Short-Term Workaround for Dying Laptop
October 13, 2014 10:40 AM Subscribe
Dad's dying of cancer. (This is horrible and I don't want to go into it.) His laptop, a Dell Studio 1555 well out of warranty running Win7, is dying more quickly than dad. What can we do to keep the laptop operational for dad to use while he's got the energy? Details and such below the fold.
The laptop's symptoms:
* Track pad buttons have stopped working completely. Track pad itself is pretty much hosed.
-We're using a USB mouse.
*While plugged in, the laptop will intermittently go straight to sleep. Not power off, just go to sleep.
-After waiting 15 seconds or so, mashing the power button will wake it back up, but only for a little while.
*Unclear yet, what happens when running off battery power. Battery is pretty weak though and won't hold a charge for very long.
Searching the internet has suggested several possible issues, below, but the internet's solutions for each of these involve either trashing the machine or replacing various components. I don't really want to do either of these. I'd just like this laptop to last a little bit longer so that he can use it when he's got the energy for it.
We've already gotten all important files on Dropbox, but his machine has got some applications (Quickbooks, some fancy tax program, all sorts of esoteric Hebrew and scholarly programs) that would be a hassle to re-install what with forgotten product keys and all.
Possible culprits are:
faulty RAM.
failing thermal glue
faulty sensor on the mobo
faulty sensor on the GPU
failing hard drive
faulty doohickey to do with the plug
What can I do that won't deprive dad of a laptop for very long and will cost less than replacing the laptop and the software?
Only thing I can think of would be to put the hard drive in an external enclosure and use it to boot up my mom's computer. Windows doesn't like waking up to find that it has all new hardware and I don't know if it would freak out every time we booted it.
I'd love some good ideas. Thanks!
The laptop's symptoms:
* Track pad buttons have stopped working completely. Track pad itself is pretty much hosed.
-We're using a USB mouse.
*While plugged in, the laptop will intermittently go straight to sleep. Not power off, just go to sleep.
-After waiting 15 seconds or so, mashing the power button will wake it back up, but only for a little while.
*Unclear yet, what happens when running off battery power. Battery is pretty weak though and won't hold a charge for very long.
Searching the internet has suggested several possible issues, below, but the internet's solutions for each of these involve either trashing the machine or replacing various components. I don't really want to do either of these. I'd just like this laptop to last a little bit longer so that he can use it when he's got the energy for it.
We've already gotten all important files on Dropbox, but his machine has got some applications (Quickbooks, some fancy tax program, all sorts of esoteric Hebrew and scholarly programs) that would be a hassle to re-install what with forgotten product keys and all.
Possible culprits are:
What can I do that won't deprive dad of a laptop for very long and will cost less than replacing the laptop and the software?
Only thing I can think of would be to put the hard drive in an external enclosure and use it to boot up my mom's computer. Windows doesn't like waking up to find that it has all new hardware and I don't know if it would freak out every time we booted it.
I'd love some good ideas. Thanks!
The above suggestion is a good one. When my dad was dying of cancer, we tried to move him from an iMac to an iPad. We thought it would be easier for him. Suffice it to say, the less change the better.
posted by jabah at 11:33 AM on October 13, 2014
posted by jabah at 11:33 AM on October 13, 2014
Best answer: I was going to make the same suggestion as Lesser Shrew. Two other thoughts: (1) There are programs that can recover lost product keys - the one I remember is Magical Key Finder, and there are also a bunch of others. (2) You might be able to make a virtual image of your current hard drive and load it as a virtual machine on another computer.
posted by trig at 11:58 AM on October 13, 2014
posted by trig at 11:58 AM on October 13, 2014
I had a Studio 1749 that did exactly this. On mine, it was an overheating problem, which I solved (well, worked around) two ways: liberal applications of canned air on a very regular (often daily) basis, and keeping it elevated so that there was airflow around all sides of the laptop (especially all the fans). It would overheat and die just sitting on my desk, so my solution was to balance it on the lids from Pepsi bottles. It bought me another six months or so of heavy daily use.
posted by okayokayigive at 12:00 PM on October 13, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by okayokayigive at 12:00 PM on October 13, 2014 [1 favorite]
My husband's laptop does similar overheat and die behavior. You can find tiny fans that you can then use to blow air across the top of the laptop, or aim at specific areas that are overheating.
Fan example
My laptop stopped overheating once I got this. The slightly cheaper Cooler Master cooling pads also work well, but I was replacing them every 6 months. I've had this one for 1.5 years now and it's still going strong.
posted by RogueTech at 12:40 PM on October 13, 2014 [1 favorite]
Fan example
My laptop stopped overheating once I got this. The slightly cheaper Cooler Master cooling pads also work well, but I was replacing them every 6 months. I've had this one for 1.5 years now and it's still going strong.
posted by RogueTech at 12:40 PM on October 13, 2014 [1 favorite]
First thing i'd do is clean the fan(s, it probably just has one though). Not with canned air, with a real compressor. Like a large shop one, or one of those gas station tire ones. You want lots of flow, not just pressure. Hit every vent on the damn thing with short pulses. Watch absurd amounts of dirt fly out, even if you had tried the canned air thing.
Second would be what rogue tech suggested with one of those cooling pads, but don't spend $30-50 on one of those. Check thrift stores, and you local Ross/kohls/tjmaxx. You should pay less than $20, or really less than $10. Mine was $3.
Get realtemp. Is it getting above say, 60c just doing normal things? How high does it get before it sleeps? If it's at like 50c and suddenly sleeping, I'd start thinking it was a bad lid sensor that freaks out when it warms up, or some other temp sensor. Maybe there's a flaky power jack and since the battery is weak when it gets wiggled it goes "OMG LOW BATTERY!" And sleeps.
You can still get windows 7 laptops very cheap on lenovo outlet. I ordered a replacement one for my office for like... $250? It's a thinkpad too, and will likely far outlast its usefulness. The goal of preventing unfamiliar change here is I think serviced by keeping win7, not by keeping a flaky junk machine or trying to replace it with the exact same one. Just buy the cheapest decent windows 7 laptop you can find refurbished and transfer everything over, if this isn't easily sorted. I'd give up at the "it's not thermal" point. Maybe even before the cooling pad. You shouldn't need one of those on a recently cleaned laptop you aren't regularly playing demanding games on or something, that just means it's a shit machine, or some solder joint is starting to go bad or something.
I'd expect this to only get worse if it isn't easily solved by what I mentioned, and I'd strongly recommend washing your hands of it. You can get refurbed thinkpad t410's and t420's for $180-220 on eBay. That will last like, half a decade at least. They come with officially licensed windows 7. There's lots of options here for a familiar but reliable machine.
posted by emptythought at 1:07 PM on October 13, 2014 [4 favorites]
Second would be what rogue tech suggested with one of those cooling pads, but don't spend $30-50 on one of those. Check thrift stores, and you local Ross/kohls/tjmaxx. You should pay less than $20, or really less than $10. Mine was $3.
Get realtemp. Is it getting above say, 60c just doing normal things? How high does it get before it sleeps? If it's at like 50c and suddenly sleeping, I'd start thinking it was a bad lid sensor that freaks out when it warms up, or some other temp sensor. Maybe there's a flaky power jack and since the battery is weak when it gets wiggled it goes "OMG LOW BATTERY!" And sleeps.
You can still get windows 7 laptops very cheap on lenovo outlet. I ordered a replacement one for my office for like... $250? It's a thinkpad too, and will likely far outlast its usefulness. The goal of preventing unfamiliar change here is I think serviced by keeping win7, not by keeping a flaky junk machine or trying to replace it with the exact same one. Just buy the cheapest decent windows 7 laptop you can find refurbished and transfer everything over, if this isn't easily sorted. I'd give up at the "it's not thermal" point. Maybe even before the cooling pad. You shouldn't need one of those on a recently cleaned laptop you aren't regularly playing demanding games on or something, that just means it's a shit machine, or some solder joint is starting to go bad or something.
I'd expect this to only get worse if it isn't easily solved by what I mentioned, and I'd strongly recommend washing your hands of it. You can get refurbed thinkpad t410's and t420's for $180-220 on eBay. That will last like, half a decade at least. They come with officially licensed windows 7. There's lots of options here for a familiar but reliable machine.
posted by emptythought at 1:07 PM on October 13, 2014 [4 favorites]
Best answer: Oh, and if you don't want to think about this at all and just want to buy something now and move on, i did some legwork for you. for $179 this solves your problem. It's a heavy duty business laptop with a warranty, windows 7, and slightly better specs than the dying machine. me and my friends abused these, both previous generations and this version through high school and college. that specific iteration is basically impossible to kill.
Also, it will work with the power brick you have for the current one ^_^.
It will also resell on ebay too easy as a buy it now for basically what you paid for it minus at most $20-30, if you don't want to keep it later or don't need it.
If you're fine with installing classic shell on windows 8/8.1, you can get a machine with current components like this brand new.
Personally, i'd take a bit more of a leap and get something like this, which is what i bought my mom a while back. Cheap, heavy duty, reliable. Newer than the dell too and faster, but you only have ebay buyer protection instead of a warranty.
How much is your time worth? wouldn't you rather spend that time with him, rather than troubleshooting this crap? get a new machine and move on.
posted by emptythought at 7:52 PM on October 13, 2014 [1 favorite]
Also, it will work with the power brick you have for the current one ^_^.
It will also resell on ebay too easy as a buy it now for basically what you paid for it minus at most $20-30, if you don't want to keep it later or don't need it.
If you're fine with installing classic shell on windows 8/8.1, you can get a machine with current components like this brand new.
Personally, i'd take a bit more of a leap and get something like this, which is what i bought my mom a while back. Cheap, heavy duty, reliable. Newer than the dell too and faster, but you only have ebay buyer protection instead of a warranty.
How much is your time worth? wouldn't you rather spend that time with him, rather than troubleshooting this crap? get a new machine and move on.
posted by emptythought at 7:52 PM on October 13, 2014 [1 favorite]
This thread is closed to new comments.
(I won't go into either, except to say you have my sympathy. )
posted by Lesser Shrew at 10:50 AM on October 13, 2014 [1 favorite]