Can laptops be repaired?

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memory

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My sister has a laptop that is not working right now. The motherboard went bad. The laptop is an HP Pavilion dv2000. To get it fixed she was told it would cost around 500 to 600 dollars. She can't afford that right now. My question is could I fix this myself? Can you even buy motherboards for laptops? If I can't fix it, could I sell parts off of it like the processor, cd drive, or anything else?
 
Yes, it is fixable. it just tkes a bit more patience when working on a lappy. ;)

Jorsoft could probably point you to hardware vendors, as he is the resident expert in that ara.
 
Make sure that it really is the motherboard that needs to be replaced. There could be a few different scenarios in which the motherboard may not need to be replaced.

If the motherboard does need to be replaced then yes... it can be fixed, just expect it to take a good long while taking the laptop apart (as i just spent over an hour taking apart a presario just to find out an inner screw has been stripped-neat).
 
they are much harder to deal with, but dealable nontheless. you'll have to buy a new mobo, generally off a 3rd party dealer or off ebay, but it will be costly.. I'd recommend trying to get a new laptop on black friday or something for around 300 bucks. Check out the price of a new board, and then scope out if it makes more sense to get a whole new setup.

looks to be what you need, but at a premium...
HP DV2000 COMPAQ V3000 431843-001 motherboard - eBay (item 220312147893 end time Nov-16-08 23:58:13 PST)
 
How can you tell it was the motherboard, first of all? I'm assuming she took it to Geeksquad or similar. They tend to blame the mobo if the culprit isn't obvious and they will charge a small fortune to service it themselves.

If it is in fact the mobo it will cost $200-300 I think. You can do it yourself but it's a LOT of work, especially if you haven't serviced laptops before. Just like a desktop, you'll have to practically disassemble the whole thing and transplant everything.
 
She knows it is the motherboard because two different people told her this. There is also a recall on HP's website about the motherboard but hers is not included because it has a different processor.

She found this out talking to someone from HP support. She was mad when she found this out. Then they tried to get her to buy some kind of warranty package or something like that, she didn't. When HP knew she wasn't going to buy anything, the guy on the phone said this conversation has to end. Man, HP support sucks.

In the meantime, she is going to buy my old desktop until she can afford a laptop. She would much rather have a laptop for work and stuff. I think someone is trying to tell her something. This was her second laptop in about 3 years. The first one was stolen and now this motherboard crapping out. Someone up above doesn't want her to have a laptop, if you know what I mean.

This might be my little project to work on, to see if I can get it working. If I don't, no big loss. She wasn't going to get it fixed anyways.
 
HP support is great. Sorry you've had bad experiences. I just got 230 dollars worth of batteries for free b/c of a recall.

If your MB was truely recalled then you can send it into HP and they will send you a free one. In fact they will send you the replacement one before you have to send off yours. Seriously it can't be easier. Go to HP's website to check if her model laptop was actually recalled and what procedures HP would like you to follow. Honestly my guess is if it was TRUELY RECALLED they will replaced the MB themselves for free.

Worse case scenario they send you a free MB (if really recalled) and you have to fix it yourself. As long as you are willing to take the time (2 hours for experienced people, probably 4 total for you since you haven't done it before) to replace it yourself you can definately do it yourself.
 
So then it is a different motherboard, so it probably isn't because of the recall.

Dependant upon the people telling me the MB was bad would indicate how much weight I would put into them saying the MB needs to be replaced. Someone from geek squad or just a family friend I wouldn't put much weight into it. Honestly that is the easiest solution to give someone - "just replace the MB." When in fact the issue could be the power connector, or a number of other things.

If you truely do believe your sources and are willing to drop 200 dollars or so on a new board in hopes they are right, then be my guest. If they are right and you perform the installation correctly you'll save yourself 150 to 250 bucks in labor opposed to taking it to a shop.

Check online to see if there are any detailed diagrams of how to take the laptop apart. Compaq (now owned by HP) usually does a great job of posting diagrams of their laptops and how to replace individual parts.
 
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