Possible Power Jack Short 2370

My 2370 appears to have a power jack short.

Has anyone had this problem with a 2370?

Can the power jack be re-soldered like the 3250?

Does anyone have disassemble instructions/pictures?

 

I had a similar problem about a year and a half ago, while I was using a non-standard AC adapter; I inadvertently yanked my N2370 from the couch where it was sitting, whereupon it fell with the weight upon the plug -- the slightly too long plug actually punched through the power jack, shattering the plastic housing and sending shards to and fro inside.

Once you open the chassis, you'll find that the power jack is soldered straight to the motherboard, difficult to access since the motherboard is difficult to separate from the chassis; I eventually gave up, deciding to attempt my repair using the only one inch of space I was able to pry between the motherboard and the rest of the laptop (no more without fear of fracturing the circuit board). Although the power jack is a fairly generic-looking one, my soldering iron was not up to the task of melting the contacts away from the motherboard -- I eventually gave that up as well, deciding instead to hunt down the fragments of the power jack, glued them back together, and soldered a bridge over the torn metal contacts. I put the laptop back together; surprisingly, it all worked, and I'm still using the N2370 as I write this.

Your skills might be better than mine, but my patch-job still makes do. I recall that the power jack on the 3250 was on a mini-board separate from the mother board, so it will never be that easy. If you do venture inside your N2370, be forewarned -- the chassis is metal, there's not much separation between the jack and the chassis, and it doesn't take much movement to start a lot of sparks and arcing! I thought I fried the whole thing.

David Reed

 

Thanks for the info...I knew it would be more difficult than the 3250, and your post forewarned me of the challenge. Every time I thought I had it apart, there would be another screw to find. The toughest to figure out were three screws under the keyboard.

Once I got it apart, I had access to the power jack contacts. One looked a little scorched. I decided to just add solder to it since, like you said, removing the motherboard from the chassis seemed to be pretty difficult.

Once I put it all back together, it would not power up. Without the battery in, when I turned it on, nothing happened, no lights, nothing. However, when I put the battery in. the battery light came on solid orange like it was charging. I tried to turn it on again and still nothing happened. This really made no sense to me.

So I took it apart again removed the solder and re-soldered it. I put it back together, plugged it in, turned it on, and still nothing. I put the battery in again and the orange charging light came on but it still would not turn on.

At this point, I figured I must have fried the motherboard or something since it was obviously getting power because the battery charging light was on.

As an afterthought, it occurred to me that maybe the power button ribbon was disconnected. Well, after taking it apart a third time, my afterthought was right! The power button and mouse pad ribbons had both pulled out. It did not seem necessary to disconnect them, so they pulled out accidentally without my knowledge. I plugged it in and voila, it turned back on.

So far the solder seems to be working.

 

Glad you got it fixed. I must have been lucky, for I don't remember pulling out any ribbons, which as we all know is the primary peril of opening any laptop! My solder patch has been working for a year-and-half so far, and hopefully yours will last as well.