Broken E500 - help me dismantle it!

Hi folks,

My best friend's laptop broke down, and I said I'll have a look at it, as a last resort.

Here's what happened: one morning, the machine just refused to turn on. It was working perfectly fine the day before, and nothing (and nobody) touched it during the night. I was at the house, so I can attest to that.

My friend sent it to an authorized LG service centre (in Whitby, Ontario), and was told that the motherboard is busted. The repair centre quoted a nice lump sum of CAD 450 for replacement costs, including labour). Considering that a brand-new Acer CULV dual-core ultraportable was only CAD 330 (taxes included), I advised my friend to get a new machine instead.

And now, I've taken the busted E500, to make a last attempt to repair it. I'm banking on the (admittedly small) chance that the repair centre was wrong in assessing the motherboard damage... maybe it was just a busted power switch contact.

If it turns out that I'm wrong, and the motherboard's indeed dead, I'll just cannibalize the parts that are still good. My friend will probably want the HDD (in a cheap external SATA enclosure), and I can use the RAM for another machine, but the rest can go (so if anyone needs spare parts, let me know...)

But my first - and most important - question is this: Does anyone know how to safely dismantle the machine? I can figure out by myself, but I don't want to damage anything in the process.


So... anyone?

PS: At first sight, I have to say that the inside of the laptop seems to be well put together. It seems that they put a lot of care in it. Even the HDD well has a foam lining, which is something other manufacturers don't bother with.

 

I can make a fairly good assumption for you, but ofcourse it's up to you to try.

I have an LG R405, and it still works great, and I have opened it up before.

Here's what I did to dismantle mine, and it should be similar to yours.

Unscrew the keyboard screws from the bottom. They are marked.

Remove the keyboard. If you use a knife, you should be able to pry it off the tabs. Carefully remove the ribbon cable. There's a little tab that holds the ribbon cable in. You just have to wiggle it loose, and it will come out easily.

Underneath your keyboard, there should be 2-3 screws holding the notebook together. Unscrew those.

Flip your notebook upside down, unscrew everything from the bottom of the case. Also, Check underneath the hard drive, and underneath the battery, there might be some screws there as well.

If all the screws are removed, try to pry along the edge of the plastic frame. It is scary, but it won't break it because the plastic is very stiff, and the tabs hold up well. I have opened it up twice, and it works fine.

If all went well, you should be able to see your motherboard. Be careful how you pull it though, because there might be some other bits dangling between the top and bottom piece, i.e. microphone.

Cheers, and have a fun time opening it up!

 

If you are disposing as parts. I would not mind to buy it for parts..my e500 has broken plastic brazel..etc.