How to disassemble Toshiba Laptops.

I just wanted to drop a line CJ - I really like this thread! It helps lots of people with their notebook problems and shows them how to take apart their notebooks to make upgrades/changes! :toshiba:

 

could you post some pics of the dissasembly process of a Satellite A105-S101. also woul it be possible to swap out the celeron m 380 for a pentium M 740 or 750?

Thanks in advance.

 

I think that model of the A-series is too new. I don't think people are going be rushing in by the truckload to have it serviced just yet Wait a little while longer.

 

You are right. I haven't seen it yet.

 

More notebook disassembly guides.

Toshiba P15

Toshiba Satellite M35

Toshiba Portege 3500

 

Great stuff, cj2600!!!

I was wondering if there is a chance that you could add the Toshiba 1100 or have a quick advice on how to open that (maybe a model that disassembles similar to mine would already be enough?).

Anyways, I posted an extra thread http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?p=1225440#post1225440
with some pictures. Hopefully it will help!

 

See your other thread - I posted there. You also might want googling your question as well.

 

Toshiba Tecra S2

Toshiba Satellite M55

 

Hey CJ are you authorized to work on laptops by toshiba?

 

Two more guides I created last week.

Toshiba Satellite M65
Toshiba Portege R100

 

cj,
Great site! I've been searching the web for instructions on how to change out the cd-rw on my Satellite 1415, your site is what I needed!
Thanks!

 

Definitely a great site! Im glad to see information up there on the toshiba A10 series laptop, it has been very hard to find the service manuals for the newer toshiba models (unlike many of the older models which are able to be found lying around on the net )


For those interested, I did eventually find the Toshiba Satellite A10 service manual, located at http://www.csd.toshiba.com/content/support/manuals/maintenance/su586992/maint_man.zip

It is an 11mb zip file with a whole bunch of PDF files with, as far as i can tell, methods for replacing just about anything in the machine

 

I want to replace keyboard on toshiba M35. Do I have to remove all the components on the back or can I just remove the retaining strip and screws?

 

THANK YOU!!! Now I can solve my issues with my M60 on my own

 

Would there be any point in dissassembling the deadbody of my Toshiba Satellite A35? Far as I know none of the components are any good and I'm not sure how to test them.

 

To replace the keyboard you have to remove the securing strip first and then remove the keyboard. It's not necessary to remove all components on the back.

 

Just for fun.

 

Hi there,
Firstly, I have to say, a fabulous service you are doing here for all Toshiba owners; It is so hard to get this info!
I have an M15 S405 which really needs an internal clean - you cannot blow out the fan/cooling area effectively with bottled air on this model.
So I just need to get to the fan - do you have any disassembly instructions for this model?
Hope you can help,
Thanks in advance,
sandman55

 

Well, if you want to know how to replace parts (such as the CPU) inside of the notebook, it's good to practice on a dead notebook.

 

It should be pretty easy. When you turn the laptop over you’ll see a CPU cover in the top right corner. Remove 2 screws and remove the CPU cover. You can remove and clean the heatsink if you remove 2 more screws from a metal plate over the CPU. Lift up the heatsink and clean it. Do not forget to reapply thermal grease on the CPU when you assemble it back.

 

Hi,
Thanks for the info - I see the cover & the two screws right where you said.
Just one thing - there is a third silver colored screw top right of the cover, by the foot, and a sunken screw top left (Please see rather blurry picture attached!) - should I remove either or both of these as well? I'm just being hyper-careful here!
Thanks again for your time & patience!
sandman55

 

Try to remove two F4 screws and one sunken screw. Do not touch the silver screw.

 

Tried to remove the cover as you suggested, but did not want to come away with even reasonable force. What does the silver screw hold in place?
Thanks again
Sandman55

 

Hi Red_Wolf,
Could not get your links to work

 

Sorry about that, seems my ip had updated and the program that kept the dyndns updated had crashed... it should all work now

 

I have one of these new Toshiba Tecra A6 laptops - supposed to go up to 2GB RAM across two slots. Only after buying it do I discover that one of the two slots is only "service accessible". Anyone have a service manual for a Tecra A6, or know how to access the second RAM slot?

Ta muchly in advance!

 

I need help replacing my cd/dvd drive in my Satellite 5205-S503 any pics on that? Or can I just put the new drive in the unused bay??

 

I've been trying to disassemble my Toshiba A105-S1013 but it's a pretty new model and there isn't much available on taking it apart. The only problem I'm having is getting the strip at the base of the display off so I can get at the keyboard screws. This model has the speakers on this strip and when I pry on it, it seems that is where it's getting hung up. I've pulled it off my old M35X several times and yes you do have to pry on it a bit but it does pop loose. I'm afraid to pry too much harder on the A105 for fear of breaking it. Is there some trick to getting the securing strip off on this model... like a tab or something..? I'm trying to complet a CPU upgrade if I ever get the dumb thing off.

 

Any chance of disassebling of a Satellite m70 anytime soon?

 

I got pics for this model, now I need some time to create a guide.

 

I haven’t disassemble Toshiba Satellite A105 myself yet but found one laptop disassembled by another tech. There is no screws on the keyboard strip, just a bunch of plastic latches. You should be able to remove it as you removed from M35.

 

Not soon. It doesn't look like US model.

 

Good writeups. I have an M35x and the screen (the whole hinged part) wobbles when I type, and appears to have some play in the hinges. Is there something that I can tighten to take the play out, or do I have to get new hinges? If I do need new hinges where can I find them/order them from? If my laptop is still under warantee would this be covered? Thanks for any info.

 

It's not - the M70 is a Europe/Canadian model only. I think the Austrialians might have it as well.

 

If your laptop is still under warranty you should take it to Toshiba repair center. Broken hinges should be covered under warranty.

 

OK, I'll take your word for it. I'll get out my guitar picks and start prying some more. Thanks for the reply. I'll take some pics as I do it if I can find a place to post them. I've already gotten all the screws taken out so the securing strip is the only hold up. Basically the same procedure as the M35X.. actually easier because they don't use screws with different lengths.. except for 3 real small ones and less of them. Hard drive removal is a little different also, though it is easy to get out. In fact I'll do the securing strip first just in case I can't get it off... I'll keep everyone posted on progress. Hopefully my next post will be benchmark data with the new processor. Ain't going to do the pin mod though since I'm looking to maximizing battery life rather than maxing out the speed. Wish me luck

 

You know this ain't easy to do having paws instead of fingers...

 

OK, I got it put in. Wasn't as easy as the M35X. Under the hood there are a lot of differences. Some make it easier, some make it much harder and riskier... The benchmark results are as follows, plus some others from previous noteooks I've owned. But first a couple of notes:

I'm only running 768 Mb of RAM right now. The M35X-S111 had 1.5 Gb. This means I'm not running in the DDR2 mode since I don't have matching SODIMM sizes. I'll rectify that later this week and see if it does really matter. I've read you can expect a 5% to 10% boost in performance if you have matching SODIMM sizes so it can run in DDR2 mode.

All drive data except those for the Compaq were from a 5400 RPM drive. The stock hard drive on the S-111 is a 4200 RPM so your mileage will vary if you run the same test on yours...

Surprises: Lower scores with the Pentium M at 1.7 GHz verses the Celeron M running at 1.6 GHz. Not sure what to make of that. But I swear it performs better with the Pentium M. Noticeably snappier. Probably due to the 2 Mb of cache on the Pentium verses the 1 Mb on the Celeron?

Notice the hugely different results in the 3D Mark2001 SE results from the M35X to the A105. The M35X had the Intel graphics chip and the A105 has the ATI 200M. I'll try to finish up the 3D Mark scores for the new setup this weekend.

Any comments are welcome.

SiSoftware Sandra 2005.2.10.50

CPU Arithmetic Benchmark

Compaq Presario 730 Duron 1 GHz: 5565
Compaq Presario 730 with XP-M Athlon XP-M 2400+: 7615
Toshiba M35X-S111 1.5 GHz Celeron M: 8269
Toshiba M35X-S111 1.7 GHz Pentium M: 9065
Toshiba A105-S1013 1.6 GHz Celeron M: 10306
Toshiba A105-S1013 1.7 GHz Pentium M: 10101

CPU Multi-Media Benchmark

Compaq Presario 730 Duron 1 GHz: 18999
Compaq Presario 730 with XP-M Athlon XP-M 2400+: 25838
Toshiba M35X-S111 1.5 GHz Celeron M 29881
Toshiba M35X-S111 1.7 GHz Pentium M: 29968
Toshiba A105-S1013 1.6 GHz Celeron M: 34053
Toshiba A105-S1013 1.7 GHz Pentium M: 33448

Memory Bandwidth Benchmark

Compaq Presario 730 Duron 1 GHz: 1189
Compaq Presario 730 with XP-M Athlon XP-M 2400+: 1217
Toshiba M35X-S111 1.5 GHz Celeron M 4183
Toshiba M35X-S111 1.7 GHz Pentium M: 4253
Toshiba A105-S1013 1.6 GHz Celeron M: 4404
Toshiba A105-S1013 1.7 GHz Pentium M: 4009

File System Benchmark

Compaq Presario 730 Duron 1 GHz: 13162
Compaq Presario 730 with XP-M Athlon XP-M 2400+: 14375
Toshiba M35X-S111 1.5 GHz Celeron M 31976 (5400 RPM HDD)
Toshiba M35X-S111 1.7 GHz Pentium M: 8269
Toshiba A105-S1013 1.6 GHz Celeron M: 32787
Toshiba A105-S1013 1.7 GHz Pentium M: 30788

Combined Performance Index Wizard

Compaq Presario 730 Duron 1 GHz: 907
Toshiba A105-S1013 1.6 GHz Celeron M: 1813
Toshiba A105-S1013 1.7 GHz Pentium M: 1949

3D Mark 2001SE Results

2288 for M35X-S111 with 1 Gb of RAM 1.5 GHz Celeron M
2474 for M35X-S111 with 1 Gb of RAM 1.7 GHz Pentium M
4271 for A105-S1013 with 768 Mb of RAM 1.7 GHz Pentium M

PC Mark 04 Results

2423 for M35X-S111 with 1 Gb of RAM 1.5 GHz Celeron M
2814 for M35X-S111 with 1 Gb of RAM 1.7 GHz Pentium M

PC Mark 05 Results

1556 for M35X-S111 with 1 Gb of RAM 1.7 GHz Pentium M

SuperPi – 2M iterations

2 min. 35 sec. for A105-S1013 with Celeron M 1.6 GHz
2 min. 17 sec. for A105-S1013 with Pentium M 1.7 GHz

 

PC Mark 04 Score is: 2971
PC Mark 05 Score is: 542
PC Mark 06 Scores are: 3D Mark - 185, SM 2.0 - 85 and CPU Score - 687

 

BTW, here are my instructions for taking it apart.
Toshiba Satellite A105

 

Hey there.

I tried to take my m70 apart a few hours ago, but i stumbled into a problem when attempting to pull off the thing that covers the display hindges and lay in front of the keyboard. I got almost got the whole ting off, but it wont budge on the left side. It seems connected to something.

Have you encountered this problem before? I don't want to use force and break the whole thing off so I thought it might be wise to contact you first

 

Yes, I’ve experienced the same problem many many times but the keyboard strip is not connected to anything. Try to wiggle it to release the latches. On some laptops it's very hard to remove the keyboard strip.

 

OK, if it's like the A105 you have tabs on either end... and on both sides of the strip along it's length.

Here's what I did... several times now. Put a thin screwdriver or something thin. A set of feeler gauges also works nice to get it started.. you can pick the thickness that way. It takes a little prying but there are two tabs on each end, they are at the ends of the strip right in the middle about a half inch from the end. The "hooks" face toward the end of the strip i.e. outward. They are a bear to get loose. I just pried on it with a long screwdriver after getting it lifted up a little with the feeler gauge, a guitar pick works too. Once it pops loose, do the other end the same way. Now both ends are loose. To get the strip all the way off you have "hooks" along the length. The ones closest to the screen face toward the screen and the ones on the keyboard side face toward the keyboard. DON'T pry from the keyboard side, you can't get at them. Just put a small flat blade screwdriver stright down into the seam along the screen side of the strip... just pry a little and the hook will pop loose real easily. Put the screwdriver in different places along the length, preferably where the hooks are located. Once you get the back unlatched you just lift it out by wiggling it a little. This is by far the most difficult thing about opening these things up. My old Compaq was a piece of cake because it had screws holding it in from the back side. Provided you remembered to remove the screws...

 

You ARE the MAN! Way to go, and thanks!

 

Okay, thanks guys.

I guess ill try it out right now :d It seems very hard though :/

 

Thanks dude. I have bookmarked this.

Now, the loooongggg wait for my warranty to run out begins.

 

Two more guides ready:

Toshiba-Satellite A85

Toshiba Qosmio F15

 

I have a Toshiba Satellite 1405-S171 that has a screen which falls back. I am assuming that the hinges are loose or broken. I have read through other guides which you have for repairing the hinges. Do I need to remove all the back items before proceeding to the top/keyboard or can I just do the items on the top? I am sure that I need to, but would rather check before doing all the work and not needing to.
Also, do you have a listing of a compatible Toshiba model on your site?
Thanks soooo much.

 

Oh man, you are the greatest. I just fixed a broken DC jack on a Tecra M2 with your guide and a little bit of solder/crimping. I couldn't have done it without your guide, I would have broke something! Keep up the good work, I'm sure it's helping a lot of people (including me).