Laptop question

[Knightmare]

I don't know if this is the right place to post this, but it seems appropriate.

Yesterday, my mother spilled coffee on her laptop. It sizzled and smoked for a wee bit. It wasn't a full cup, just a splash. She called me and asked what to do. I have no clue. She can get online, she can get to everything on her computer, but she says "It's going slow, and I can't type." Apparently, the coffee shorted parts of the keyboard. But could coffee make the machine slow? And how can we get the keyboard fixed? Ideas? Suggestions?

Thanks!

[Seshat]

Presumably the laptop is completely dry.

1. If you're incredibly lucky, you just have a minor glitch in the keyboard. A bit of dirt or fluff 'washed' into a place where the key mechanism has got stuck. Pray that this is the problem - it's an easy fix.
Get a small brush - one of those plastic paintbrushes they sell for children to paint watercolours or poster paints is fine. Turn the laptop off, and use this brush to clean between and under the keys. Get all the fluff, grit and hair out that you can.
Turn it on again. Try it. If this is all, you're just fine! and lucky! :p
If you have only one or two keys glitching, be especially thorough around them.

For everything else, make sure your laptop is no longer under warranty, and remove all power - battery and power cord. DON'T do these if you're not willing to take full responsibility for the laptop - you MIGHT make it unusable at all. :(

2. In some laptops, they keyboard is designed to be removeable, and potentially replaceable. Ideally, a couple of screws hold the plastic cover that holds the keyboard in. If you have one of these, you can take the keyboard out - carefully - and check for visible damage to the visible parts of the keyboard. If you're lucky here, you've got fluff or a bit of sticky coffee-gunk that can be cleaned off.
Dust it with your small brush or a lint free cloth, if you can get it clean that way.
If there's something that can't be dusted off, clean off the gunk with something as gentle as you can - a lint-free cloth that's almost dry but has just enough soapy water for the job, or a bit of rubbing alcohol on a cotton bud.
Make sure the keyboard is completely dry before reassembling the laptop, and testing it.

Beyond this point, there's the possibility that some gunk has got in elsewhere in the laptop, and it's a careful disassemble-clean-reassemble-test process.

Or you're unlucky, and some component(s) has(have) been fried. :eek:

Fried components can often (but not always) be identified by visible burnmarks on the tracks around the components, or visible scorching on the component itself.

The most likely component/s to be damaged in this case are the ones controlling the keyboard - not just the keyboard itself, but the chip responsible for understanding the keyboard. Unfortunately, laptop layouts are so tight for space, the chip may or may not be near the plug the keyboard wires connect to, and may or may not be specifically for the keyboard: it might control something/s else as well.

Anyway, I know this is rather vague, but I hope it's at least given you something to go on with.

[Knightmare]

Yes it has, thank you. I'm heading over there tomorrow to see what I can do. I can work on desktops; have never worked on a laptop before, so I'll do thorough research before I unscrew my first screw.

Thanks again!

[Seshat]

You're welcome. Glad I could help.

[Depot Denizen]

I'm surprised it started up at all. In almost all cases, liquid of any kind will immediately short out and pop the motherboard. At the Depot, students have a tendency to have their brand-new MacBook or Latitude out during a party, and inadvertantly someone dumps beer on it...you would thing after spending close or above $2,000 for a new computer, they'd be more careful. Then again, it's usually Mommy and Daddy (tm) who paid for it in the first place, so they have no idea of how to be responsible with it. Why Apple doesn't include accidental damage protection, I don't know...

[sld72382]

Why Apple doesn't include accidental damage protection, I don't know...

Probably because many of the MAC laptops are sold to dumb college kids and Apple doesn't want to lose a lot of money. :rolleyes: