Coffee + laptop = bad week for my father

Hi all,

Yesterday my dad spilt coffee all over his laptop. He unplugged it, took out the battery etc. Rather than going through all the trouble of fixing it, he bought a new one, and sold it to me for 50 bucks. Hell of a bargain, its an amd 3500 w/ 2 gigs of ram, a decent graphics card 17.5 inch monitor etc. I am pretty sure it is dry as I put a fan next to it and left it on for 12 hours. I booted it up, of course the keyboard is gone. I will be replacing that soon, but the biggest problem is the screen. In the bottom right hand corner, there is no dead pixels but a dark tint from coffee stains. I tried rubbing it lightly with a damp cotton cloth but there was no change. How well are these screens sealed? Could the stain be behind the protective covering or could it just be that water has no effect on it whatsoever. I am sure someone else has experienced this. Any ideas? Thanks

The coffee probably leaked in between the screen and anti-glare shield via capillary action. This happened all the time on LCD taximeters that I used to repair (sometimes the liquid in question was urine instead of coffee :sick2. You'll have to see if you can take it apart in order to clean it completely.

get a bottle of rubbing alchohol and use that to try to wash the coffee out, if you can take it apart enough use some bleach water on the coffee stain. You may be able to soak the keyboard in the alcohol too or soak it in something like fantastic or 409 and rinse it with alcohol. That may work.

Lynx_Arc said:

get a bottle of rubbing alchohol and use that to try to wash the coffee out, if you can take it apart enough use some bleach water on the coffee stain. You may be able to soak the keyboard in the alcohol too or soak it in something like fantastic or 409 and rinse it with alcohol. That may work.

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I know with any kind of board, alcohol wont hurt it, but are you sure thats true with an LCD screen? I can actually try and get the alcohol behind the anti-glare screen?

Alcohol and LCD screen=White film and destruction:shakehead

Just use some tap water if you can get to the stain and clean it. Let it dry thoroughly, and then test it. Never use harsh chemicals on an LCD

Nitroz said:

Alcohol and LCD screen=White film destruction:shakehead

Just use some tap water if you can get to the stain and clean it. Let it dry thoroughly, and then test it. Never use harsh chemicals on an LCD

Click to expand...

Right, but i need help getting the coffee that is behind the screen

Did you remove the plastic bezel around the screen?

After that you should be able to remove the glare shield, or get to where the coffee has seeped behind.

Nitroz said:

Did you remove the plastic bezel around the screen?

After that you should be able to remove the glare shield, or get to where the coffee has seeped behind.

Click to expand...

Unfortunately, there are no screws anywhere, or any information that i could find

What brand of laptop is this?

You might just need to find the plastic clips around the bezel if it does not have any screws. You can use a small amount of force to snap the bezel away from the LCD, I have a plastic tool at home for this purpose.

I have a gateway 7422. I guess the anti-glare is only a coating that should be removed with a chemical, I really dont want to remove that.

Dang! Double post.

If this is your laptop?


If so, then you will need to remove the little rubber tabs where I have put the red arrows. Under those is where the screws should be. Then you will need to pry with your fingers around the bezel until it snaps off the screen.

Make since?

Thank you very much. I have got every part of the bezel except for the hinge part that allows the laptop to open and close. I have been attempting to work that part open for a good 15 minutes. I tried googling for tips on getting this open but no luck. Do you know any tricks to this? Edit: Oddly, the screen is attached to the front piece.

Do you mean the rounded silver covers?

If you do. Their should be some screws on the back side of those. Once removed you should be able to snap those loose fairly easily.


Good luck! Oh, and don't turn into a mad tater if you get frustrated.

I am about to leave work and will be at home around 11:50EST. I'll check your progress.:thumbsup:

Nitroz said:

Do you mean the rounded silver covers?

If you do. Their should be some screws on the back side of those. Once removed you should be able to snap those loose fairly easily.


Good luck! Oh, and don't turn into a mad tater if you get frustrated.

I am about to leave work and will be at home around 11:50EST. I'll check your progress.:thumbsup:

Click to expand...

Hahahahahaha it is very tempting to just snap it off.


I dont know what you mean by screws on the back. I am about to take a bunch of pictures so you have a good visual. I will post them in my next post. Thanks a lot for helping me out with this.

Ok, so heres my update. I got it apart but because gateway stupidly put the screen on the front part of the bezel, there is no way for me to clean it any better then with the bezel on unless I completely take off the LCD screen which was glued to the plastic front piece. I guess I will just have to take the protective layer off chemically. Any suggestions as to how I can do this safely? Also do you think this would be a good replacement. http://cgi.ebay.com/LCD-Screen-Prot...oryZ3697QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Too bad consumer reports doesnt rate this type of thing :mecry:

Thanks,
Stephen

Any pictures?

Hi, I'll take pictures now and edit this post when I upload them. I tried tech support and the useless "Technician" didnt even know what LCD stood for. pfft

Although its barely visible using a 2 mega pixel camera. (insert laughter here) it is extremely noticable in person.

I see you removed the screws. Did you remove the plastic bezel around the LCD?

Or is that held on by some other part of the shell? I can't really tell from that picture.