global Laptop and motherboard repair tutorial | Page 23

hard drive, the Wireless card, RAM, and similar. The hard drive will sometimes have a caddie, and
the caddy’s purpose is to secure the laptop to the hard drive. A caddie will wrap the drive or will
cover one side of the drive then will be secured with small thick screws (usually 2 to 4). The hard
drive and caddie will then slide into the hard drive port (whether SATA or PATA is irrelevant) or it
will use a ZIF connection and pull away from the port. Use the installed pull tab on the hard drive to
either slide or pull the hard drive away from the laptop. Some hard drives will be secured to the
laptop and some will not. Once the hard drive is removed, look in the empty hard drive bay for any
screws there. Remove any screws in that bay.
Next part to remove is any Wi-Fi Card and antenna wires. You will typically find the Wireless
card on the bottom side of the laptop. Most models will allow you to leave this card installed and
will not hinder the disassembly process. The Wi-Fi antenna cables are what you want to remove…
You will disconnect the 2 (or more) antenna wires and un-route them from the case track. These
wires will typically run up to the upper-side of the motherboard and you need to allow them to be
pulled away from the upper side by loosening them and untracking them on the underside. Remove the
card also if needed.
Continue on removing the bottom base screws, all along the front of the laptop (still on the bottom
side), usually there are 4 to 6 in the front, sometimes a sticker or rubber plug is hiding the screw, you
will remove any blocking tab and remove the screw.
When removing the CD/DVD rom, you need to visualize the actual size and shape of that drive in
relation to its location on the laptop and remove the securing screw at the rear of the cd rom drive
which you will typically find located near the center of the laptop and it will almost always have a
perforated Icon imprinted on the bottom case right next to the corresponding screw hole.
Since I mentioned these imprinted icons, I will now elaborate on them and their use. If you look
closely at the bottom of the laptop, you will see Icons near some of the screw holes. Typically the
RAM has an Icon, the Wi-Fi will also have an icon, the hard drive will have an Icon, the keyboard
screw locations will have an icon, and the cd drive locking hole will have an icon. It is also common
for a Screw length guide to be located somewhere on the underside of the laptop, either imprinted
directly into the plastic, or printed onto a sticker.
Once you have removed the screw that secures the optical drive in place you will need to slide it