds(or bottoms).  So if you put your laptop on an uneven surface such as your pillow, blanket, or your lap, the airflow into the laptop becomes disrupted, causing the temperature of the cooling air to rise and the laptop to eventually overheat. You can easily avoid this situation by placing your laptop on a flat surface such as a tray, laptop holder  or  lap stand 

Buy a Laptop Cooler

A  laptop cooler  will do your laptop  a lot of good as it contributes additional cooling to offset potential overheating. Make sure you get the right cooler  because the last thing you want  is a cooler merely sitting under your laptop and sucking air away from it. This of course will cause the laptop to overheat and we don't want that do we? Buying a laptop that blows air upwards will be beneficial as it will take care of problems such as intake grills at the bottom of the laptop. Or you can buy  a  passive cooler which does not consume power but absorbs heat. So the issue of rapid overheating does not arise.

Well, that's a wrap on "What to do When Your Laptop Overheats"  The laptop is prone to overheating due to a combination of external factors and user habits that threaten  the laptop's existence. However, so long as you follow these hardware suggestions and  treat the laptop with love and care, your laptop should live a little longer.




So if you are a laptop user looking to learn how to fix ypur laptop including  preventing overheating, Download Laptop Repair Videos.

How To Handle a Laptop That has Liquid Spilled on It.

Laptops are a  sensitive as our ego because they're not waterproof. The smallest drop on the keyboard, and and you could snuff the life out of it. The god news is  that it's possible to fix a a laptop with liquid spilled on it. The trick here is you have to act fast and smart,. Wait another second longer, and you reduce the chances of your laptop surviving the spillage. Here is how to handle a laptop that has liquid spilled on it.

• Turn off the laptop immediately. Remove the AC Adapter. Doing so cuts down the possibility of the adapter shorting out.
• Disconnect all external devices
• Turn the laptop upside down to stop the water from flowing any further.
• Use paper towels or clean lint-free cloth to clean the liquid
• Double-check the keyboard. Pour out any leftover liquid, then remove and clean the keyboard.
• Use  another piece of clean lint-free cloth, slightly dampened to wipe sticky areas of the laptop such as the screen, keys on the keyboard, and any other buttons located on the laptop
• Don't get your hands anywhere near static electricity as it causes high voltage and could destroy your laptop even when it's dry.

• If you can't reach the spillage quickly enough, I suggest you disassemble the laptop to prevent the circuit boards from corroding. As part of the disassembly,remove your hard disk to prevent loss of data and the Network Card, Video Card, e.t.c
• If you happen to spill non-water stains such as Coca Cola and coffee on your laptop, use a tooth brush or lint-free cloth to clean the residue from the spillage.. Then blow the residue away with  compressed air. 
• Put the laptop back together, and test it to see whether it's working.

That's a wrap on "How To Handle a Laptop That has Liquid Spilled on It." It is possible to handle spillages but you need to act quick  to accomplish this task. Do this, and you should be able to handle the spillage breezily.

If you are a laptop user looking to learn how to fix your laptop including cleaning liquid spillages,  try the following lapotp repair training products:

•  Laptop Repair Videos
• Laptop Repair Made Easy
• The Laptop Repair Workbook: An Introduction to Troubleshooting and Repairing Laptop Computers

How to Disassemble Your Laptop-Part II

This week we continue  from where we left off with our tutorial on"How to Disassemble Your Laptop-Part II" by Removing the expansion Memory.

Remove the Memory Module


To remove the memory module

• Put the laptop in boot mode
• Turn the power off and disconnect all cables from the laptop
• Turn the laptop upside down and take out the battery and the screw securing the memory module socket cover
• Slide your finger nail under the socket cover and lift it off. Push the latches to the outside to free up the memory module. A spring then forces one end of the module up.
• Hold the module and pull it out.
• Seat the cover and secure the screws
• Replace the battery
• Remove the memory bay cover

Remove the Modem

To remove the modem:

• Remove the strip cover and keyboard
• Remove the two black screws securing the modem module
• Lift the unit off the connector
• Disconnect the modem cable from the modem module

Once you've taken all these part apart, put the entire laptop back together again.

That's a wrap on 'How to Disassemble your laptop-Part II. Hope you all have learnt a lot in this two part series. Although it seems scary, at first, once you get the hang of it, taking your laptop apart  should be a breeze.

So if you are a laptop owner looking to learn how to learn how to fix your laptop, including taking it apart, Download Laptop Repair Videos.

How to Disassemble Your Laptop - Part I

As a laptop owner aspiring to fix your laptop, the first thing on your mind is "I want to learn how to disassemble my laptop". Of course , you have to learn how to take your laptop apart. That is the only way you are going to learn how to fix your laptop. Besides, you need to learn all the body parts  of your laptop that way when your laptop starts acting up, you know what is causing the problem. Besides, you also understand how the laptop is put back together. So we are going to do a a two part series starting today on how to disassemble your laptop. Let's get started.

To Remove Battery Pack

• Turn your laptop upside as stated above
• Unlock the battery double lock and slide the battery bay latch to free up the battery pack. And then remove the battery from the bay.

To Remove the HDD Module.

• Again, turn the laptop upside down
• Locate two black M2.5x5 screws and unscrew them to release the HDD door.
• Pull out the tab to remove the HDD unit.

To Remove the Optical Module

• Turn the laptop upside down
• Follow the previous procedure to remove the HDD module
• Locate one M2.5x8 screw and slide the optical drive module from the battery bay. If your laptop doesn't require any screw removal, simply eject the drive.

To Remove the Wireless LAN Unit

• Turn the laptop upside down
• Loosen the screw securing the wireless LAN compartment cover
• Lift off the Wireless compartment cover
• unscrew and remove the M2.5x5 screw securing the MCI packet
• Detach both ends of the wireless LAN antenna. Get  a Hex or Torg(T7) screw driver 
• Gently press on the latches]
• Grasp the wireless LAN unit and pull it out.

That's a wrap on  how to disassemble your laptop part I. I Hope you didn't find it too difficult. Next time you will continue with how to remove expansion memory.

And if you are a laptop owner hoping to learn how fix your laptop, including disassembling it, Download Laptop Repair Videos.

Fixing Your Laptop AC Adapter

Of all the laptop irritants, the most annoying is power failure. And when that happens, the AC adapter becomes the main casualty. Consequently,, no power flows through the adapter, making it difficult to turn on or boot the laptop. But before  you go fixing your laptop AC adapter, let's identify the root cause. But first let me show you the things you will need for this exercise.

• VOM/DMM Devices
• Wire cutters
• solder gun
• Electrical Tape
• Screw Driver

Now to the troubleshooting:

• Check the wires protruding from the adapter. There should be a plug at one end and a lead connecting to the adapter at the end. Make sure the connections are tight and check the pins in the socket for damage.
• Verify that the LED adapter light is left
• Check the lower right corner of your laptop and see whether your battery icon is showing. It should have a plug picture on top of it.
• Test the AC adapter with a VOM or DMM device to get a read on how much electrical current is flowing through the adapter.

Now that we are through with the troubleshoot,  onward to the repair:

• Check the cable for breaks or frayed areas. If you detect any, unplug the cable and connect the wires with solder to prevent shock and ensure proper insulation. Also, make sure you march the wires properly.
• Now check the internal wires. If the wires are glued together, fair enough. If not, open up the adapter by removing the screws. Just Make sure the adapter case is resealed.
• Now retest the AC adapter with the same  VOM /DMM devices to see whether power is flowing through the adapter this time.  Hopefully your adapter is back to its old self.

That's a wrap on 'Fixing your laptop AC adapter. Hopefully, after this tutorial your laptop adapter will start working again. Good luck!

If you're a laptop owner, looking to learn how to fix your laptop from a pro? Download Laptop Repair Videos