You be the Doctor!
Today is Sunday. Very few of you will be burdened with the choice I’ve had to make today. I hope you never will. But I am here for you and here it is… I do all of my work from my IBM Thinkpad. When I purchased the laptop it was was one of IBM’s flagship series models (Lenovo Thinkpad T61p). I’ve owned the laptop for 2 years. It goes on road trips (California), on the Table (onto the floor), In a backpack (jossled), On the car seat (sat on). It even survived a full bottle of beer falling off the couch straight into it like a drunken missile. The laptop is not “Shiny and Twinkly” like a Macbook. It didn’t have the most “Bang for it’s Buck” like a Dell. The Thinkpad is a Flat Black Always Up Always Working Tough As Nails Don’t Cry When Wet Get The Job Done Go For Beers Go To Sleep Wake Up And Do It All Again Workhorse. This laptop has earned its keep and my next laptop will be another Thinkpad.
Gone are the days of lifting up your 57 Chevy’s hood or opening up the back of your Yamaha Tube Amp to fix or replace a broken part. Modern technology such as ipods, digital cameras, and laptops are collaborations of engineering feats that have followed Moore’s Law closely. Chances are, if you open up any modern electronic device today (with the exception of changing the battery) you’re not getting it back together without access to an electronic technicians lab. By the way, I am never responsible for any damage your laptop incurs if you decide to follow what I have done. That being said, today I turned on my Thinkpad this morning and saw THIS!
THE HORROR!
Peering at the laptop screen under some light it appeared to be a HAIR! I thought, “How can a hair that long manage to get sandwiched behind my LCD screen?” A quick google turned up this story. Good luck at the Mac Store pal! I then thought to myself, “There’s no way I’m sending my laptop off to IBM’s repair shop! The foreign technician might interpret remove the screen imperfection as remove and clean partition DOH! So like anyone’s first time making love, I proceeded with caution trying not to damage anything…
I removed the bezel by following page 108 to 112 in THIS online manual. I placed some folded up paper behind the screen to raise it up while I removed the screws that held the LCD in place.
Bezel removed
I GENTLY pulled out the sleep ribbon from it’s slot with some tweezers. Once the ribbon was loose, I gently lifted up the screen and placed paper (non conductive) behind the screen to raise it up out of the back plate. I had to remove the antenna that is attached to the left side of the screen. Small screws held the LCD screen into the silver frame. I removed all of the screws so the White Tape around the edges of the screen could be accessed.
The 'sleep' switch. Pull it out gently with tweezers
That big warning sign on the LCD is for the Lab Technicians at IBM not Do-it-Yourself MEN that are about to void any sort of warranty this thing had left on it! Joking aside, behind that white tape is an extremely delicate electronic fabric that cannot be cut or disturbed. So I gently took a razor blade and ran it against the metal frame and peeled back the white tape exposing the side of the LCD.
I touched the white tape (Don't tell anyone)
I cut the white tape and verified I didn’t destroy the green circuitry ribbon underneath it. I then gently unclipped the corner where the hair was stuck. I then beckoned my fiancee with the vacuum. While I held the LCD apart, my elegant assistant placed the vacuum against the side of the bezel and the hair sucked right out. Nicely done!
Don't cut the green tape. You'll be sorry.
I then sealed the side up again using some packaging tape. I carefully laid everything back into place. Before buttoning everything up, I booted the laptop to ensure everything was still intact. Everything looked proper again so I reversed all my steps putting everything back together how it was. And the Thinkpad continues working for me…
Taped up again. Good as new.
A word of warning: if you find yourself in the same predicament and don’t have a technical background such as myself, seek a second opinion! I was prepared to eat the cost of a $2000 laptop, are you? The Reckless Redneck’s last words, “Watch this guys!” applies here. If you don’t have the tools readily available around the house, you probably aren’t someone that does this type of work, seek a second opinion. Did I mention I did the entire procedure while the laptop was turned on and running? Why you say? Well, if I made a mistake during the procedure and wrecked something I wanted to know exactly when and where I did it. By the way, if you have epilepsy and your fingers are larger than Hungarian sausages, don’t even bother attempting this. And if you can just ‘live with the hair’, I don’t want to know what else you ‘live with’. This blog is open 24/7.
Good night.