Laptop + Liquid = ?

I

idyllhands

New Member
Hi, I accidentally spilled a cup of water of my girlfriend's laptop. It was off at the time, so we set it aside for about a week to dry. Now, when we turn it on, the power light flashes green/green/yellow/off and repeats.
So it appears to get power, but won't boot at all. My questions are, why would it fry if it was off when it got wet? More importantly, is there anything that can be done? I am reasonably PC savvy, built my home pc and several others, but never worked on a laptop before. Any advice to save it?
 
= bad, for the most part.

However, you say it was off at the time and you set it aside to dry - that was the best thing you could have done after the fact.

Did you take it apart while it was drying? If not, the surface and immediately below could have dried, but water can still remain under the surface. It's most likely that condensation is still there. If you have the know-how, remove the LCD from the case, keyboard, HDD, and RAM. Next, preferably someplace warm with air circulation (a heating vent will work, just have it about 6 inches above it) and give it another day or two.

Before putting it back together and trying again, make certain the individual components are dry, too. I'd keep the HDD upside down and at an angle so any moisture has a chance to let gravity to the work:)
 
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Also, if it was plugged in or the battery was in, there could still be power going through it even if it was off. And if you spilled an entire cup of water on it, unless you took it completely apart there is probably still a decent amount of moisture in it.
 
Take it down a computer shop i think because when it is off the mainboard is still on otherwise the system time would always be haywire.
But i think it has fryed the mainboard can you recover data from it?
 
well thats not always true, a guy in my class spilled about half a cup of orange juice on our lenovo t60s and his is living :D maybe hes just lucky
 
windowsvista said:
Take it down a computer shop i think because when it is off the mainboard is still on otherwise the system time would always be haywire.
But i think it has fryed the mainboard can you recover data from it?
Click to expand...

Yes,,,

Get a external case for the HD.You can use the drive as a back up or copy date to your desktop.
 
well there is two things. circuits may fry with tap water. circuits WILL NOT fry with distilled water. but will de destroyed in salt water. it is a good chance it is fine the reason distilled water is ok is b/c distilled water has no conductivity. best thing to have dont is remove all power from it. if is seems broken, i would open it up and peek around. and try to remove the cmos battery if your in there too
 
FYI, you can wash over circuit boards with water as long as there is no power running through them. At factories where circuit boards are manufactured, they run them through water after building them to clean off all the excess crap.

The only time water or any other conductive liquid hurts circuits is when they are powered. Isotropyl alcohol is a non conductive liquid.

You have have just damaged your keyboard, which liquid can damage because keyboard have a small amount of power running through it, however if you are not getting POST it is most likely something else.
 
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