So my laptop took a little tumble....

[kypron7]

I have a Dell Inspiron 9300, and it was in it's dell carrying case when I had to put on the brakes in my truck, and it fell about 2 feet off the back seat and flipped over. It seems to work fine so far, but my question is should I be worried about damage that will manifest itself over time? Or are these things made to take a little impact now and then? D'oh.....

 

[Matthias99]

If it was off at the time, and in a padded case, you're probably fine.

Hard drives can take quite a bit of impact while they're powered off. You could conceivably damage the display or crack the motherboard if you really dropped it hard, but even the cheap cases that Dell sends with the systems offer pretty decent protection.

 

[Rubycon]

It will be fine.

Notebook hard drives are incredibly durable. I have a 120GB WD Passport that has been dropped countless times from chest height to a steel plate deck. :Q

Still works and I run Spin Rite 6.0 at level 5 after every time it takes a spill and never shows any problem!

I would imagine if it were subjected to those conditions in a notebook the case would really be messed up. :Q

 

[Ruptga]

laptop hard drives are about impossible to kill when they're powered off, don't worry about it. If I remember right, they'll generally take 500g's of force when off, and between eleven and twenty if they're on? Something like that; anyway, don't worry about it as long as the thing powers on, though I suppose a scandisk couldn't hurt.

 

[porcorosso]

Under those circumstances the thing I'd worry most about would be the stupid hinges. Inspiron hinges have been a sore point with me (and lots of other people) for a long time. I had an Inspiron 7500 (really cheap plastic case) that suffered FIVE hinge failures -- and it was never dropped even once! The designs with displays/lids that overhung the bottom case of the notebook were the ones that were most prone to this sort of failure. Just the act of carrying them in some types of cases would place strain on the hinges because the entire weight of the notebook was being supported on the edge of the lid.