Pavilion ZE2000..What Happened Here?

Laptop starts, shuts itself off. Sometimes will boot to Windows, then shut off. Now, obviously this thing is toast. But look at that thing..what's with the wire? What's with the huge blob of solder? Did somebody just cobble something up here so it would at least still power on, giving some hope of fixing it? Does anybody here think it's fixable if I replaced that chip? Is it a power mosfet? Sorry no pics of the reverse side as I haven't "progressed" to that point yet. Thanks for any ideas.

 

I don't know what's up with that wire, but yes, that is a power mosfet, and the thing should power up after you replace it. Edit: Wait, it does not look like a fet. It's an 8-pin chip like the ones on the left... Could be a voltage regulator (mosfet controller). Anyway, i'm willing to bet it's the same as the ones on the left, so google the serial numbers on them and see what you can find.

 

Thanks for the reply. Yeah I don't understand that blue wire. My guess is a bypass of some kind, along with that huge blob of solder. It'll be interesting to get the MB completely off and look at the other side, lol. Unfortunately, the chip is burned to the point where I cant make out anything, other than 4413 and a stylized A, which apparently means it's an Anachip. How bout something along these lines? IC MOSFET P-CH DUAL 30V 8-SOIC - FDS4935BZ

 

Hmm so it is a FET after all. That solder blob looks really funky indeed, i think whoever did it didn't know much, but if it still powers up it's a start.

Measure the voltage between that wire and ground (now don't tell me you don't know where to find the ground connection, else i won't help you anymore). Follow the wire to the other side of the board. Like i said, if the laptop still powers up at this point my guess is that the blob should be left alone (it's magic ). Instead you should replace whatever part that wire is going to with one rated for higher current, and hope it works.

 

Okay well, I got the MB out. And of course, everything I do is butt backwards so I unsoldered the chip before I measured anything. So there you have it. Pretty bad. That blue wire was attached to one of the legs of the mosfet, which was bent up and soldered to the blue wire. It ran around to the other side and was soldered to the board. The point at which the blue wire was soldered on the reverse side is indicated in Burnt3 and is circled in yellow. What a mess. By the way, is anybody good at reading schematics? I'm pretty bad at it but if you want to take a crack at it I can email you a pdf of it for this board. Thanks again.

 

Alright. Honestly, I know little about electronics, so bear with me please. Looking at some search results, here's what I see. It appears that the blue wire was attached to the G pin of the chip...apparently the "Gate" of the chip(?). So, if this part of the chip is blown(and if you look at it the diagram, it is in that area) then whoever soldered that blue wire there did it as a bypass. What I don't understand is why it was soldered to the back though. Why not just replace it the chip?

Edit: Looking further at that first picture, it looks like the G(#4) pin does not contact the same area the others do. So again my question, what does that attach to?

 

Doubt the board is repaireable, you got delamination of the pcb board.

 

The chip is made by Alpha & Omega. Search on AOxxxx (whatever the 4-digit number is). Occasionally they go boom.

 

Unfortunately yes.

Given the look of that area i wasn't expecting anything else... I've fixed PCBs on lots of things but a laptop motherboard is just too small, so don't even try. Buy a new mobo.

 

Update: First a thank you to brianstretch for the info. That was the kind of help I was looking for. And also thank you all for the thoughts/ideas, it is appreciated! Okay now for the update. I got a parts laptop and salvaged the chip off it. It is a different brand. I insulated the tin from the board underneath where it was sticking up. Then I soldered the chip down and left the G pin unsoldered. I then resoldered that little blue wire from the G pin back to where it was before. A quick power on test and guess what? Powers on fine with no stability problems. Now here is the caveat(?), I'm not going to connect the battery as I think that might blow the chip and I don't want to cause anymore damage than is already present. Anybody have thoughts on that? I worked with the laptop for 3-4 hours last night and no problems thus far. Now, some might question the effort and use of a laptop without the convenience of a battery. Well, this laptop is for my GF and all she will use it for is some light web browsing and some games that it can run easily, and I know she'll only use it maybe once a week at the coffee table. So that's the deal...thanks to all who helped!

 

Well, you were lucky.

That regulator handles power regardless if it's AC adapter or battery. I don't think you should have any issues with using the battery.