I want more karma than John!

OK. Title says it all. John may be the dude fixer of video game cymbals, but I have just become the dudemeister fixer of laptops.
For the past week or so the power cable of my laptop has been going south. For a while, I could fidget with it and get it to work. Well, tonight, even that was no longer working.
Toshiba wants $93.87 plus shipping for a new cord. The cheapest I could find on E-Bay was $45 plus shipping. To heck with that. Its midnight, my computer is dieing, and I am not done with facebook or 3Reef ;D
So out came the tools. For any musician out ther, the power cords for laptops are exactly identical to instrument cables. You have a ground wire that attaches to the outside of the plug, and the positive lead which goes on the inside. And it's the same exact scenario. Flexing over time causes either one to separate from the plug. So here are some pics:


After cutting away the insulation/covering, you can see that the positive wire is broken away and the cause of the failure. Simple as re-soldering the lead. Also a little disappointed to know that the ground has NO protective insulation at all. But oh well:





After soldering the positive wire back in place:



Either heat shrink or electrical tape BOTH leads to fully insulate them from each other:



Fully wraped and working! Works like new without problems. Only not as pretty. This was done at 12:30 after coming home from the pub, and still only took about 7 minutes. So easily done Just figured that I probably am not the only laptop user here, and I know cable failures are a common problem. Fix it yourself and fight the establishment! ;D

 

K given

now is the the personal stuff that meant you may not be on as much?

you had a few of us worried

Steve

 

Good job Jason... ;D

 

:thumb_up: The word Macgyver comes to mind.................lol


Luna

 

k+ on the fix, good thing it was not the plug end on the mother board there a real pain to fix.

 

K+ given, btw I want more K than John to but I haven't had to do any mcgyverisms in a long time unless you count the alarm on my mustang that wouldn't stop going off about 2 weeks ago, that was pop the hood grab a handfull of wires and pull really hard lol

 

That's how I fix things - either pull on them or bang on them!

K given, Pack!

 

lol so I take it that me finding the cord online the other night information was not used to buy a new cord for 13 bucks! I'm not sure this fix would work if a certain black lab was to use it as a chew toy.

 

An added tip...use heat shrink tubing. It looks much better than THAT crap And be sure you put the wire through the tubing before you solder, or else you're going to want to kick yourself real hard.

Hahaha nice detective work, dear Watson. And yay facebook.

 

Yeah it does. I didnt have any heat shrink on hand last night though, and with 5% battery left, I didn't have much other choice.