Well, this is fucked.

Duff

Last night my 'precious' XPS 13 suffered a rather bad encounter with a cigarette lighter that managed to get tossed in the wrong direction.



So yeah, I'm not amused that my $1600 ultrabook that I'm still paying for is now useless for the time being. Fortunately, it's replaceable. I really don't relish the thought of disassembling this thing, but the service manual provides decent instructions and there's a YouTube video for it.

I was a bit concerned at first; I had a service technician replace my keyboard when it was under warranty and it required removing literally every component down to the mainboard and some 100 or so screws. Fortunately, replacing the 'display assembly' only requires removing the base cover and battery, which seems relatively simple. Even so, there's still a good chance I could fuck something up (I say it's about 75 / 25 success vs failure) working inside that bastardly thing.

Anyway, I'll be forking out close to $300 for a new display.

There's really no point to this topic other than to show how I (well, my mom, who I gave it to a few months ago) managed to fuck my laptop's LCD with a stupid cigarette lighter tossed in the wrong direction. 2015 is rapidly becoming one of my least favorite years thus far, almost topping out 2009 which was extremely shitty for me.

BOD

I've replaced a few laptop displays myself largely thanks to... fist incidents. At least Thinkpads are child's play to take apart.

Duff wrote:

I had a service technician replace my keyboard when it was under warranty and it required removing literally every component down to the mainboard and some 100 or so screws

Fucking Insanity . Replacing a keyboard on a Thinkpad is like 3 screws.

Duff

Yeah, let me quote the manual for the prerequisites for keyboard replacement:

XPS 13 9333 Service Manual wrote:

Prerequisites
1. Remove the base cover. See "Removing the Base Cover" on page 10.
2. Disconnect the power-light board cable from the system board. See "Removing the Power-Light Board" on page 12.
3. Remove the battery. See "Removing the Battery" on page 14.
4. Remove the speakers. See "Removing the Speakers" on page 16.
5. Remove the wireless card. See "Removing the Wireless Card" on page 19.
6. Remove the solid-state drive. See "Removing the Solid-State Drive" on page 21.
7. Remove the heat sink. See "Removing the Heat Sink" on page 24.
8. Remove the power-adapter port. See "Removing the Power-Adapter Port" on page 29.
9. Remove the fan. See "Removing the Fan" on page 26.
10. Remove the I/O board. See "Removing the I/O Board" on page 31.
11. Remove the system board. See "Removing the System Board" on page 34.

Fucking insanity is right.

BOD

That is ridiculous considering (IMO at least), a keyboard is one of the parts of laptop that would need replacing. Wear and tear combined with drinks abuse means I go through keyboards at the rate of nearly one every 2 years.

FAMICOMASTER

In my opinion (which probably isn't going to matter much), the keyboard, display, battery, touchpad, and hard disk (and / or optical drive) should be really easy to replace / upgrade. The RAM would be a close second, but I don't see a good reason to make it a latching door. The most breakable things should be hard to replace, not the other way around!

Hopefully you can get that fixed. I'm having laptop troubles myself.

BlueSun

I haven't replaced the display in any of my thinkpads yet. But I did just replace the display in a Toshiba Satellite A660. They make it really easy. Just 4 screws to remove the front bezel and 6 screws hold the panel on to the hinges.

jakeypearce

That's what you have to do to remove the keyboard? I recently had to replace a keyboard on an old Dell Latitude D610 laptop. All you have to do is pop the bezel off with a screwdriver, take two 2.5" screws off, lift the keyboard up and remove the ribbon cable. That's all you have to do! Then you can repeat it in reverse for installation of the keyboard.

yourepicfailure

Ooh, had to change heatsink grease in my Inspiron 15r. (always do it when I buy a new laptop. Don't trust that cheap crap they lather on)
I ended up breaking 5 "snap" latches, and ended up with like 20 screws I couldn't find out where they went.
And just to swap hard drives, you must insert a flathead into a special spot on the cover, then three others in a specific order or you break it.
On top of that the caddy is designed so poorly you end up inserting the drive wrong 75% of the time, and not realize it until you try to put back the cover and it won't fit.

Don't even get started on those "top-of-the-line" laptops that need a "certified technician" to change the damn ram or battery. Screw that, I'll either DIM or just not buy that shit.
Now talk about insanity.

mrlt

Dell Latitude E5410 is just a single screw for almost everything. So the case falls apart a lot. Top replace the screen you just pull off the surround.
Decent design, bad execution.

Paul

I once closed my laptop lid onto a cigarette lighter and caused the same damage to the LCD screen. Fortunately I enjoy taking computers apart more than actually using them at this point.

wpblogheader

That's why you should get a MacBook. :P

dosbox

MacBooks are way overrated.

garirry

wpblogheader wrote:

That's why you should get a MacBook. :P

They aren't that much better in the repair department to be honest, they are repairable, just not easily.

dosbox wrote:

MacBooks are way overrated.

Not really. They're pretty hated to be honest.

wpblogheader

dosbox wrote:

MacBooks are way overrated.

So are UltraBooks.

Frankly, I don't see the point in spending 1000+ on a laptop. (MS Surface excluded)

I would rather buy a middle-of-the-road desktop.

calvinb

Except, you know, can't really use a desktop on a bus, or wherever.

wpblogheader

ampharos wrote:

Except, you know, can't really use a desktop on a bus, or wherever.

Ah. Forgot about that.

BlueSun

ampharos wrote:

Except, you know, can't really use a desktop on a bus, or wherever.

Actually... it depends on the desktop. If you got something with a sufficiently small form factor, such as a NUC... you could run it pretty easily on battery power.

As for the monitor / mouse / keyboard, they do make laptop-like units that can connect to the NUC... either that, or you could get a sufficiently small / low powered monitor and a small keyboard / mouse combo.

Certainly not practical by any stretch... but not impossible.

wpblogheader

BlueSun wrote:

ampharos wrote:

Except, you know, can't really use a desktop on a bus, or wherever.

Actually... it depends on the desktop. If you got something with a sufficiently small form factor, such as a NUC... you could run it pretty easily on battery power.

As for the monitor / mouse / keyboard, they do make laptop-like units that can connect to the NUC... either that, or you could get a sufficiently small / low powered monitor and a small keyboard / mouse combo.

Certainly not practical by any stretch... but not impossible.

It would certainly draw looks in public, though.