My T42 was assasinated...

Yup - I managed to spill hot tea on it on Dec 31, and it's dead as a doorknob . It's still under warranty, but of course it doesn't cover such stupidity. I sent it in for an estimate, which came back today - 616 Euros (it's a US machine, but I'm currently in Germany). 340 Euros for the system board, the rest for labor and taxes. Needless to say I'm not thrilled with this option - T42s similar to mine seem to go on eBay for ~$500.

I can't seem to find "my" motherboard on eBay, which would probably be the cheapest way out.

So my question is: what other options do I have?

Look for some barebones ThinkPad to stick my RAM, HDD and DVD drive into? Does it limit me to a T42? The main reason why I'd like to get a ThinkPad is that I absolutely love the keyboard.

Any and all ideas appreciated, thanks in advance!

 

Laptop repairs are alot like car repairs; they're costly and usually not worth it. I would recommend that you simply buy another laptop and sell the T42 parts on eBay.

 

T40 and T41 should also work with your RAM (DDR1) and your dvd drive (UltraBay Slim?). You could also try to find the mobo from these on eBay or the like.

 

for that amount of money I would donate it and just buy a new one...i'm sure you can flip the chassis on ebay for a few bucks.

Can you salvage anything from it? Keyboard? Screen?

 

sell the parts on ebay, and buy another one.

 

....or try to find one on ebay that is stripped.....with a broken screen...cracked case....as long as it has a good mobo do the Frankenstein thing.

 

Thanks for the answers, and sorry for the title - I really don't know what I was thinking .

I wish I could afford new notebook, but I can't - so at the moment it's this one or none. They quoted only motherboard (39T5529), so I'm assuming everything else is OK. Hard drive certainly is - I already backed it up.

Looks like I'm off to scanning eBay then. I need to find one with video card with the same resolution as my now dead one, to match my LCD screen, right?

 

if it is a preconfigured system you can try typing in the type number into the search box and checking the "search titles and descriptions" checkbox. You may get lucky and find an identical system.

 

It is preconfigured system, but I could not find any match right now. Mine has one of the 32M ATI video cards (XGA). I need to find mobo with an XGA card, right? Or would SVGA+ work as well, just throttled back to 1024x768?

In case it's not clear: T42 seems to have ATI 7500 (32M RAM), ATI 9000 (32M RAM) or ATI 9600 (64M RAM). I have one of the 32M ones - I'm not sure which one. My LCD has certainly 1024x768 native resolution. So I'm assuming mobo with either 7500 or 9000 would work, right? I don't have to find one with the same ATI chip, right? If the chips were different I'd just have to make sure XP has the right drivers, correct? Would my LCD screen also work with the mobo that has 9600 ATI chip? It should, right?

Oh, how I curse my stupidity...

 

its not stupidity its lack of information. The thing I think would make all the difference is the connector on the lcd cable. Different models may have different motherboards or different lcd manufacturers etc...possibly having different means of connecting the two. What I've done in the past is to take a chance if a good deal is available, and resell it if it is incorrect. In this situation I would think that any t42 would work even the integrated graphics models if all you need is 1024x768 considering that there needs to be some standardization of cables and connectors, but I'm not sure.

try getting the hardware maintenance manual to see if the figures provide some clues to whether there are differences in connectors. It will also tell you all the different lcd's used in that model as well as all different video cards. You may be surprised to see that they were used interchangably among all the different models.

 

I meant me spilling the tea on the thing - you must admit that was stupid.

Good idea - that's what I'm gonna do.

 

If all doesn't work. Since you are under warranty still, go and get a warranty upgrade to accidental. Wait a month, then tell them you need a fix! Upgrades might cost you around $400USD (a lot more than buying with the computer, but at least you don't have to pay a premium for the parts).

 

Relax; just think, something like this will likely happen to you again in the future . So why get upset? Its just reassuring proof that you're human.

 

for the display part, you need to run the resolution that is native for your LCD screen. Otherwise you'll get screwed view. This is only for LCD displays.

if the native resolution is too big (you see too small stuff), then you can chage the appearance. That's what I did on mine - I run it with the "large font" opion activated.