IBP CZ-17 Motherboard In Need Of Replacement

Hi Gents,

My laptop is at a local reseller/technicians office and so I have little to provide besides the bare specs that I remember.

My laptop is a IBuyPower CZ-17 Valkyrie.

Intel 17-3630QM
1TB Standard Drive
16Ram
Nvidia 670M

Just the other day I was going to trade it for a desktop, while moving files to my external drive the power went out and the cable was plugged in! I initially thought I just needed a new charger and after calling around the greater los angeles area for a 180w AC Adapter(very hard to find when you need it the same day!!) I found a laptop re seller that had some extras in stock. I headed over excited to pick it up and be on my way later in the day to trade for the more powerful desktop.

When I got there we plugged in the replacement and to my surprise it still didn't charge the laptop, even worse was we began to smell something burning and at this point we knew something was really wrong. The tech opened up the case and saw a slight burn near the charging port as well as we could both smell it when putting our noses close to the area.

He recommended I replace the whole motherboard and after a day they quoted me around $400 for the mobo and $50 for installation.

I'm asking on these forums because I'm unable to find any information or the board online myself. I've read that the manufacturer is MSI and thus I should probably be searching for a board made by them that's compatible with my system but I am not a laptop enthusiast, or educated much on these subjects.

$400 for the mobo however does not seem worth it to repair. If it can be found cheaper then I'd probably do it.

Anyone here able to help me find a compatible mobo for my laptop would be a savior.

Another Question,

What GPU's if any could I upgrade to? The biggest problem with the laptop is the lack of a dvi, display, or mini display port. Essentially bottlenecking my monitor at 60hz when in some games(the ones I care about) it could reach 144hz. Is it possible to in anyway upgrade to a GPU that provides a dvi or display/mini display port? Or do these ports come from the motherboard themselves? Can the motherboard be upgraded without replacing all the other components?

And lastly, how can I tell/what diagnostics can be run to determine if the spark that occurred damaged any of the parts on the system?

After the spark occurred the laptop had some juice left and was able to start up but it couldn't get past the log in screen without BSODing. The tech removed my hard drive and transferred more files to another external of mine and so we know the HD works and his thoughts are that Windows got corrupted somehow.


Very much in need of help and all is appreciated and welcome. Looking forward to hearing from you James of IBP.

Best.

J


Extra

I have been using the laptop essentially as a desktop for the last 2 months, I have not moved it in all that time and it's pretty likely that the angle at which the AC Adapter connected to the laptops port was somewhat strenuous and so I think that must be the culprit.

What's left to determine is what damage has been done, and I would like to know how to determine that.

The price to repair(is it possible?)/replace these parts, and what possibly upgrades are compatible?

:thumbsup:

 

Hello VAL1ANT,

$400 for a motherboard replacement is pretty standard. The motherboard is an MSI part. There are a few boards which are physically compatible with the chassis, basically anything that was from an MSI GT70 based system. but it should only be replaced with one from the same generation which came with the GTX 670M.

Upgrading the video card on the laptop won't be able to give you what you're looking for. The video ports are on the motherboard and not on the video card themselves. Since the laptop uses NVIDIA Optimus, refresh rates over 60hz will not be possible because everything gets routed through the Intel iGPU.

Its really hard to diagnose without having replacement parts online. If you can boot it up in safe mode and it actually gets into windows, then you can try uninstalling the video drivers. if you can then boot it up normally after removing the video drives, then I would worry more about the GPU being bad. I'd recommend removing the GPU and booting up the laptop to make sure it's not the GPU that is causing the problem.

Were you planning on selling the laptop anyway after getting it fixed?

Hope this helps

 

I will most definitely be selling it after I fix it now, even for the very small profit...

I have another laptop that I can use for awhile and I'll be getting a desktop that can land me 144hz.

Hopefully Christmas yields me a new laptop

At the shop in Torrance, hidevolution.com , their was a pretty sick new ibp laptop with dual gpu's and a very slick case.... that's looking appealing

 

So I called into MSI to find out info about the board and they seem to route every call regarding parts to a guy named Tom, who makes up the entirety of their Parts Department.

Sending him an email now.

Also, Question for you Jason.

I called the shop my laptop is now at to get my SN. I repeated it over the phone to the tech to see if it is still under warranty with MSI. I bought it last year in October, yet they say it was purchased 2 years ago? I no longer have the receipt, may have the box at my grandmas if that makes a difference?

Regardless, their warranty for bare-bone units is 1 year and I'm down to the very last days, does IBP offer warranty on their product as well or is it through MSI?

I'll need to get a move on things if it's limited to the 1 year warranty, so your timely help is appreciated. Also, how to prove I bought it when I bought it?

 

Hey VAL1ANT,

did you originally purchase the laptop directly from the iBUYPOWER website? or through a different retailer?
You can PM me the s/n of the laptop and I can look it up to see if it is still covered under warranty.
If you purchased directly from the iBUYPOWER website and it is still under warranty, you should have no problem getting warranty covered.
If you purchased it from a retailer and they held onto it for a long time before selling it, the warranty through us and MSI may not be active anymore. Also, if the laptop isn't purchased through an authorized etailer, the warranty will be invalid.