How To Find Out If A Laptop Has CPU's Soldered?

Marv02

Hi,

My little brother was granted a laptop by a Govt scheme. Now, they top you up £400 onto a special card, and you can only shop at specific retailers, and only buy specific laptops/computers. So please do not comment that I should go buy an i3 laptop from PC World instead, as this is not possible. (way to see our tax bucks at work...)

Now, they have two laptops our of the lot they've given us to choose from which are semi-good. One of them is a Samsung R519 Celeron Dual Core, and the other is TOSHIBA C650 but with a single core celeron.

Now my question is, is there anyway to find out if the Toshiba C650 has its CPU soldered? Because I wanted to get the Toshiba instead as it came with more RAM and a bigger HDD, and it looks WAY better then the Samsung. My idea was to just buy a simple Dual Core (motherboard supports C2D too) from ebay and chuck it in there.

Please reply ASAP as they are running out of stock for the both of them.

Regards.

Parva

I'm no laptop expert but I would be amazed if you found a laptop that does not have a soldered CPU. Laptop CPU's are not considered to be swappable items for upgrades and if you think about the extra dimensions required to make a connector where you could swap CPU's it would likely make the laptop several millimetres 'fatter', which is the last thing you would look for in a nice sized laptop.

Hammyman

Parva's comment is completely wrong, I've yet to find a laptop with a soldered CPU and I repair them for a living. A CPU socket adds about 1 to 1.5mm and is well within the space available because there are other components on the mainboard which are far taller than a CPU socket/CPU/heatsink arrangement. Just think about it. The manufacturers order boards by the 10,000's. They have no idea when they order the board what CPU combination is going to be popular or when they're designing them what Intel CPUs will actually be around and they'd be left with a massive pile of unusable mainboards if the CPU was hard soldered.

You can do what you're thinking however it will most likely invalidate any warranty as its pretty much going to require the complete base of the laptop removing. The number of laptops where the CPU can be accessed via a flap are very few and far between.

TBH, the Samsung R519 would have been the better choice. 2GB of RAM is more than plenty for 99% of people using home computers, as is even an 80GB HDD. A dual core CPU is pretty much a must nowadays though.

Chimpofdoom

Hammyman wrote: »

Parva's comment is completely wrong, I've yet to find a laptop with a soldered CPU and I repair them for a living. A CPU socket adds about 1 to 1.5mm and is well within the space available because there are other components on the mainboard which are far taller than a CPU socket/CPU/heatsink arrangement. Just think about it. The manufacturers order boards by the 10,000's. They have no idea when they order the board what CPU combination is going to be popular or when they're designing them what Intel CPUs will actually be around and they'd be left with a massive pile of unusable mainboards if the CPU was hard soldered.

You can do what you're thinking however it will most likely invalidate any warranty as its pretty much going to require the complete base of the laptop removing. The number of laptops where the CPU can be accessed via a flap are very few and far between.

TBH, the Samsung R519 would have been the better choice. 2GB of RAM is more than plenty for 99% of people using home computers, as is even an 80GB HDD. A dual core CPU is pretty much a must nowadays though.

Indeed and if you had to upgrade it, it would be far easier upgrading the HDD and RAM than the CPU!

Dave101t

id question the point of being on a benefit where you get something for free, then take it apart, probably breaking it in the process, just to 'upgrade' it.

JasX

Agree with the above, CPU will not be soldered however will be a pain to get at -google the laptop name plus "service manual" for step by step instructions, stripping it down will be time consuming, require moderate technical ability and not be risk free (take anti-static precautions, don't forget to order thremal paste for re-atttaching the CPU heatsink properly or your new expensive CPU will melt).

I would suggest as above you consider getting the better CPU model and upgrading other parts if required.

Marv02

Dave101t wrote: »

id question the point of being on a benefit where you get something for free, then take it apart, probably breaking it in the process, just to 'upgrade' it.

guys guys, relax I'm a techie myself I was just asking regarding these specific laptops in question. All my life, like above I have never seen soldered CPU's the only problem is, with my time spent on TomsHardware everyone keeps talking of soldered CPU's on newer laptops and wanted to check if the above were soldered from factory.

Thanks.

PS: The samsung has 1GB with 160GB the Toshiba has 2GB DDR3 with 250GB, so its pretty much more worth it, plus looks way better. Problem is, it's not dual core. (but supports dual-core.)