Coffee on Laptop nightmare?

Danger!

For some people, spilt coffee on their laptop spells disaster. For others, it’s the beginning of a new challenge, a journey of geek research, experimentation and eventually – fulfillment.

My friend recently spilled coffee on his laptop. Afterwards his PC went on strike. Refusing to boot for longer than 5 minutes at a time. This article documents his research into possible replacement models and eventually his desperate resurrection attempts prove fruitful thanks to that friend of many – alcohol. In this case iso propyl-alcohol (rubbing alcohol to many, propan-2-ol to chemists such as myself)

Well that’s the executive summary now over to Dudley:

Notebook Research Feb 2010

Hewlett Packard Laptops (HP Notebook):

Overall unimpressed by their offerings. they seemed to be behind in the implementing the newer micros. Even the high end notebooks (80-90000) used the core 2 duo and came with 1-2 gb memory and windows 7 pro x32.  They were not clear in their glossies what the upgrade possibilities were but since the prices were already sky high I really did not want to check. Yes I know that you are happy with the core 2 Duo but most notebooks with that are limited to 4 GB memory and “slightly” slower. Most new laptops are either i3, I5, or i7. I think that the core 2’s are on par with the i5 performance wise but the i5/i7 offerings could handle 8 GB memory.

Comment from Dominic: Yes HP are usually behind most other vendors in terms of using the latest technology but my understanding is they have more extensive stability tests and more rigorous compatibility tests with all drivers, so if you want to be sure – a HP system has some value.

Asus Notebooks, Asus Laptops

I did not check them out as thoroughly but I got the same impression that there offerings were the same as HP. The only one that caught my attention was a ultra low voltage offering. It looked nice but I knew that the lower performance of this class would drive me crazy. The 10 hour battery life would not make up for that. All their other offering that I saw were Core 2 , 4 gb memory.

Dell Notebooks, Dell Laptops

I almost hit the buy button for one on Malaysia online.  Basically all their new computers were i3, i5, i7 with Windows 7 x64 as standard. Some of these were limited to win7 pro since they did not have a TPM (security) chip. Without the TPM you have to go in to the policies setting of win7 ultimate to activate the ultimate’s bitlocker (which works really well and transparently). I know that you are not big on security but I generally have all my financial access on the laptop and desktop. Without my usb key I want that computer to be nothing more than a paperweight.  The model that intrigued me offered “windows 7 ultimate x64″, 256 GB SSD for only a 9000Baht (converting from ringit) upgrade, and a RGBLED display (no LCD filter in front of white LED’s, the led’s are the display)  from 6000 baht upgrade. My techie side was hooked. The only thing that stopped me was that I was not in Malaysia and would have had to bother a friend to take delivery if I ordered last week. I actually decided to do that and execute my order last night at which time I saw Dell had doubled the SSD price. I was angered and sent them an email telling them about what I thought of them.  Besides in 6 months they will probably offer the same thing with a win7 touch screen which can be really nice on a laptop.

Acer Laptops, Acer Notebooks

Speaking of the win7 touch screen, after I got through with my Dell email I had resolved to head to the acer store and by there really nice win7 touch screen model. It is slick.  I was tempted to buy it a few days back but was put off by the core 2 Duo and 4 gb memory limit. All their other new offerings were the more modern micros with 8 gb memory limits. They were also very nice.

In summary in my opinion Dell and Acer have the best newer, progressive offerings with Dell being the most expensive. The USA market order would by HP, Dell, and Acer  as1st, 2nd and 3rd respectively in market share but HP had better offer something new fast if they want to maintain their lead. Dell is slipping because they have a price problem with their superior offerings.

That said  I was going to buy the Acer Core 2 duo touch screen model today (30K baht) but my old laptop suddenly came to life.

Why this quest for a new laptop?

For the last two months its run time life was 2 minutes before it would shutdown. As a last ditch attempt to keep it running I got the isopropyl alcohol out and squirted it into the cpu heatsink exhaust port. A lot of nasty stuff came out and it ran for 15 minutes before it went into hibernation on low battery. After that it refused to even go through the post and try to restart for the next 5 days. Last night I opened up to expose its innards and turn the aircon up to 30C to let it “bake” and air out overnight. This morning it started right up and has been running for 6 hours and the CPU heatsink seems to be subjectively much cooler. Before the alcohol douche it would burn the finger.

I would have tried to remove the heat sink and clean it properly but after 5 years the old heat transfer compound has probably welded it to the micro. Besides that i was tired of the trips to the IT centers hence the midnight all or nothing alcohol douche.. Time to get on the Malaysia ebay and get a new battery out of Singapore. I may be good for another 5 years. (wishful thinking).

Update – 2 hours later.

The 5 year old laptop is still going strong after 10 hours. I could have avoided the 5 days dry out time by aiming the syringe down instead of up. As it turns out the fan shroud has a bottom but no top so basically I shot the mother board as it sprayed through the heat sink fins. I could have aimed it downward.

That said if Acer offers the touch screen with an I5 or I7 with 8 gb of memory the 5 year old laptop is going in the dumpster (or to Megan).  If Dell offers the xps 16 with an ssd and RGBLED with touch screen option the geek side of me would crater in an instant even. I could not resist at any price.  They better do so before Acer comes out with a decent MB to go with their Windows 7 touch screen.

You just know that Dell has to come out with a full Windows 7 laptop. Dell already has the full Win7 ultimate x64 support but how could they have not have a two finger touch screen within 6 months. By the same token Acer has the Win7 two finger touch screen (and touch pad) and it is very nice. What moron decided to saddle it with one of their older mother boards. That has to be a 6 months stop gap measure.

In any event the two companies are so close how could they not complete the Win 7 experience within 6 months. That is my next decision point. In the mean time this email is being written on the laptop which has been now running for 12 hours without shutting down. It has not done that in 6 months. Praise isopropyl.

Of course I note that they have started producing IDE SSD’s . I first found them on the Malaysia EBAY sourced out of China through Singapore but since them I note that others are producing them also in the rest of the world.  That would be a perfect upgrade for the 5 year old laptop if Dell and Acer disappoints me again.

The price of SSD’s is scheduled to drop by 50% this fall. That is when they start production on the 25nm lines. So if you can wait 12 months your going to be making big savings.

That was going to be the windup but I just saw the following on a google search for SATA 6.0.

“Unless you’re running a RAID array or plan to switch up to solid-state drives anytime soon, SATA 6Gbps is more a buzzword than consumer benefit”.