I decided to try fix my old Aspire 5738 lappy, rather than just throw it away. The problem was that it was unbearably slow and though it could still play video and music, it would over heat and crash any time I tried to run skype, as well as some other simple programs. The unit was basically a big paper weight which was destined for the bin.
So I opened it up. And laid out her guts.
I decided that I would give her an all over cleaning, and also renew the thermal paste.
Perhaps it may just need some TLC.
Once open, I discovered something very interesting. A fake air vent.
So I opened it up. And laid out her guts.
I decided that I would give her an all over cleaning, and also renew the thermal paste.
Perhaps it may just need some TLC.
Once open, I discovered something very interesting. A fake air vent.
The damned fan had been blowing its load straight against a flat piece of plastic shell in an enclosed space. For years! No wonder her guts were failing. This is a huge design flaw, and these units by all rights should have been recalled. It's shocking that this product got on to the shelf in the first place, even more shocking that Acer did fuck all about it and just let people keep buying them and frying their laptop's internals.
Anyway I do all my work on an awesome little Zenbook these days, so the old Aspire is just a toy now. Never the less, waste not want not. After I cleaned her completely, drilled some air holes and did a clean install of windows, she is purring along nicely. I've removed the battery, DVD and screen, and just leave it plugged in to my main monitor through the VGA port, while my Zenbook uses the HDMI. So it's possible to just switch between systems on the fly. Now I just gotta find some use for her. If I played more games I would consider getting a controller and using her as a type of console. For light weight games of course.
No comments:
Post a Comment