global Laptop and motherboard repair tutorial | Page 39

So you have now ruled out the Battery, the DC Jack, the RAM (memory) and the hard drive as being
the causing issue. Note here, that, you have ruled out the DC Jack simply because it is powering on
initially, then, shutting down. If the jack were faulty, you would get no power initially, or the
shutdowns would be more sporadic and only occur when the cord or plug were moved slightly.
Battery was ruled out simply for the fact that removing it didn’t change the fault.
S o, now that you still have a laptop that won’t power on properly, and you have ruled out the
easier parts/components, you will now have to move on to disassembling the laptop to begin
troubleshooting and viewing all parts and components.
While disassembling the laptop, you will be looking for certain things along the way as the root of
the failure causing the laptop to not power up properly. You will basically be looking at everything.
Something as simple as crossing pins inside the Ethernet/cat5 cable input port that are bent and
touching one another, or possibly even crossed pins inside the USB port can cause the laptop to
power on then shut down. So you will need to closely look at all parts and components now to
determine where the failure has occurred.
Your mindset now will be … looking for signs of liquid damage, looking for motherboard damage,
looking for blown components.
Blown components you say? Yes, and quite common though nothing like a Desktop computer
component failure. The only similarity between a desktop motherboard and a laptop motherboard
when relating board failures…. Is the failure of Capacitors. The failing of capacitors is probably the
most common component that fails on either board. Remember here that the capacitors on a laptop
motherboard differ from those on a desktop computers motherboard. Though some laptop
motherboards will use electrolytic capacitors, the majority of capacitors on a laptop motherboard
will be tantalum capacitors (no gasses).
I will elaborate more on motherboard components in a bit, now we will discuss what to look for
with liquid damage to a laptop and why that could be the reason for the laptop not powering up
correctly.