This part came off the HDD ribbon..

Guys this little white bracket came off the hdd caddy ribbon that connects onto the MB. It came off far too easy, its goes back on but doesnt fit tightly.
Is this normal ? or have a damaged it?

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I have the same problem wasn't too gentle with it but it holds well for me.

 

There is a white bracket, that can EXTREMLY GENTLE be lifted (if you have to use any force, you are doing it wrong). when the bracket is lifted to 'up' position, you can insert the ribbon and GENTLY push down the bracket.

 

Thanks guys, Im a little worried since it pretty much came out by itself. I was being EXTREMELY gentle too...

 

I know, it is a very loose. I take it out before taking out the caddy, so i won't destroy anything

 

Gotta it back on fine, its probably one of the most fragile pieces in the machine

 

Same problem here. Now I have to use a pair of tweezers to remove and install it. Does the same job either way...it is just a wedge to hold the ribbon connector in the slot.

 

I had to get my motherboard replaced because that clip. I went to install my ssd 5 minutes after getting my M18x, and that little clip popped out. When I tried putting it back in, it wouldn't stay secure. Dell wouldn't send me a replacement clip, so they sent a tech to replace the entire mobo. I will never mess with that clip again.

 

FWD that sucks. As if they can't just send out another clip. Surely there is some other part that can take its place..?
Even if its some other piece of generic plastic.
I was worried when I put everything back together my hdd's didn't show.
I thought...'now I've done it'.
I opened up and redid it pushing the cable in further and everything is good so far.
I'm not looking forward to fiddling with it again.

 

Unfortunately, those little ribbon clamps are not serviceable items. Dell cannot send out spares as they do not have spares for them - they are part of the motherboard when it's made. If it gets broken or damaged, the only hope (bar a new board) is that you can securely "wedge" the ribbon cable into the mobo port with the remains of the clip and some DIY skills - NOT superglue, just wedge it in with a thin bit of plastic.

For the most part, if you can successfully "adapt" a broken ribbon clamp without losing functionality, you should be good to go - unless you WANT a new board.

Just a FYI here, but when I work on my machine, I never actually remove the Sata cable from the the mobo port - I just pull the drive caddy away from the interposer and that is enough. The interposer stays attached and dangling, then I use my fingers to gently nudge it safely into the empty drive bay if I am flipping the machine over - you could use some tape to do the same thing if you were concerned about it getting damaged whislt "flapping about".

 

Thats what I prefer to do Stevie.., except this time as I was doing it the ribbon and clamp flung off from the MB by themselves
I'm worried to dig around in there anymore. I need to go back and get a screw I clumsily dropped behind caddy/battery somewhere too..

 

If a third-party could manufacture a variety of this type of ribbon cable retainer they could probably get rich selling them at a 1000% markup, LOL. It's very unfortunate that they are not available as a service part. Even at $30 to $50 a pop it would be easier and better than a motherboard replacement.

 

someone should really make cheap plastic that are much easier to put in than these plastic tabs and secure the drive better. make a fortune even with just $5/set of plastics lol, like 10cents to make but sell em for 3-5 bucks. those tabs are annoying, R2 cable is so thick and kinda bends inward which pushes the tab to an angle. tabs not straight is hard to put it in, had to use tweezer and flat headscrew, both hands to secure tighten it in.

I then electrical tape it.

 

The clip is fragile and adding something extra to keep it in place could result in it getting broken down the road. I would not use anything extra like electrical tape unless the clip is broken and needs help staying in place. If it is not broken, it does not need any help. The cloth type of electrical tape sticks too well and could easily break one of those clips trying to remove the tape.

Using a clear "Scotch" tape works pretty well to hold things in place without being too aggressive. If you make a tab by folding the edge over on one end of the tape, it is easy to remove without grabbing too tight to what it is stuck to. It also leaves behind no sticky residue like electrical tape. I used to use this method to hold CrossFire cables in place after the factory tape got work out and would not stick well any more. Without some kind of tape across the connection, they have a habit of working loose and causing issues due to a poor connection.

 

Yeah scotch tape sounds like a good idea if problems occur.
I can't help but think those plastic hobbie model car/plane sets would have something close in it.

 

This is true, we don't have those parts for spare sales. Just like rubber bumpers. We would have to replace the entire part to have it serviced.

 

I just seems crazy to me that Dell cannot get the MB maker to do a production run of these as spares. Replacing a mother board for a badly designed micro-cent part just seems INSANE to me.

Mine was broken when I received my brand new machine, (a rattle in the case, flakey HD). Fortunately it will stay in place if I am gentle with the machine. Doing a repair depot turn around was a hurdle I could not face the day after getting my machine. (I had waited so long already).

So I live with it like the sword of Damocles hanging over my head.

 

I hear you, but unfortunately there is not much we can do about it since that's the way the have run things for a while now. At least it works as intended when being hold even without the clamp so the replacement is not needed.

 

I broke mine as well, wasn't extremely gentle, it is a very delicate part. Fortunately, it seems that the tension of the ribbon, due to the close proximity of the HD caddy, has kept it in place even with a lot of moving the computer around and vibration without the plastic white tab that secures it to the mobo. Unfortunately, you cannot replace the white tab, Dell doesn't offer replacement.

Don't worry about it, it will stay in place.

 

That would bug me to no end to know my m18x is permanently damaged. I'd have to get it fixed

Sent from my SPH-L900 using Tapatalk 2

 

I hate to say but that is a poor excuse for why things are done. We spend massive amounts of $$$ to by these laptops. When the warranty runs out if a tab breaks, your faced with a hefty bill to replace the motherboard. Maybe Dell needs to look at revamping the motherboard design moving forward.

 

Dell should make some alteration to this design, they are losing money themselves on motherboard replacements due to tech fees, even though I am sure they just fix it inhouse with the many tools they have and put them in refurbished systems.

 

Lol. I just had my mobo replaced. Engineer didn't screw down the heatsink properly on one of the gpus soi ventured into the case. Broke the same clip on the keyboard backlight connector.

I reckon we could easily take one out and send it to a plastics company that would do a run of a few 1000. Then we could sell em for profit.

 

Honestly I'm sure we could find something that's works as good.

 

I'm raging pretty hard right now. It's kind of a long story, but I'll start from the beginning.

About 15 minutes after getting my M18x, I went to install my ssd and the clip popped right out of the mobo with hardly any force. I've worked on many laptops in the past, so I'm pretty familiar with how these clips work. I know to be extremely gentle when handling any of them, but that didn't help me here. After waiting weeks for my new computer to get here, I was once again without a laptop. I called tech support and they told me it wasn't covered under my accidental coverage and I would have to pay for labor ($150) to have a tech come fix it.

Two days later, the tech arrived to perform the motherboard replacement. After getting the computer back together and finishing the final touches, we realized that a screw was broken off in the hole that holds the wifi card down. Dell had sent the tech a defective board. That wasn't the only problem... the keyboard lighting wouldn't work either. Unfortunately this was a Friday, so I had to wait until the following Wednesday for the tech to come replace the motherboard for a second time. Everything appeared to go smoothly, and I finally had a working M18x (a week after it originally arrived.)

Flash forward to last night, when my computer started acting strangely. Chrome wouldn't load web pages and I couldn't open programs. I restarted the computer and everything seemed fine until this morning, when the same issue happened again. I restarted my computer and then the second hard drive wasn't recognized. I tried restarting yet again, but Windows froze while shutting down. I did a hard reboot and the computer wouldn't boot into Windows. It froze at the "Windows loading" screen. I called tech support and the tech told me it was probably my ssd, and suggested I run diagnostics and install Windows on my 500gb hdd. Diagnostics said all my hardware was fine, so I opened the computer up to make sure everything was ok and to try loading Windows on my secondary drive.

That's when I see that the same hdd clip lying on the mobo with one of its legs broken off! I hadn't even touched the thing since the tech came out here and replaced it the second time! I'm assuming the tech broke it while installing the mobo, but symptoms didn't start until I moved the laptop last night (I took it over to my gf's house.) At this point, I'm livid. This is such a basic flaw in the design of this laptop. If a tech can't even get the ribbon cable in without breaking the clip, there is something seriously wrong. If I'm spending $3500+ on a laptop, I don't expect it to need 3 motherboard replacements within the first month of ownership. I'm not even comfortable with owning a laptop that has had parts replaced this many times.

So, I called tech support and asked for either a new M18x or a refund, but the supervisor I spoke with refused because I've owned it 26 days. He said that this issue was my fault, and only offered to have the computer sent in for repair at the Depot. I'm pretty pissed. I love my laptop for its build quality and performance, but I wish I had just gotten a desktop instead. This thread proves that there is a fundamental design flaw with the hdd ribbon cable connector. The sata ports should be connected to the mobo directly, so BS like this won't happen.

tl;dr

Broke the clip
Motherboard replaced twice
tech breaks it again, don't realize it until a couple weeks later
Sick of mobo replacements, want new computer or refund
Dell says its my fault, refuses

 

Yeh mine flung off in the same manner, and I was being as careful as physically possible. I have it somewhat back in but i fear it's more for decoration than function. I'm a little scared to have to play with it again, especially since I plan to do a HDD/Ram upgrade soon. I'm sure some other small piece of plastic can act as a wedge in the same manner and do a better job, I'm still yet to find such piece.
Mine seem to be ok but I'm yet to transport it anywhere.
I'd sooner find a bandaid job than take off my aftermarket mods and send it to the depo.

I'm sure Dell would say I broke it too. Technically I did, but I'd like to have seen someone do a better job on my particular machine. I'm sure the outcome would be the same.

So if anyone here has a good solution. I'd love to hear it.
Personally I think breaking a pic pen and getting a couple of small plastic shards would do ok.

 

I hear you man... unfortunately I've never been able to get the drives to work without the clip, so each time there's an issue it's completely unusable. If I had an msata it wouldn't be such a huge deal, but as is my laptop has been totally out of commission three times in the 25 or so days I've owned it. What kills me is how the tech supervisor guy I spoke with said this isn't a design flaw, and he's never heard of this issue before... I even pointed him to this thread, but he still said it was an isolated issue and it was my fault (despite the fact that Dell themselves haven't been able to fix it with two motherboard swaps... ridiculous.) I love this laptop, but I'm really regretting not getting an Aurora with 680 sli instead and just using my M11x (or getting an M14x or something cheap) for mobile duty. I'm seriously considering escalating it with Dell to see if I can get a refund, new M18x, or Aurora... I just don't feel comfortable with a.) having a laptop that's had three mobos in less than a month, and b.) ever working on the M18x again (or having a tech work on it, either.) I've never had this much trouble with a computer before, and that includes ones I've used for years lol. I'm not used to having issues like this.

 

Do you have any pictures of how the the piece is broken? Here is mine, as you can see the boots of the legs (right side) aren't identical. I never got to hear or see a break. It just flung out this way. Similar to yours ?



(Sorry about the quality, doing this all for an iPhone. But you can see what I mean)

 

I believe the legs are different, so yours looks ok from the two I've seen. What happens to me both time was one of the legs broke off. The first time, one was cracked when it popped out, so as I tried to put it back in it broke off. This time I opened up the laptop and the clip was just sitting there on the mobo with one of the legs broken off. I remember the tech had trouble getting the ribbon cable in, and took the clip out of the slot. He must have broken it while putting it back in. I got a good look at it while it was out though, and that's what it looked like. I think the legs are supposed to be different on the tips, so it should hold in the port fine

I can take a pic of my broken clip if you like though. It looks exactly like that, except for the broken leg lol

 

These parts are not removable. If the tech took it out of the slot, then he broke it intentionally albeit out of sheer ignorance.

 

Yeah, I know it's definitely not supposed to come out. A tech I spoke with a few weeks ago asked one of their engineers if it's possible to get back in, and the engineer said it was difficult, but possible. I'm beginning to think he was wrong though lol.

Well I've been thinking about what to do, and decided to just risk it with having another tech come out for a motherboard replacement. Perhaps the third time is the charm lol. If it happens again, I guess I've gotta send it out to the Depot.

 

Can't believe that's the only option. Seems like you have no choice, so you might as well go for it.

 

They should sell a replacement for them really since loads of people seem to have this issue. Bet it would save a lot of wasted time and money on tech appointments

 

Is it something like this. This company only sells the complete latch and socket, but it may help

1-1734742-6 - TE CONNECTIVITY - CONNECTOR, FFC / FPC, 0.5MM, 16WAY | Farnell United Kingdom

I will have another look later tonight to see if I can find the latch only.

Thanks

Ian

Or possibly one of these..

1-84952-6 - TE CONNECTIVITY / AMP - CONNECTOR, FPC, SMT, 1MM, 16WAY | Farnell United Kingdom

Just need to make sure it is the right no of pins to suit the connector, they are anything from 10, 12, 14 and 16 way.

Hope this helps

Thanks

Ian

 

We're getting close with what you've found there.
But the piece actually has no pins (I'm fairly sure). It's purely plastic to help wedge in a ribbon
Rep +1
Getting warm I feel. I'm sure it's out there somewhere

 

Yeah, those look similar, but the ribbon cable ports don't have pins like that. It would be awesome to find someone that makes an identical part. I would buy several just for backup

 

If you remove the clip from the socket then it should be ok to use on the socket that's fitted to the motherboard

I may be completely wring though

Thanks

Ian

 

Hello, Its not your fault or anyone else its just cheap connectors. I used to do Graphics Reballing and have opened countless Laptops and i broke mine too though its from one side i stick it with Superglue and it seems to work so far but they are way too cheap. I also broken my Side panel Illumination clip and amazingly the locks are all fine the small strip that holds the cable inside broke amazingly I am looking for these connectors if they are of same size i will resold them on my board and get rid of the problem though my Laptop is working all fine but i hate to even have a slight feeling that something was broken.


Buy ffc connectors online from RS Components

ZF5S - 0,50 mm Zero Insertion Force FFC Connector

FFC - FPC Connectors and Jumpers - Molex

Toby Electronics: 0.5mm Pitch Horizontal mount Upper Contact type

Plug connector overview manufacturer pitch type - ES&S Solutions GmbH

I will update everyone if this helps.