Back Up!

humbird · Feb 2, 2022

I prefer a laptop nowadays though because of the portability. When I go to the coast to visit my relatives, I like to be able to take it with as I do not own a smartphone, nor would I. Just my choice. I have a "dumb" cell phone that I am very happy with.

CornishRattler · Feb 2, 2022

Have to say that Dell do include a pretty decent tear down manual for their higher end stuff that walks you through almost anything, it’s as though they expect you to tinker and upgrade

jvickers · Feb 2, 2022

humbird said:
I prefer a laptop nowadays though because of the portability. When I go to the coast to visit my relatives, I like to be able to take it with as I do not own a smartphone, nor would I. Just my choice. I have a "dumb" cell phone that I am very happy with.

While I rarely use my laptop, I do need it because I need to be able to work from wherever I am. I'm still wed to my desktop, though!

humbird · Feb 2, 2022

I do occasionally miss having a Desktop.

Winuser · Feb 2, 2022

BunnyJ said:
I would never work on a laptop.. I would take it to a shop and have them do all of the work. After I made a backup.

I try to only open up a laptop if it's my laptop or if it going to be trashed. The hardest job I did on a laptop was to replace a touch screen on a laptop that my wife's niece broke. The laptop couldn't be used so I figured there was nothing to lose. Plus, it was an old laptop that we gave her and we paid for the new screen. I took the old screen out to make sure I could do it before I ordered the new screen.

Winuser · Feb 2, 2022

BunnyJ said:
Crap.. I do have to go into Knoxville but it's worth it..

We have one repair shop in the town I live in. I have only bought parts from them so I have no idea if they do good work or not.

Winuser · Feb 2, 2022

jimbo45 said:
Most modern laptops are very thin and not easy to work on -- although usually the hardest bit is getting the case open without damaging it. If you can open the case then usually you are OK -- the hardest thing is probably detaching the lid / screen from the laptop which is usually required when modifying modern laptops before you can get at the "rest of the bits" inside. Even replacing a battery can be a nightmare.

These days TAKE PICTURES of any thing you do before removing / disconnecting components or if you are "Old school" engineering take plenty of notes and diagrams.

Unless you are reasonable with handling small precision tools I'd leave this sort of stuff to experienced repairers --there's usually a few around if you look at local traders etc unless you are out in the middle of nowhere.

Older laptops are more "Battleship built" variety and are much easier to disassemble.

I'd advise though these days for anybody looking for new laptops to go for minimum 512GB SSD or increasingly NVME, 16GB RAM and whatever screen size fits your purpose -- external monitors can always be attached - HDMI is pretty standard. Look also for a decent number of USB ports.

With increased and permanent more remote working the demise of laptops was grossly over exaggerated !!! even if people do a lot more on phones and tablets. Laptops are definitely not dead at all these days.

Cheers
jimbo

The very first thing I do before opening a laptop is to look for how-to videos of the laptop model I'm going to work on.

BunnyJ · Feb 2, 2022

Winuser said:
We have one repair shop in the town I live in. I have only bought parts from them so I have no idea if they do good work or not.

I had a guy that went out of business when COVID hit.. he was great but there are others in Knoxville I would use to get a laptop worked on.

Winuser · Feb 2, 2022

jvickers said:
I upgraded a CPU on my old Acer. It worked well, but as with everything I seem to take apart, I had some extra screws! Hard drives aren't too hard to upgrade on a laptop, though. Neither is the RAM. Now, the CPU... you have to remove the monitor and keyboard on most of them. (Probably all of them.) Oh, and I was living on the edge - no backup!

What laptop puts the CPU behind the screen? I can see where on some laptops one may have to take the keyboard off to gain access. That is if one can even replace the CPU.

CornishRattler · Feb 2, 2022

Winuser said:
What laptop puts the CPU behind the screen? I can see where on some laptops one may have to take the keyboard off to gain access. That is if one can even replace the CPU.

I'm pretty sure the CPU on mine is actually under the MB, that would be an absolute no go for me to try

Winuser · Feb 2, 2022

Season 2

CornishRattler said:
I'm pretty sure the CPU on mine is actually under the MB, that would be an absolute no go for me to try

I imagine that on most laptops today the CPU in non replaceable.

Wynona · Feb 2, 2022

BunnyJ said:
I would never work on a laptop.. I would take it to a shop and have them do all of the work. After I made a backup.

I'

Wynona · Feb 2, 2022

BunnyJ said:
I would never work on a laptop.. I would take it to a shop and have them do all of the work. After I made a backup.

I'm the one that would be caught changing out the drive; ain't no way I'd pay a minimum of $49.00 for them to just look inside, never mind adding the drive to it. When laptops used to come with a "door" for upgrading drives and RAM, I always did my own upgrades. So, now I just need to pull the back off and change out the drive/RAM.

BunnyJ · Feb 2, 2022

Wynona said:
I'

Yup.. that's what I said.. that's what I would do

Wynona said:
I'm the one that would be caught changing out the drive; ain't no way I'd pay a minimum of $49.00 for them to just look inside, never mind adding the drive to it. When laptops used to come with a "door" for upgrading drives and RAM, I always did my own upgrades. So, now I just need to pull the back off and change out the drive/RAM.

That's what you would dol and I wouldn't.

Any question? None.. good

jvickers · Feb 2, 2022

Winuser said:
What laptop puts the CPU behind the screen? I can see where on some laptops one may have to take the keyboard off to gain access. That is if one can even replace the CPU.

It wasn't behind the screen. I had to remove the screen to remove the top of the laptop, though. What a pain!

Winuser · Feb 2, 2022

jvickers said:
It wasn't behind the screen. I had to remove the screen to remove the top of the laptop, though. What a pain!

The only time I've had the top off a laptop was when I replaced the keyboard on my wife's cheap HP laptop that she bought from Walmart. The keyboard developed a mind of its own. When she hit a key, she never knew what character was going to be typed. The new keyboard didn't even last a year before it started doing the same thing. I removed the HDD and memory and sent it to the electronic recycling center.

jvickers · Feb 2, 2022

Winuser said:
The only time I've had the top off a laptop was when I replaced the keyboard on my wife's cheap HP laptop that she bought from Walmart. The keyboard developed a mind of its own. When she hit a key, she never knew what character was going to be typed. The new keyboard didn't even last a year before it started doing the same thing. I removed the HDD and memory and sent it to the electronic recycling center.

Interestingly, I'm having key issues with my really expensive Corsair keyboard. Sometimes it's Microsoft Outlook, but more often than not, the "z" and "y" keys on my keyboard are reversed. Really strange. I have to reboot to fix when those keys are switched. It might have something to do with the iCUE software. It's a little buggy. But without iCUE, I can't control the color of my keyboard. That's the whole reason I purchased it, so I could have my keyboard purple.

The-Hive · Feb 2, 2022

I have only worked on my laptops twice, I put a 2nd SSD in the A51 and extra ram in the Dell and always backed up. I do back up regularly before any software changes as you guys know, one piece of software can react with another

The-Hive · Feb 2, 2022

The worst part is getting the base back on when you finished, the clip-in clips don't and the screws never pop straight into the holes

jvickers · Feb 2, 2022

The-Hive said:
The worst part is getting the base back on when you finished, the clip-in clips don't and the screws never pop straight into the holes

This is so true!

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