My Laptop Screen Is Black

My laptop screen is black, it does not mean that the laptop has stopped displaying image, what has happened is that image displayed by the laptop cannot be clearly seen because the laptop LCD screen backlight is not functioning due to one reason or the other.  The common cause of this type of fault is a dead backlight tube or a faulty LCD inverter.

To troubleshoot effectively, you need to open the laptop screen, before doing this please check here for instructions on how to replace an LCD screen. During dis-assembly of the screen, take note of the points where each screw is before it was removed, so that you won’t have problem assembling the laptop screen back.

Possible Faults

• Burnt or dead backlight tube
• Faulty LCD inverter
• The laptop motherboard does not supply the LCD  inverter with the 5V needed to power the screen backlight
• The laptop LCD lid close switch is stuck in the close position

My Laptop Screen Is White

My laptop screen is white, experience overtime has shown that the cause can be conveniently narrowed down to three and by following simple troubleshooting techniques we can zero down on the actual cause of the fault. So when your screen starts behaving funny don’t write off the laptop yet or rush into conclusion that you need to buy a new screen.

The truth is when the screen of a laptop develops a fault, most people feel it is something that they can’t handle on their own, hence they go looking for an engineer down the road to help them fix the laptop back, but fixing a laptop screen may not be as complicated as you are meant to believe by the engineer, it is something that you can do very much handle on your own.

Possible Faults

• Loose connection between the video cable and the LCD screen or a bad video cable
• Faulty or bad LCD screen
• Faulty or bad VGA card

How To Back Up Your Computer Files And Data

There are different ways through which you can back up your computer data and they all have their advantages and disadvantages. The safest ways to back up your data are through hard drives, DVD or flash drives and cloud storage.

1. Back Up Using Hard Drives

There are different shapes and sizes of external USB hard drives available in the market, some of them require power source from the mains while most take power from the USB port. Using hard drive to back up data is the easiest and cheapest method of backing up data. All you have to do is just copy and paste your data from the internal hard drive inside the laptop to the external hard drive connected to the laptop through the USB port.

Using hard drive to back up data is not 100% fool proof, it is still vulnerable to theft, damage and data corruption. Apart from the copy and paste method of backing up data to hard drives, the more efficient method is to make use of Windows inbuilt back up utility. To use this, just press the Windows key on your keyboard and type back up, if you are using Windows 7, click click the Back up and Restore link that appears.

Laptop is Frozen, Keyboard And Mouse Not Responding

1. Restart your laptop or computer by forcing a shut down

You can force a shut down by holding the power button until the laptop turns off, if this does not work, then force a complete shut down by following the steps below.

• Disconnect the power cord

• Remove the battery from the laptop

• Wait for some time (20 seconds)

•  Replace the battery into the laptop

•  Reconnect the laptop power cord

• Turn the laptop on

How To Replace A Laptop Keyboard

These instructions will help you to remove and replace faulty keyboards on various laptops, but if your keyboard is missing just a key, it’s not necessary to replace the whole keyboard. What you have to do, is to look for the specific key that is missing and replace it on the keyboard. Follow these steps only if you want to completely replace your faulty laptop keyboard with a new one.

Step 1                                                                                                                                   

Begin the process of removing the faulty laptop keyboard by inserting a small Flathead screwdriver under the keyboard bezel and carefully lift it up, then use your fingers to continue releasing the plastic latches, until the keyboard bezel is completely removed from the laptop.When doing this you have to be careful because on some models the keyboard bezel might be connected to the motherboard, so if you accidentally pull the cable connecting the bezel to the motherboard, please connect it back. In this case it is not necessary to disconnect the keyboard bezel from the motherboard in order to remove and replace the keyboard. What you have to do is just put the keyboard bezel aside so that you can access the keyboard screws.

How To Fix A Loose DC Power Jack

To begin the process, you have to disassemble your laptop and remove the motherboard in order to have access to the power jack, for a step by step  instruction on how to remove a motherboard click here. The main fault of the laptop is that the DC power jack terminals is not making proper contact with the motherboard and as a result power supply to the laptop is cut-off. The three basic steps involved in troubleshooting this fault are as follows

• Desolder the DC power jack from the motherboard

• Clean contacts points on both power jack and motherboard with a brush and alcohol

• Solder the power jack back to the motherboard

Step 1
Start desoldering process by adding some new and fresh solder to all three contact points of the power jack on the motherboard, this will make the old solder easier to remove. After the addition of fresh solder to the contact points, begin the removal of  solder on each contact point by heating the point with soldering iron and using the soldering pump to extract the solder. Repeat the same process for all the power jack contact points until you have removed as much solder as possible from each point.

How To Take Apart A Laptop

How to take apart a laptop, circumstances might demand that you open up your laptop to carry out some repairs. It is possible that you spilled something on it and you want to dry it or it may not be functioning properly and you want to take a look. Whatever the reason may be, this is a simple guide on how to completely take apart your laptop.

Step 1

Start the process by disconnecting the laptop from power supply, unlock the battery and slide it out from the laptop. Remove all the screws at the bottom of the laptop.  

Step 2

Remove the four screws securing the hard drive, pull the hard drive and disconnect it from the motherboard.

Top 5 Laptop With Longest Battery Life

Most people this days don’t just look for laptops with beautiful and sleek designs, they want a laptop that has a long battery life. Most 15 inches widescreen laptop been manufactured nowadays have battery life that do not last more than 3-4 hours, for me personally I don’t think this laptops are good for people who travel frequently. For regular travelers I wound recommend a laptop that has a battery life of at least 5 hours or more so that they wound not have to bother about charging their laptop frequently.

When buying a laptop most people use factors such as screen size, processor speed, RAM size, graphics card and price to decide which laptop to buy. Sincerely speaking these factors count for nothing if the battery life of the laptop is very poor. If one of your wish is to get a laptop with a fantastic battery life, then you are at the right place because I have compiled a list of the top 5 laptops with the longest battery life as at 2013, these are the very best laptops you can find any where in the world as far as laptop battery life is concerned.

How To Replace A Broken LCD Screen On A Laptop

A broken screen can make a laptop to be completely ineffective, but the good news is that it can be fixed, even though it requires a bit of technical savvy to accomplish. A slight crack or a dent on the screen can stop you from using your laptop to do any meaningful work.

To fix a broken laptop screen, you need to have the right tools to work with, this will make the task easier. When buying the replacement LCD screen, you must ensure that the new screen matches the broken one exactly.The only way to guarantee this is to remove the old one and go with it to the place where you intend to purchase the new one or copy the model number of the broken screen. The step by step guide below will show you how to replace a broken laptop screen.

Replacing A Motherboard On A Laptop

Replacing a motherboard on a laptop, the reason could be that you want to upgrade the motherboard of your laptop to a better and more efficient one or that it is bad and cannot be fixed. The process of replacing the motherboard may take up to two or three hours depending on your expertise and experience with how to disassemble electronics devices. 

Before starting the process, it is necessary you ensure that the new motherboard is compatible with your laptop and that you have the right tools to carry out the process. If you have doubt about the compatibility  your laptop with a particular type of motherboard, please refer to the motherboard manual or go to the manufacturer's website. Things that you need to carry out the process are a set of screwdriver and a compatible motherboard.