Laptop Woes

[Juice Box]

so I made the mistake of trusting a wierd company (www.internetishop.com....they re now out of business) a few yrs ago and bought a really nice laptop from them. It was manufactured by ECS and sold thru this online store. It was a really good deal for a good gaming laptop. Everything worked great except for when the AC port began to go south. It was very twitchy and it had to be plugged into JUST right for it to charge...got really annoying. It recently began to not work at all...and i looked online for a solution...only one I could find was soldering. I took it apart but cant really figure out what to solder exactly and im beginning to think its not fixable....but all the parts are still perfectly good! What are my options in this situation?

Pentium Centrino 1.7
512 PC3200 Ram
ati 9700 Graphics
60 gig 5400 RPM HDD
Wireless card
15.4" Screen

Any suggestions as to what I can do? Do you think ECS would fix it for me?

 

[tami]

internetishop is not bad, but i wouldn't buy a laptop from them.

you should always get a laptop -- at the minimum, since parts are not necessarily easily serviceable -- from a reputable reseller, like dell. if you have a good warranty, you'll get your laptop fixed in no time.

and it doesn't hurt to call ECS to ask.

 

[loic2003]

Tough call. Have you phoned ECS?

Normally the power socket would be soldered onto the board unless it's some fancy alternative incorperated into some other part. You'd have to pick up a whole new power socket that's the same as the bundled one (maplins in the UK or maybe radioshack in the US?). Also be careful when soldering: you don't want to short or melt anything. How about you post up a picture of the laptop's mmotherboard? Top and bottom....


Some people might cry about the fact that this is the wrong forum, but hey... I don't mind.

 

[Fritzo]

Just so you know, same thing happened with my HP laptop. I couldn't soldier it, and they said the only way to fix it was to get a new motherboard (part was build on to the board). $489 repair :roll:

Yeah right...I got a new laptop. Not going to sink that kind of money into a 2.5 year old laptop.

 

[Juice Box]

Originally posted by: loic2003
Tough call. Have you phoned ECS?

Normally the power socket would be soldered onto the board unless it's some fancy alternative incorperated into some other part. You'd have to pick up a whole new power socket that's the same as the bundled one (maplins in the UK or maybe radioshack in the US?). Also be careful when soldering: you don't want to short or melt anything. How about you post up a picture of the laptop's mmotherboard? Top and bottom....


Some people might cry about the fact that this is the wrong forum, but hey... I don't mind.

I emailed them last night and no response yet...I might give them a call when i get home...but knowing how things usually are...itll most likely cost upwards of $200 to get it fixed..and that doesnt promise itll work forever. Is there any way I can use some of these parts in a new laptop possibly? Something barebones maybe?

 

[NikPreviousAcct]

Yeah how about posting in the correct forum?

 

[Juice Box]

from what I saw....the port is a part of the motherboard...i dont understand why it was so picky with the power plug...it got REALLY annoying because it wouldnt charge unless it was in JUST right... :roll: Now im just not sure what I can do.....dont really wanna drop 1g on a new laptop

 

[loic2003]

Originally posted by: Juice Box

Originally posted by: loic2003
Tough call. Have you phoned ECS?

Normally the power socket would be soldered onto the board unless it's some fancy alternative incorperated into some other part. You'd have to pick up a whole new power socket that's the same as the bundled one (maplins in the UK or maybe radioshack in the US?). Also be careful when soldering: you don't want to short or melt anything. How about you post up a picture of the laptop's mmotherboard? Top and bottom....


Some people might cry about the fact that this is the wrong forum, but hey... I don't mind.

I emailed them last night and no response yet...I might give them a call when i get home...but knowing how things usually are...itll most likely cost upwards of $200 to get it fixed..and that doesnt promise itll work forever. Is there any way I can use some of these parts in a new laptop possibly? Something barebones maybe?

Doubt it. Usually it's really difficult/impossible to cannibalise parts from a laptop. I say go for gold and give a repair a shot: once you've exhuasted the possibility of a repair through warranty/whatever.

 

[woowoo]

Whip out the soldering iron and hardwire the power adaptor to the motherboard

 

[Juice Box]

Originally posted by: woowoo
Whip out the soldering iron and hardwire the power adaptor to the motherboard

heh that would be rather impractical....but i dont even know exactly what the problem is....the power port IS connected to the mobo...i guess just not very well

 

[NutBucket]

Sell it to me cheap

 

[Juice Box]

Originally posted by: NutBucket
Sell it to me cheap

define cheap

 

[Juice Box]

Well now ive gone and made a mess of things Still working on it though!

http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/digitalsnare/laptop.jpg