Damn Dell

Ok, here is my story. I have a Dell Inspiron 5100. The power supply on the thing had been acting up for like a month. Me acting like an Idiot didn't order another one. Well Now I have a problem. Not the one your thinking. I fixed the power supply so it would work. (For those wondering I will explain that long ass topic in a PM if you want to know.) Well I got the Power supply to work. No Problems at all. But then me being a complete retard, I got up from my desk and accidentally yanked the power supply out of my Laptop. Right after this happened. I heard a senge, like something fried. I orgionally thought that I had fried the Power Supply. But after trying several different types of Power Supplys, I figure that my Mother Board is probably fried.

Now I have 2 questions 1 does Dell even sell Laptop MotherBoards?

2 Does anyone know if an Inspiron 5100 will only work with it's own power supply cord. I have tried different models and different adapters, none of them worked. So I am not positive.

Oh and one other thing. Has anyone else seen the New Dell XPS Laptop that thing is Bad ass. I caught an article about it in Maximum PC. Man that thing is just pretty. 3.4gig processor. I mean everything on that thing is just crazy bad.

For those that are Slang lackeys. Bad means good. (Don't ask, I didn't come up with the term.)

:)

Dell even sell Laptop MotherBoards?

Your best bet is to trying finding one on Ebay.

Does anyone know if an Inspiron 5100 will only work with it's own power supply cord. I have tried different models and different adapters, none of them worked. So I am not positive.

I was able to use an similar model on an old laptop I had, so I would have to say if the connector fit and the wattage was the same, you should be fine.

Has anyone else seen the New Dell XPS Laptop.

Yes, it is very nice, a little bit cheaper than the Alienware, but the Alienware is smaller, better looking, lighter, and has a swappable video card.

How much is the Alienware. The Dell XPS is $4100

gee that does sound unfortunate.. why not take it apart to see if there's any obvious damage ?
maybe a fuse on the motherboard ? what, you heard it sizzle ? you said senge.. not sure what that is. a surge ? it doesn't seem likely that you've fry it by ripping out the plug on it's AC adapter.. maybe you just ruined the connector. If you decide to toss it.. send me a pm.. I might be willing to pay postage and try to hack the thing back together. :D

jenjen I am more likely to Engineer Dell into sending me another before I tos it. I did take it apart I didn't see any noticable damage, besides a circuit that looks like it is a bit burnt. Yeah I meant "surged".

I am guessing I am going to just have to call Dell and see if they sell mother boards. If they don't it came under a 1 yr warranty but, I don't know if they cover the Motherboard. (Knowing how their sorry ass Warranties are.)

I'm sure that for their repairs they simply replace components anyways. I remember people discussing the topic and it somehow reached a concensus that it was much cheaper to simply replace things that were potentially broken than to pay someone to figure out what is wrong with it, and eventually replace it.

As for Dell acturally selling the mainboards by themselves... I don't know. But if it was sent in for repairs you'd either get someone else's lappy or your own with a replaced motherboard.

And another AC->DC power converter thing would work provided the voltage and amperage is the same.

No Dell wont send you any intenal spares for any of their products! No matter what you do or say!

They will issue spares out to recognised Dell repair outlets but thats about it.

It would be a lot easier for you to send it away to be fixed as changing a Mo/Bo on a lap top is no where near as straight forward as it is an a PC especially if you havent done it before.

As for your power cord, as someone has already said, as long is it is producing the correct amount of power it will work.

However I dont think that ripping your power cord out would have had any effect on your Mo/Bo (apart from maybe the actual power socket) didnt your battery kick in? It is more likley to have effected your Hard Drive.

What happenes when you try to boot up?

Nokia, don't take my questions as though they are coming from a End User. I have already knew about the voltage. I also know that the battery should kick in.

I wasn't sure if they would send you the parts and I have taken Laptops apart before, one of the benefits of being friends with the IT at your job.

I really don't want to send it in for repairs. I have a hdd full of pirated software. Not that I really care if they know. I have several things on it that I really need. But oh well. I also have the source for a Program that I am working on that I don't have the source written down anywhere else. (That teaches me not to save important stuff to multiple computers.)

Actually, Nokia to be honest your MB would get damage from a surge before your Hdd would. Just a note.

Oh well, guess I have to start that project from the beginning again. Oh well.

Thanks for the help.

Oh and the Laptop does boot it's just that if fails, because the power is dead. The power was dead when I ripped the cord out.

There are laptop->desktop HDD converters. That way you could just toss that laptop HDD into your desktop PC and copy whatever you want over before sending it in for repairs (if you do that). I don't remember what they are called, but it should be pretty easy to find one and you won't have to start your project from scratch again...


IMO $4,000 is a lot for a laptop...and I've never seen that Dell model around (I don't follow laptops much) For less $$$ try a Sager? (Alienware and Sager are both Clevo Resellers - http://www.clevo.com.tw/ ) I still don't have a laptop of my own though...

just a note, taking the power cord out of your laptop wont cause a surge as there wont be any power to surge anywhere.

Removing power from a system suddenly, 9 times out of 10 will damage the HDD if it damages anything at all.

Yanking a power cord forcefully from a side angle could short the motherboard out, those connectors inside aren't that ruggedized. It's just a connector soldered onto the board, you can even wiggle some of them with or without the cord plugged in. Either something shorted on the board related to power or the socket came loose. If your willing try reheating the power connector with a soldering iron? Actually that is a high risk and I am leary recomending it if your not careful with heat, just a quick dab on each connector pin.

Since you were "playing" with the power supply, yanking it out could have jostled something and caused a splinter surge, but I would bet physical connector damage versus that scenario. In worse case the board got twisted a little and a run or 2 got crossed. Those things have many layers under the plastic coating, pretty spiffy.

My friend has the ALienware laptop, whew expensive but very "kick ass".

Dell sends me and my staff parts all the time. I bet they are leary at home based end users. The business division works a little different. To date this year I have reveived 3 motherboards, 3 hard drives and one laptop power supply. I had an issue where you have to wiggle the connector to get the power to go AC off the laptop battery. It turned out to be the power supply connector wore down enough to not make decent contact, versus a problem with the laptop itself.

I have to agree with RoadClosed I broke the connectors on my laptop pretty much the same way. I risked it and soldered it my self and lucked out that I had no problems. He's right it is not an easy job. And I hear Nokia, dead HDDs bite.

Both the new Dell and the Alienware are awesome. If you are looking for a good comparison chek out TechTV's gaming laptop roundup. They had the Dell winning on pure proformance, but the Alienware on over all.