On Sun, Oct 05, 2008 at 12:57:13PM -0700, Jimbo wrote: > hey I fix cars...how hard is a laptop? > > Jimbo > Its actually not too hard if you follow the service manual. I know people who just start unscrewing things without getting a service manual first, but I try not to because there might always be another plastic tab or screw under a sticker I don't see until I break it or something. I think Toshiba and IBM/Lenovo have better service manuals than Dell. The Dells have photo illustrations that I think are harder to understand than the line drawings in the other manuals and the dells are also generally a bunch of html pages instead of a pdf. Some of them may also be only available on the web. At least Dell service manuals are easily available though, I think with the Toshiba I had to email an authorized service center because it wasn't on toshibas site. With Dell and IBM it was right on their website, and with IBM you could download a pdf which was nice.
For Thinkpads thinkwiki.org and forum.thinkpads.com are also very helpful sites. Lately though, I've actually gotten more cautious or lazy about repairing laptops because some of those that I repaired or saw repaired just had more problems later. For some problems it may not be worth the trouble if it involves taking out the motherboard or lcd panel. But repairing laptops is definiely possible and often works out pretty well. There are a huge amount of parts available on ebay. There are also tricks you may already know about like using an ice cube tray for screws and putting screws taken out at later steps in "later" compartments. Have fun. Nick _______________________________________________ vox-tech mailing list [email protected] http://lists.lugod.org/mailman/listinfo/vox-tech
