Dropping a Laptop Won't Always Cause Severe Damage

by Graham Kelly
http://www.trilogicuk.co.uk

Rarely can you drop your laptop without it suffering severe damage. Often the damage isn't immediately obvious; this article describes the likely outcome.

If it was dropped on a corner or edge then you definitely are more likely to see cracks in this area, however, cracks and chips are likely to be seen almost anywhere around the case. They are the obvious signs of damage. Cracks usually only affect the appearance of the laptop and should not alter or affect the performance so can usually be ignored, however they indicate that the laptop has been dropped from quiet a height and further hidden damage could possibly be present.

When a laptop is dropped or banged when turned on then the hard disk drive will almost certainly be damaged. You will most likely see any of these symptoms of this:-clicks and banging noises, operating system not seen, crashing during operating system load, very slow operating system load, very slow laptop operation. If you observe any of these symptoms then a hard disk drive has probably been damaged and will require to be replaced immediately. If you have important data then recovery ought to be attempted quickly as the greater it is used when damaged the less likely it's to permit data recovery. If the laptop was turned off then the hard disk is probable ok, however, if it was set in sleeping mode then the hard disk drive may have been operational but will almost certainly be damaged.

Check the display; if you observe any cracks, lines or bars down or across the screen, blotches or what looks like ink leaking then the screen has been damaged during the fall. Once broken, a laptop screen will need to be replaced as it can't be repaired. It is a job for a laptop repair specialist as the new screen can easily be damaged during fitting.

When a laptop is dropped on its power connector, often the internal connections of this connector are damaged. Occasionally this is easy to see where the connector breaks or is bent. Based on the degree of damage and force you may find that the connector gets very hot during charging or operation or will not operate at all. This might indicate failure of the inner power connector.

If you have checked for obvious damage but still your laptop does not power up then it is possible a RAM chip has come loose from its socket. The majority of recent laptops employ a RAM flap underneath secured by screws; remove this and make certain the chips are correctly inserted and haven't become detached.

Assuming that you have checked all the above hints and still your laptop does not power up properly then there might be a fault on the motherboard. It is mounted within the laptop case. The motherboard inside a laptop can easily be broken when subject to dropping. Copper tracks may break or electronic components may be broken or cracked when the motherboard is stressed. If a laptop motherboard is broken it willit will eventually either need repairing or replacing; repair is a very specialized job and is just done by a small number of laptop repair companies.

The conclusion is always to handle your laptop very carefully, especially when turned on avoiding expensive repairs bills and potential data loss. Graham has had many years experience repairing defective laptops, netbooks, notebooks and is able to recover flash drive data; specialising in fixing motherboards at component level for http://www.trilogicuk.co.uk. Laptop repair is difficult however is extremely rewarding when an obscure fault is located and fixed.

Article submitted Friday, September 16, 2011 & read 20 times.

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