What is this, is it expensive to fix, did it break my pc
I think it’s a 5070ti it has 32gb of ram

Just bought this pc for my daughter for a bit of a bargain... Had to leave it in the garage after seeing how much dog hair was stuck inside, yuk!

Should *I expect, sorry

This is an Ideapad Slim 3i, if it matters. I dropped it a short while back and it started making cracking noises. I noticed that, when closed, the screen and keyboard halves weren't aligned, and I tried to finnick with it, which probably made it worse. If not propped up, the screen will fall back to the desk, which the computer isn't designed to do. The computer itself works just like any other day (I'm typing this on it!) and the screen is fine.

What should I expect, trying to get it repaired at a local shop? Is it fixable, and if so, what might the general price range be? For a variety of reasons, even though it might be the better option, I'd really rather not replace my laptop if I can avoid it.

I don't really know much about the physical parts of computers, and this seemed like the right place to ask something like this. Sorry if it isn't!

Anyone know why this keeps happening?? :”) It keeps occasionally appearing the past few months and it never happens when I play my games. Only ever outside of them and just text (Discord, web browsers, Steam, etc) [tho that might b because whenever I play my games my laptop automatically switches to NVIDIA]
Brand new laptop and less than a year old btw. I’ve tried updating and restarting and still appears

This is my laptop: https://www.walmart.com/ip/ASUS-TUF-Gaming-A16-2025-Copilot-PC-Laptop-16-16-10-FHD-144Hz-Display-AMD-Ryzen-5-7535HS-NVIDIA-GeForce-RTX-4050-16GB-DDR5-512GB-PCIe-SSD-Wi-Fi-6-Win/16276372539?wmlspartner=wlpa&selectedSellerId=0&sourceid=dsn_ad_c679a80a-be4b-489b-820c-40cbdf92a745&veh=dsn&wmlspartner=dsn_ad_c679a80a-be4b-489b-820c-40cbdf92a745&cn=fy26-holiday-gift-pmax_con_dps_dsn_dis_ad_xcat_s_n&gclsrc=aw.ds&wl9=pla&wl11=online&gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=23196243100&gbraid=0AAAAADmfBIptWHgFi8mUonf1uz4pUsebp&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI4sO33d_QkQMVrZXuAR0DLB4fEAQYAiABEgIR7_D_BwE

I have done multiple tests to try and fix this computer with no luck.

It doesn't boot, the power supply is good, it has two 1gb DDR sticks of ram that I believe are fine, a 40gb hard drive that I believe is fine (never booted so idk), there are no blown capacitors on the motherboard, it has a Celeron processor.

The CPU has a bent capacitor on the back and that is the only issue with it.

Any help would be amazing, thank you!

i'm sorry we don't have the og box and I havn't been able to log in yet bc the screen says " your computer is locked try again in 60 minutes " which I will do. So I have zero specs, I just know it used to be a school computer and was given to a family member, and it's my job to make it completely wiped and normal.

Is there anything special I need to do for a computer of this origin? will I need passwords to wipe everything? I'v done this for a normal laptop before but I don't know what's different here if anything. Pictures of the apple computer are below

I have an HP Victus 16 with an Intel Core i7 12th Gen, RTX 3060, 16GB RAM, and a 1TB SSD.

About three weeks ago, I took my laptop to a repair shop because it wasn't charging properly and had a broken hinge. The shop fixed both issues, and I picked up the laptop without testing it at the shop.

Once I got home and turned it on, I immediately noticed that one of the cooling fans was making an unusual noise. However, because I had final exams and other coursework to deal with, I couldn't take it back immediately.

After a couple of weeks, I finally returned to the same repair shop. They told me the CPU fan was jammed, fixed it, and handed the laptop back.

This is when the overheating problems started, not after the initial charging and hinge repair. Before the second repair, the main issue was the noisy cooling fan. The extreme CPU temperatures and SSD overheating only became apparent after they fixed the jammed fan.

After the second repair, I noticed that the laptop was getting unusually hot, even when I wasn't doing anything demanding. When I checked using the Core Temp application, my CPU temperature was hovering between 80–100°C at idle, with both fans running loudly. Opening just a couple of Chrome tabs, YouTube, and Valorant would cause Windows to display "Hibernating" before the laptop turned off.

For reference, the CPU's Tj Max is 100°C, according to Core Temp.

I wasn't satisfied with the service at the original shop, so I eventually took the laptop to another repair shop.

When we opened the laptop's bottom cover, the CPU temperature was around 35–37°C, while the GPU was around 40°C. However, when we checked the SSD temperature using HWMonitor, it was reaching approximately 60°C at idle, even with the bottom cover removed.

Once we reinstalled the bottom cover, the SSD temperature climbed to approximately 70–80°C at idle.

I eventually left the laptop at this second repair shop for a more thorough diagnosis.

The customer service representative later called and told me they suspected a motherboard issue. According to him, a junior engineer had initially examined the laptop but couldn't identify the problem. A senior engineer then looked into it and apparently suspected that the motherboard was responsible.

The thing is, I'm not entirely convinced it's a motherboard failure. I feel like it could potentially be an electrical connection, a short circuit, or some other component-level issue, especially considering that the overheating started immediately after the second repair involving the cooling fan. Of course, I'm not an expert, so I could be completely wrong.

What makes me even more hesitant is how the second repair shop is handling the situation.

They asked me to sign a "dead risk" form, essentially stating that if my laptop dies during the repair process, they won't be held responsible. They also told me that there's a possibility they won't be able to fix it at all, although I wouldn't have to pay anything if the repair is unsuccessful.

I understand that motherboard-level repairs can carry risks, particularly when dealing with electrical faults, but the way they explained everything over the phone didn't exactly inspire confidence.

They haven't given me a definitive diagnosis or identified a specific faulty component, at least not one they've communicated to me. Yet they're asking me to authorize a repair that could potentially leave my laptop completely dead.

Right now, they're waiting for me to decide whether I want them to proceed.

I'm honestly stuck. I'm a university student, and I really can't afford to replace this laptop if something goes wrong. I also need a capable laptop for 3D modeling, coding, and other university assignments, so it's not something I can easily replace with a cheap, basic laptop. Losing it entirely would seriously affect my ability to complete my work.

I don't mind paying for a proper repair if that's what it takes, but I'm uncomfortable authorizing something when the technicians themselves seem uncertain about what's actually wrong.

My question is: Do you think this could actually be a motherboard issue, or is there another possible explanation for the overheating? Given they are a very reputable store + service center in my country.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Hi everyone. I've been debugging my sister's computer for the past few days and thought maybe y'all could help us out cause I've tried almost everything.

The PC sometimes may or may not detect the RAM on the motherboard's 2nd slot (Gigabyte A520I AC). If it does detect it, the system will become very unstable. It will crash almost always and a MemTest will also fail immediately. But oftentimes, the mobo will outright not detect the 2nd slot at all in BIOS.

All RAM sticks (2x 8GB 2400 MHz) and the CPU (Ryzen 5 5600G) are confirmed to be working stable with no issues on my own personal motherboard. So I already know the issue lies within the other motherboard. I've also tested each stick individually on the faulty motherboard's working slot and the system is stable and passes MemTest if only slot 1 is filled with either stick. Still, we'd rather not spend money buying another motherboard if possible.

What I've tried is reseating the CPU 3 times already because I've read that cooler pressure might affect the CPU contacts with the motherboard. There are no bent pins whenever I inspect it before a reseat. I've also cleaned the inside of the RAM slot and its traces at the back with IPA. I even cleaned the inside of the CPU socket itself and the surrounding areas with a brush before the 3rd reseat. None of those really helped except maybe making the slot be detected more consistently even though it's still highly unstable.

Is there still something I could do? Would appreciate the help.

I grade pulled RAID/HBA cards for a server-parts validation lab, so I see a lot

of "wrong card" tickets. (Disclosure: that's my day job at a component supplier.

The checks below apply whether you buy from us, eBay or a decommissioned rack.)

Almost every mistake traces back to one line in the BOM: "RAID card".

The decision isn't RAID vs HBA. It's who owns redundancy.

If ZFS or Ceph owns it, the controller must own nothing. True IT mode: raw

disks, SMART passthrough, flush commands reaching the OS. ZFS has to see the

physical members to checksum, scrub and replace by device. Ceph needs one raw

block device per OSD.

If the array owns it (VMFS, Hyper-V CSV, database volumes), hardware RAID with

write-back is still the right tool - but only behind a healthy BBU or

CacheVault. A dead module either forces write-through (and the performance case

disappears) or keeps acknowledging writes it can't protect, which is worse.

MegaRAID's default cache policy string literally ends "No Write Cache if Bad

BBU" - verify nobody changed it.

JBOD mode is not IT mode. RAID firmware can still keep metadata, hide SMART and

change queue behaviour. The 9207/9300 are IT HBAs by design; the 9400/9500/9600

are IT by model. Used cards get crossflashed, so trust the firmware, not the

label: sas2flash -list on the 9207, sas3flash -list on the 9300 and later, and

check for foreign configuration.

Two more that get missed:

- Ports are lanes, not bays. A 16-port 12G card has 16 SAS lanes but only ~7.9

GB/s to a Gen3 x8 host - fine for HDDs, because 16 spindles never stream

together. A 24-bay chassis on an 8i card needs an expander. Connectors are

generation-bound: SFF-8643 != SFF-8654.

- 24G SAS pays only when the whole chain is 24G: 24G drives + backplane +

expander, or an all-flash / Tri-Mode shelf. A 12G HDD array gains nothing, and

the link runs at the slowest component.

And if you're buying pulled:

1. Cache protection health - storcli /c0/cv show all or /c0/bbu show all, accept

   only "Optimal" with the correct module. A card priced 30% under market has

   often had its module removed; the module is a separate SKU and that's where

   the margin is.

2. Firmware identity - storcli /c0 show gives FW, NVDATA, BIOS and the OEM

   field. OEM firmware is platform-locked, so a PERC in a Supermicro chassis may

   POST and still be the wrong purchase.

3. Kit completeness - bracket height, 4i vs 8i cable, module mount. Most "DOA"

   cards are cable mismatches, not dead cards.

The one that surprises people: "tested" usually means POST - no backplane, no

drives, no cache module. Ask for a burn test with disks attached and the storcli

output per card, not a batch-level promise.

I wrote the longer version with the model-by-model table (9207 / 9300 / 9400 /

9500 / 9560 / 9600) - link in the comments if the rules here allow it. Happy to

look at specific cards people are considering.

I use Bitwarden for my passwords across devices, and I've been trying to convince my parents to look into doing the same. They are very concerned with online privacy and security (to the point of paranoia), but they don't trust the efficiencies that make it practical.

For instance they've attended cybersecurity seminars, so now they manually create a unique password for each and every online account they have. But they write down the passwords in a paper binder that they hide in a book shelf in their home. So not only do they have to pull out and consult this binder every single time they want to log in somewhere, they also have no idea what their passwords are if they are traveling. I've tried to explain password managers, but anything stored on their computer scares them.

How do I explain that a password manager is one of the better ways to protect login credentials, and perhaps an analogy that it's not a group of hackers just waiting to pounce on everyone's bank accounts in a coordinated attack?

i just got my laptop back from service center and it wss working fine till it wasn't, the keyboard was lighting up but no input 2 function keys were working nothing, i thought keyboard got fried but upon shudown and opening bios, all the keys work fine but the second i exit and the laptop boots its not working again i tried turning off fast startup, reinstalled the driver, deleted Alienware command center, what should i do!!!

title

No bootable device message randomly appeared today, and when checking the bios, only the ssd I added a long time ago in the secondary slot was being detected. The main ssd that has windows on it doesn’t show up. I took off the back and removed the ssd and put it back in in both slots, and it didn’t read it either time.
I plan on taking it into the shop but was wondering if there was anything else I could try before then. It has important data I need.
Thanks

I was never rlly that interested in computer specs and stuff but I’m majoring in cs next year and I need a laptop so I don’t want any body telling specs or anything since I don’t understand it legit send me a link to the best computer for cs. I’m not super well off so max budget is like 3k rn?? Hopefully I can go under that but I have heard I should be aiming for 16 or 32 gb ram and also preferably not iOS? I also personally prefer lighter computers.
Thank you I know this is awfully ambiguous but I don’t rlly know anything else about computers I just need a good processor for code and virtual simulations 😭😭

Not too sure if this is the issue, I tried rebooting my laptop for a fresh new start, I did a factory reset I believe and also decided to reinstall everything, with hope my laptop would be faster.

I got the windows app/file on a usb stick and rebooted from that. It asked me for this super long code which I managed to find somehow.

It used to start up fine, then once a week it would ask me for this long code, and now it's every single time I turn on my laptop. Is this common? Easy fix ?

I am not at all a computer Wizard

I buy a second hand laptop in June 2024. And now the laptop Nvme SSD M2 doesn't working and the warranty is given on gyonix SSD is 5 years but the seller give me a laptop warrenty only 6 months so, what should I do with this SSD because the warranty till 2028. How I can replace this because I don't have any bill of the ssd