laptop repair bill?

balletshoes

We have an Advent (I think its a Roma 2001), its DD's laptop, she's had it for 2 years. It overheats (more than likely fluff as I understand, so I'm going to get a can of air) but there are a couple of other problems with it. It doesn't charge its battery at all, so it has to have the mains charger in it all the time to operate it. Also, within the last week or so, we have no sound coming out of it, the icons are still there, its not on mute, and if you put the volume up you just get lots of loud crackling/squealing when you raise and lower the lid of the laptop.

Anyone have any idea if all of these things are fixable, and at what cost roughly?

Thanks .

Loopz

Battery for that laptop goes for about £45 on ebay. The worry is that the overheating may have caused the sound chip or speaker to malfunction.

One way to check to see if it's the speaker, is to plug earphones in. If it plays ok through earphones then your speaker is the problem. If not then, it's most likely a hardware problem with your sound chip. There is a remote possibility it could be software related but do that test first and see how it is.

With the overheating, it's best to concentrate on clearing/cleaning the fan area and any air vents. If you can take plates off the laptop to help clean, then do that as well. These plates/clovers are normally to cover up hard disks, memory etc.

hope this helps a little.

HappyMJ

balletshoes wrote: »

We have an Advent (I think its a Roma 2001), its DD's laptop, she's had it for 2 years. It overheats (more than likely fluff as I understand, so I'm going to get a can of air) but there are a couple of other problems with it. It doesn't charge its battery at all, so it has to have the mains charger in it all the time to operate it. Also, within the last week or so, we have no sound coming out of it, the icons are still there, its not on mute, and it you put the volume up you just get lots of loud crackling/squealing when you raise and lower the lid of the laptop.

Anyone have any idea if all of these things are fixable, and at what cost roughly?

Thanks .

It is all fixable....but at what cost? A can of air won't fix the fluff problem you will have to get a screwdriver the repair manual (downloadable for free) and take it apart. You might also want to get some arctic silver and reapply that between the heatsink and CPU. The battery you can get quotes for just do an internet search and find one. Maybe about £30...

The sound however is a different issue and possibly by taking it apart and reseating everything that might just fix it but if it isn't that then you will have to determine which bit is faulty.

You could get a quote to fix it from the local computer repair shop or try and fix it yourself depending on how technical and confident you are.

I charge up to £25 an hour but base the time on what I estimate it would take to fix so I would quote a fixed price after looking at it. I would take it apart and put it all back together again for probably £25 without the cost of parts.

balletshoes

thanks, just tried the sound with the headphones, still getting the loud crackling and squealing sound through them. so is it a more serious issue than the speaker?

balletshoes

HappyMJ wrote: »

It is all fixable....but at what cost? A can of air won't fix the fluff problem you will have to get a screwdriver the repair manual (downloadable for free) and take it apart. You might also want to get some arctic silver and reapply that between the heatsink and CPU. The battery you can get quotes for just do an internet search and find one. Maybe about £30...

The sound however is a different issue and possibly by taking it apart and reseating everything that might just fix it but if it isn't that then you will have to determine which bit is faulty.

You could get a quote to fix it from the local computer repair shop or try and fix it yourself depending on how technical and confident you are.

I charge up to £25 an hour but base the time on what I estimate it would take to fix so I would quote a fixed price after looking at it. I would take it apart and put it all back together again for probably £25 without the cost of parts.

I'm not laptop-savvy at all, so it would need to get a quote from the local computer repair shop I think, thanks.

Loopz

balletshoes wrote: »

thanks, just tried the sound with the headphones, still getting the loud crackling and squealing sound through them. so is it a more serious issue than the speaker?

It's a hardware fault by the looks of things. To be honest, this is where you do need to get a quote for a fix and then you need to way up the options of whether it's worth fixing. The overheating is a bad sign and could have already caused other damage waiting to happen.

Grab a quote from your local IT repair and report back with what they say. They may just write it off though.

balletshoes

thanks guys, one last question (although I'm aware this might be a how-long-is-a-piece-of-string one) - with the cost of the new battery, cost for computer techie guy to look at the laptop, and then fix what might be broken, is it likely to get near £150 or more?

Loopz

It's hard to say as you have already pointed out. The big issue is the sound problem. Overheating can be cleared but within time it will come back. The battery is easily fixed and you can do that yourself by purchasing off ebay. So the last 2 problems, wouldnt cost that much.

It's not a high spec laptop so i would seriously start looking at purchasing a new one, as well as getting a quote. There are not many who would actually attempt the sound issue. IF it is hardware which is liekely and remember it's not the speaker because of the test you did. It's pointing at the actual sound chip on the motherboard. Most IT guys wont attempt a fix but instead replace the board. Replacement motherboard on ebay is about 80 quid.

so 80 + 45 is 125 pounds. Then you have to add on top of that labour. It's going to cost a lot of money.

andy2004

or to get around the sound by a £4 usb sound card of ebay
something like this
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/USB-External-3D-7-1-Channel-Audio-PC-Sound-Card-Adapter-/200673605777?pt=UK_Computing_ComputerComponents_SoundCards&hash=item2eb9143891
or this one
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/PORTABLE-USB-2-0-3D-VIRTUAL-5-1CHANNEL-PC-SOUND-CARD-/290366278243?pt=UK_Computing_ComputerComponents_SoundCards&hash=item439b2dca63

baza52

people are far too quick to write laptops off in my opinion.
As Andy2004 said, USB soundcards are very cheap and will fix the sound problem. Using air to clear any of the airways will only have a positive effect. Batteries can be bought cheaply on ebay but wont last as long as a branded one. Failing that, just use it connected to the mains with a £4 USB sound card until you can replace it.

Mista_C

Try reinstalling the sound card drivers before you take it in. If it is the Advent Roma 2001 (ECS I50IL1) then you should have the Realtek ALC662 HD sound card in there. The links below are the drivers for this card from the Lenovo website...

Windows XP
Vista/Windows 7

Also, IIRC, that model has a large panel on the underside that gives direct access to the heat sink, fan and CPU without taking the whole thing apart. You should be able to unscrew the panel and get at the dusty fan with very little trouble.