Motherboard fried/overheated

[sethmachine]

Hi,

A laptop I've been using overheated and shut itself down when I heard a popping noise (like a circuit breaking) and the smell of something burning. No smoke or fires, but a very very hot laptop.

I am mostly ignorant of hardware (and also keeping computers clean it seems), so I brought it into a repair store, where I was told the motherboard was damaged and needed to be replaced. The problem was the fan had been blocked by an inordinate amount of matter.

Now even after the thing popped, I was still able to run the laptop, which I did briefly to make some last commits on a project (as in simply sending the commits, no more than 5 minutes).

So it was still functioning even after this event. The laptop is currently disassembled and the repair estimate is about $300 (parts + labor).

I am told the rest of the parts are ok and not damaged. I am no physicist, but that much heat is never good for a computer. Since the laptop has been under extreme heat for quite some time before finally overheating, the parts that have been exposed to that heat have probably degraded at a rate higher than normal.

The original cost of the laptop was close to $1000, bought back two summers ago (August 2012).

Now I would like to know if it is worth it to get the motherboard replaced or if I am better off throwing the laptop out and getting a new machine.

The thing that confuses me is I've had a much lower end laptop functioning for much longer and never ever getting hot or overheated (an Acer laptop). That acer laptop served me for over 5 years before its hard drive failed. And I used it for just about everything: coding, WC3, playing music, etc. Yet it never once got hot or had its fans blocked.

 

[Dr Super Good]

A laptop I've been using overheated and shut itself down when I heard a popping noise (like a circuit breaking) and the smell of something burning. No smoke or fires, but a very very hot laptop.

Electrolytic capacitor from the PSU burst. They are one of the most likely components to fail.

I am mostly ignorant of hardware (and also keeping computers clean it seems), so I brought it into a repair store, where I was told the motherboard was damaged and needed to be replaced.

I think most lap tops have motherboards with PSU built on to them due to the limited space. In desktops this would just require you to get a new PSU.

The problem was the fan had been blocked by an inordinate amount of matter.

In English this means that dust blocked vents/the fan resulting in no air flow. A badly designed part of the PC did not cope with this temperature and broke. In summer (if you are in Northern Hemisphere) this is a common cause of failure as the 30 degrees difference in ambience is huge with respect to cooling.

Now even after the thing popped, I was still able to run the laptop, which I did briefly to make some last commits on a project (as in simply sending the commits, no more than 5 minutes).

Looking at the track layout and positioning you can guess what the capacitor did. However the fact it popped means something will no longer work within its designed limits. It could be anything from the PC crashing at full load (a bulk current capacitor for in-between 50/60 Hz waves when no current flows) to just a noise filter (to prevent injecting HF noise into the mains).

So it was still functioning even after this event. The laptop is currently disassembled and the repair estimate is about $300 (parts + labor).

I would say about 50:50 with respects to the new board and labour.

I am no physicist, but that much heat is never good for a computer.

Yeh which is why Intel, Nvidia, and maybe AMD (they notoriously bad at this, sorry AMD fans) generally throttle back on power consumption if their components overheat to prevent damage. Stuff cannot get hot if it consumes no power. This is why many people experience sudden performance difficulties in laptops since they overheat and are throttled (that is how they are designed, you just cannot run that spec of processor with that cooling and they rely on only full speed very seldom for shot periods).

Since the laptop has been under extreme heat for quite some time before finally overheating, the parts that have been exposed to that heat have probably degraded at a rate higher than normal.

Possibly. However due to thermal transfer only the high power components would be very hot, the rest would be much cooler (well still hot, just not anywhere near the bad temperature).

Now I would like to know if it is worth it to get the motherboard replaced or if I am better off throwing the laptop out and getting a new machine.

A new one will likely be faster and have less risk (comes with a guarantee). Is it worth it I cannot tell. I would advise reading up online if anyone else had this problem and if so consider the new laptop. It could also turn out to be a design defect with only the motherboard in which case you could probably replace it without risk of failure after.

The thing that confuses me is I've had a much lower end laptop functioning for much longer and never ever getting hot or overheated (an Acer laptop). That acer laptop served me for over 5 years before its hard drive failed. And I used it for just about everything: coding, WC3, playing music, etc. Yet it never once got hot or had its fans blocked.

Performance is nearly linear with power consumption. Nearly 100% of power consumed is turned into heat.

A Raspberry PI, as an example, can run from a USB port, gets pretty hot but has no heat sink at all on it. On the other hand the Xbox One is 70% by volume heat sink due to AMD stuffing both the GPU and CPU on the same die and consuming multiple hundred watts (well I think its near 200).

A low end laptop might consume only slightly more power than a mobile phone and could possibly get away with passive cooling.

The physics? Well power is dependant on the square of frequency so a 1 GHz processor will get nowhere near as hot as a 3 GHz processor of the same technology. Throw in less functional units and things (fewer transistors) and it will never get anywhere near as hot.

 

[Chaosy]

As far as I know it's impossible to replace items inside a laptop. Beisdes the battery maybe. Besides you can underclock the stuff using BIOs settings, it can prevent a lot of heat.

 

[Paliouras]

Wouldn't a Laptop cooler reduce the heat?

 

[Velmarshal]

Well you can always buy a motherboard from ebay, though I dunno how reliable that is. I bought some TV parts from there with no issues.

Otherwise, you might be better off with buying a new one and cleaning it regularly (if your financial situation allows it).

A lot of new laptop hardware with improved power efficiency came out, including the GTX800 GPUs and Haswell based processors.

 

[sethmachine]

Hmm well I got my broken machine back. The thing is it would turn on and run. But now it won't even turn on and there's no light from it charging.

Is this a result of the damage taken to the motherboard or is something else off (like a cable disconnected?).

 

[Velmarshal]

Check if the battery is still in?

 

[sethmachine]

Yup the battery was still in. I'm not a complete fool.

Edit: Here's the motherboard serial number in case anyone can help me find a replacement.

HP-SPARE

682183-001