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Posted by: Dave_Darling Aug 1 2006, 11:25 AM

Hey, any locals have a favorite place for getting laptop computers repaired? Mine seems to be dying. The monitor (17" LCD flatpanel) got a crack in it a few weeks ago, which of course has been propogating. Now the backlight only works intermittently (the external monitor port works fine thankfully!). And this morning, it just powered down on me and would not power back up. Not until I unplugged the AC adaptor and the battery, and let it sit for ~15 minutes, at least.

If it were just the LCD and/or the backlight, I could do the repairs myself. (But then, where do I get the parts?) But the SLOP (sudden loss of power) is very disturbing, and not within my troubleshooting ability.

So, any recommendations? Something near Mountain View is preferred.

914 content: That's the computer I use for my Pelican gig, and it has most of my 914 stuff on it.

--DD

Posted by: SLITS Aug 1 2006, 11:28 AM

No great loss there Wayne will off his "F" car and buy you a new one.

You can get the repair parts off the net Dave....remember....."Search with Google".

Posted by: ZZZZZ Aug 1 2006, 11:33 AM

With the laptop monitor cracked....you would be best served on getting a new unit. The cost will be 50-75% of a new unit.....and when you get it back....you still have the old POS you started with.

Posted by: drewvw Aug 1 2006, 11:40 AM

I agree, replace the unit. My laptop also just blew up and I took it apart to fix but its a gonner.

look on craigslist if you are looking for a cheap replacement....thinkpads are easy to come by.

Posted by: ZZZZZ Aug 1 2006, 12:06 PM

Best deals on laptops are Costco and Dell.

Posted by: carreraguy Aug 1 2006, 01:08 PM

Hi Dave:
There is a Mac repair place on El Camino south of Page Mill in Palo Alto; at the corner street that lead to Fry's as I recall.
Later,

Posted by: Jenny Aug 1 2006, 02:26 PM

What about computer surplus off of 101 in santa clara?

Jen

Posted by: anthony Aug 1 2006, 03:32 PM

I often buy parts on ebay to repair laptops that would otherwise cost too much to repair. For example, for a Mac ibook/powerbook I can usually get an lcd off ebay for $200-300. Apple wants over $750 for the same part.

The laptop powering itself down automatically is weird. Sounds like something that only a motherboard replacement could fix.

It may be still worth $200-300 to someone for parts. You could sell it as-is to offset the cost of a new one.

Posted by: Dave_Darling Aug 1 2006, 04:13 PM

Well, it was a top-of-the-line model (or close to it!) about a year ago. The only place I've found so far on-line with parts wants about $600 for a new LCD display, which is only 35% of the then-new cost of the whole shebang.

It is not a Mac, it's a PC laptop.

I'll have to check into what an equivalent machine costs now, and assess if I can down-grade or not. (I'm not using the machine for the job that was running heavy-duty graphics and computation, which was why I picked up a high-end one at the time.)

But I'd at least like to know WTF is going on, and get some kind of estimate on repair cost.

--DD