DELL Inspiron 2600 Laptop

Just received a 2600 for repair w/ a soda spill on the keyboard.

The rest of the laptop looks alright so our customer will just need a new keyboard.

This one is not in stock but will arrive in approx 3 days.

A Best Buy customer..

Well BB did it- they destroyed another customer's data.

Anita now has an IT attorney.

Shuttle X desktop PC (another unhappy Intrex customer)

This Shuttle X desktop just arrived.

Our customer, Derrick, has installed what is called a BIOS overlay. This allows a computer to run a larger hard drive on an older system that normally would not support such a large drive. In this case, the computer has a 200GB Western Digital hard drive.

A file is missing that is required to run Windows XP. Our customer needs over 150GB of data safely returned. Apparently the people at this particular Intrex location do not know what a BIOS overlay software is, because they told him his data was gone.

We'll see. An update will be posted shortly.

Fujitsu Lifebook N3010 P4 Laptop

This one just came in w/ no display...

More news to come...

Corporate Network DSL Install

Today we went on a service call to one of our corporate client's sites.

Verizon had installed DSL and no computers were able to get online. The install techs had told them the computers were infected with viruses.

3 of the computers needed to be cleansed of spyware. A new (working) router and a 10/100 switch fixed up the connectivity issues. We were in and out in under 3hrs.

You can learn more about our onsite services here:
http://www.absoluteraleigh.com/cary_onsite_service.html

Gateway Desktop

Another desktop came in today infected with spyware.

Often we remove the spyware but in this case, a reload of the customer's OS was in order.

IBM ThinkPad R31 2656-EFU - no display

This one came in and needed an inverter, FRU 26P8139.

The part was in stock. The complete repair was under $100.

DELL CPX Laptop

This one just came in and certain keys do not work.

The condition of the keyboard has been deteriorating.

CPX keyboards are in stock which will likely fix this one. On rare occasions these symptoms are cause by a bad motherboard. We should have news on this one on Monday.

Toshiba Satellite 2405-S201 Laptop

This heavily used laptop just came in...

It appears that the LCD cable has given up. Not quite sure yet..

Samsung 213T 21.3" LCD

One of our customers just purchased a NICE computer from us. His LCD just came in which he already picked up. The LCDs go for ~$650 after end user rebates.

An original pic is not available but we found one on the net that shows off the LCD:

IBM ThinkPad T20 2647-PW1 Laptop

This one has "been running slow and freezing up"

Our drive test revealed that this hard drive has unrecoverable lost sectors.

A new 30GB will take care of that.

The part was in stock @ $79. Repair took under 48hrs.

We also salvaged some data from the defective drive.

Dell Latitude CP

Just got in a CP, 233Mhz...

This one has a bad board.

Boards are in stock. In combination w/ the software issues the machine has, this repait is going to run just over $100...

Compaq E500 plastics

Got in a Compaq Armada E500 earlier- this one needed LCD plastics.

It turns out there are SEVERAL E500s out there w/ many different LCD configurations.

Amazingly, these parts were in stock. The repair was under $99 and took around 48hrs.

=)

Gateway Solo 9300

Bad hard drive...

Replaced w/ a new 20GB- part was in stock..

IBM ThinkPad T21 - no display

ThinkPad laptops are great machines- we just happen to get a lot of them in because we specialize in them.

This particular T21 came in yesterday- our customer figured the backlight was bad but it ended up needing a new LCD cable.

The part was in stock and the repair was under $99. The turnaround time was 24hrs.

Dell Inspiron C610 no video

Well this one came in last night w/ a very dim display. Our customer figured it needed a backlight but it ended up the inverter was bad.

This one had visible damage...

The part was in stock and her repair was under $99. She just picked her unit up in less than 24hrs after she dropped it off...

DELL Inspiron 5150

Well... Another 5150 has made its way in here. These are notorious for having a bad motherboard... The boards seem to last for 3 - 9 months on average. Dell sells new ones for $500. The only problem is that they're still selling the SAME defective motherboard.

Usually a manufacturer will issue a new revision of the board or something...

On top of that if you start talking about the defective machine in the Dell forums there is a good chance Dell will remove all of your posts. At the moment, if you go to the Dell forums and type in Dell 5150 reboot problem you will get around 500 posts...

The AC adapters for these are very fragile as well... That reminds me- i overnighted an AC adapter from Dell about 3 months ago which just arrived yesterday. I may just keep it- After a week of waiting and looking like a fool I had to buy the part from a third party- I spent 2hours and 10minutes on the phone w/ Dell reps from all over the planet attempting to cancel my order. VERY frustrating.

I have been upgrading/repairing PCs for 13yrs now and I have never seen such poor behavior from any company... (Well, maybe from a few small companies but they're gone now. )

Anyways, this particular 5150 is just sitting here for now while the customer thinks it over. We'll probably buy it and throw it into our growing pile of Dells... Later this year when we have more time we will explore the defects of the 5150 for possible solutions...

Compaq Presario 1700

Another unit has arrived with a bad motherboard...

It is bad motherboard week!

This customer decided to go with a ThinkPad T22 instead of repairing the Compaq which has multiple issues....

Asus Vento 3600 is here!

Well I had to order one of these...

Wow is it a cool case.

Another DELL Inspiron 600M

Well another 600M came in last night.

It bad a bad motherboard- surprise, surprise..

The customer wasn't very happy. He bought a ThinkPad T41 we had here for $1100. We took some $ off for his trade in. He is now very happy. The T41 is under IBM's warrantee until Jan 2007. How is that for peace of mind?

He told us it was the only T41 under $1700 he could find and will be sending us some customers.

His T41 is a 2373-4GU. It was all original except it had a new WD 60GB HD in it. Specs:
P M 1.6GHz, 512MB RAM, 40GB 5400rpm HDD, 14.1 XGA(1024X768) TFT LCD, 32MB ATI Radeon 7500, 16x10x24x/8x CD-RW/DVD, 802.11a/b/g wireless(MPCI), Bluetooth/Modem(CDC), 1Gb Ethernet(LOM), UltraNav, Secure Chip(TCPA), 6 cell Li-Ion battery, WinXP Pro

DELL Axim X50V Repair

An X50V came in a couple of days ago from the North Carolina Dept. of Justice.

It needed a new Touch Screen / Digitizer. Got the part in 48hrs and popped it in.

The D.O.J. calls around and goes with whoever has the lowest price.

I guess we had the best solution for them... =)

ThinkPad T30 - dead hard drive

T30 showed up today... This hard drive definately had a head crash.

For the first time all year someone had been keeping backups! What a releif. Laptop repair is great but informing people that all of their data has been permanently erased is no fun.

We installed a new WD600UE hard drive into their laptop. It is a Western Digital 60GB 5400RPM Hard Drive. I had not used a WD in a laptop before so i had to order some. It did its job.

My friend just pointed out to me that the WD600VE has an 8MB cache and is only slightly more $. I'll have to order some of those in a few minutes.

Len

IBM ThinkPad T21 repair

Another T21 came in- someone thought the LCD was shot.

Fortunately, it was just another bad LCD cable. We sell those for $39. They're in stock...

IBM ThinkPad T20

Another T20 came in today w/ what we call the "power light problem."

When you hit the power button the HD light blinks once. The system board (motherboard) is bad.

A couple of people have told me this is because of an overloaded cap... capacitor... Could be- we just replace them here though. We stock and sell T20 system boards for $99.

Inspiron 7500 motherboard

You wouldn't think a PII could cause so much trouble.

I'm not going into details but this laptop was just one of those rare time consuming repairs...

Argh..

Len

Virus Blog

Here's the best virus blog on Earth:
http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/

IBM ThinkPad 600 161, 163 error

Got in a ThinkPad 600 today...

This one has a bad CMOS battery. We stock parts for these... The batteries go for $15...

Compaq EVO N800V Laptop Repair

EVO N800V.

Bad motherboard. This one would work fine until you moved the laptop, then it would reboot...

Zap.

Len

Inspiron 600M Repair

Got another 600M in.... Out of warranty. Bad motherboard...

Dell motherboards are very sensetive so we usually buy them from Dell because they provide a 90day warranty w/ them.

The 600M boards are currently $395.The reps will quote you around $460 but you can tell them you're only interested in buying it at $395 and they will lower the price. I have never seen anything like it before...

W/ the boards already being expensive we just pass them along to our customers at cost and charge the labor to install...

Len

Cool Case! Asus Vento 3600

Well I have been waiting years to see some good cases for the public.

Finally, ASUS started making cases. They already make the best motherboards and have several quality products- now cases are here, too.

Here's a review:
http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1558,1763332,00.asp

Len

Blog Test, Post #1

Well here it is. Post #1 to our new weblog. I have been putting off blogging for years because I wanted to be the last person to ever create a blog. Millions of them keep popping up so I figured we would start now.

This particular blog is going to be a company weblog.

AbsoluteRaleigh.com (Absolute Computers) is a laptop repair company. We're going to be posting about laptops we get in for repair- maybe even more- who knows!

- Len (Owner)
Absolute Computers
www.AbsoluteRaleigh.com