[plug] Fluid damage to Laptop

[Kev]

Jonathan Young wrote:
> Hi All
>
> This week I am looking at a laptop which has been potentially damaged by
> fluid ingression.  In other words, a glass of red wine was spilt next to
> it and a fair amount managed to land on the keyboard, the upward facing
> left speaker and the remainder washed around the based of the laptop
> where it sat on the desk before anyone could react.  It is a Toshiba
> laptop and won't be cheap to replace.
>
> On the plus side, the laptop was immediately unplugged, switched off
> (power button held down for 10 seconds), the battery and hard drive
> removed (all data is safe and sound) and nothing went "pop - bang" at
> the time.  In fact, it continued to play the music/video it was
> processing during the ordeal and the screen showed everything normal
> until it was forced to turn off.
>
> On the down side, wine literally poured back out of it (mainly from the
> speaker) and it was nearly a full 300ml that went "missing" and then
> came back out.
>
> On the plus side, after it was manually cleaned as much as possible, it
> was tipped upside down with paper towel between the screen and keyboard
> and has been that way (on a slight angle) for 24 hours ++.  Not a drop
> has appeared on the paper towel during that time.  The design of the
> base of the laptop also meant that four rubber feet kept it raised off
> the table by around 2mm - just enough to keep the wine off the base. 
> For example, none of the stickers or labels are even remotely stained. 
> The CD-RW drive which is immediately behind the speaker was spotless
> which implies a separate cavity for the speaker cone inside the chasis.
>
> So......
>
> Is it worth pulling it apart to see what the insides look like and/or to
> do further cleaning?
>
> How long should it be left to dry before being powered back up for a test
> run?
>
> If it boots, what tests can be done before putting the hard drive back in
> to ensure it won't short out and damage the drive for instance?
>
> If it boots, what will it take before it can be trusted again - can it be
> left switched on when no-one is home?
>
> If it appears to have survived, what can some evaporated wine crystals or
> residue do to the insides of a laptop that might cause it to die
> prematurely in the coming months?
>
> And lastly, what do pluggers think of people eating and drinking around
> their computers, especially laptops where the risk is more than just a
> $10 replacement keyboard?
>
> All suggestions, personal experiences and especially technical facts
> would be appreciated.  I'd really like to save this one, though the
> temptation is to hit the button now and see what happens...!
>   
So long as you can disassemble down to just cct boards - with NO moving 
parts etc - you can wash it with the garden hose if you like!  I've done 
similar many times on all sorts of equipment.  It's things like 
switches, plugs/sockets etc which will give the heartaches.  Even there, 
I've hosed off many a board and then flushed out all the annoying bits 
with metho (or some other alcohol form - must be hygroscopic) and had 
most come back to full, productive life again.  Main things to be sure 
of are that you dry off the board PROPERLY afterwards - metho followed 
by hair dryer works most of the time, and that you ensure that switches 
and plugs are clean and dry.  I use metho because it absorbs all the 
water (prevents oxidation in the solder joints), evaporates away easily 
and what residue it does leave has been harmless so far.

Best o' luck

-- 
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Kev Downes
kdownes at tpg.com.au  ph 0404 7 0808 2
We use and recommend Xandros 3.0.2
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