How to Clean Laptop Vents and Recognize a Deeper Dust Problem
I notice laptop fans in coffee shops, which is not a hobby I recommend. The loudest machine in the room is rarely rendering video. Usually its owner is answering emails. When a fan works that hard over light tasks, dust is the usual reason. Air passes through the intake, across the fan, and through a […]
How Long Do Laptops Last, and What Usually Fails First
In a spiral notebook next to my precision screwdriver kit, I keep a log of every laptop friends and relatives have handed me since high school. It has 64 entries, each with a model, a year and one short line about what went wrong. Read in order, the notebook tells a consistent story. Laptops rarely […]
A Lifting Trackpad Can Be the First Sign of a Swollen Battery
A lifting trackpad is one of the few laptop symptoms that makes me put my coffee down. If one edge of your trackpad now sits slightly higher than the palm rest around it, or if it feels stiff or has stopped clicking properly, the most likely explanation is the battery underneath it. Lithium-ion batteries can […]
Your Laptop Keyboard May Be Dirtier Than a Toilet Seat
I noticed it while replacing an SSD in an older laptop on my desk. The inside was cleaner than the keyboard. That is never a good sign. Under the keys were crumbs, skin oil, dust, and some small mystery particles I chose not to investigate further. The laptop still worked fine, which felt slightly rude. […]
A Hot Car Can Ruin a Laptop in One Afternoon
You park at noon, tuck the laptop bag behind the passenger seat, and come back four hours later. The steering wheel is too hot to hold, and the aluminum lid of your laptop feels like it has been sitting on a stove. The laptop was switched off the whole time, so it should be fine. […]