I dropped Dell Inspiron 700m, now Ethernet, DVD and Mass Storage Controller don't work. Help!

Hi everyone! I am new to this forum. Unfortunately under not so good circumstances. I tripped over the adapter of my Dell Inspiron 700m causing it to crash on to the floor. Now, my ethernet, mass storage devices and DVD drives aren't working. Device Manager shows a yellow exclamation mark beside each of those devices. My first reaction was to reinstall drivers, but I cannot because there is no way to access them. In other words, when I plug in a usb flash drive, smart disc, pc slot drive, dvd-rom, etc -- it all shows up in the device manager with the yellow exclamation mark. I tried to install a wireless internet adapter, and I get the same thing. My guess is the impact of the drop must have caused the board to not recognize or read the storage and communications peripherals. Is this a motherboard problem? Can anybody help? Any help is appreciated. thanks!

James

 

... yeah, it's probably a motherboard fault. I'm surprised anything works at all. There may be components other than the motherboard that may have suffered some serious damage, but you'll probably fix a majority of the problems by replacing the board.

Quite frankly, I'd run a check on your HDD first. Those are usually the first things to die after your computer goes through this kind of traumatic experience and may cause - strange - behavior.

 

It is more likely that the motherboard was damaged in the fall rather than 3 separate components in the 700M. If your hardware is not working after a fall, it is almost certainly a hardware issue and not a software issue; as such, if you have any warranty with accidental protection, you should send it in to Dell.

On the other hand, if you don't have a warranty, the only thing left to do is dismantle the laptop and search for signs of damage. You can replace these parts (it won't be cheap, mind you) or the motherboard by searching online (ex, eBay).

 

One word: southbridge.

I bet the southbridge is dead, or just the BGA solder has cracked and now there is bad contact between the SB and the motheboard.

So one thing you could do before throwing away the motherboard is to try BGA reflow on the SB.

Could be as simple as buying a heat gun from your local hardware store. Set it to 300C and heat up the SB for a few mins.

There are plenty of youtube videos showing BGA reworking/reballing/reflowing.