Idea for repairing my laptop power jack

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Mon, 11 Aug 2014 06:02:40 -0700 (PDT), Tim R <timothy42b@aol.com>
wrote:

On Sunday, August 10, 2014 11:29:17 PM UTC-4, Jeff Liebermann wrote:
As for "an appreciable fraction of a new laptop", I'm curious as to
what percentage of the cost of a new laptop you would be willing to
pay for a repair?

The cost is a good question. I'm still using a laptop (not this one!)
I paid $1,000 for ten years ago. It has a wonky fan and I'm backing
up files waiting for it to die.

Until just recently, I was running a Xenix server that's been running
since about 1993. I got tired of waiting for it to die, so I pulled
the plug.

The local shop quoted me $200 to fix it, which is 20% of the purchase
price, but a new laptop that is faster and better in every way would
run me $300, or a refurb would be $179.

Thanks. 20% of the purchase price is not what I'm looking for. I'm
curious about the repair cost percentage of the replacement price.
$200 / $300 = 67%
which is far too expensive. If you can find a $300 replacement
laptop, I would certainly replace instead of repair.

However, if you're looking for a Windoze 8.1 machine, I don't believe
you can buy anything decent (i.e. i3 CPU or better) for less than
$400. If you want a screen that you can see, which means 1920x1080, I
would guess about $500 minimum. Since laptops don't come with built
in CD/DVD drives any more, add another $40. (Add about $150 for MS
Office 2013 Home and Student). Ignoring MS Office, taxes, Geek Squad,
time to reinstall, and some extras, my guess is a shiny new Win 8.1
laptop will set you back about $450 minimum.
$200 / $450 = 44%
So, what percentage of the REPLACEMENT cost would you be willing to
repair the laptop rather than replace it?

I think the break point is not a percentage but an amount. $80 I
would pay, $100 is a maybe, $120 is definitely no.

$80 / $450 = 18%
$100 / $450 = 22%
$120 / $450 = 27%
I usually use 25% as my fix/replace break point, which puts the jack
replacement as marginal. I just wanted to confirm my pricing. The
$75/hr shop rate allegedly includes any warranty and failure to fix
costs. At 25%, I guess the decision should be by whether the laptop
is worth fixing. If it's a single core CPU or older, forget it. If
it's a dual core or later, then it might be a worthwhile repair.

Incidentally, for the laptop tightwads, the $130 laptop:
<http://www.groupon.com/deals/gg-acer-116-chromebook-with-14ghz-dual-core-processor>
I have several and they run Ubuntu 12.04LTS quite fast and fairly
nicely.


--
Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

 

[Tim R]

On Tuesday, August 12, 2014 11:41:55 AM UTC-4, Jeff Liebermann wrote:

Incidentally, for the laptop tightwads, the $130 laptop:

http://www.groupon.com/deals/gg-acer-116-chromebook-with-14ghz-dual-core-processor

I have several and they run Ubuntu 12.04LTS quite fast and fairly

nicely.

Interesting. No conventional hard drive, just a 16G solid state. Do you find that a limitation? or just run an external? Oh wait, I just googled chromebook and realized most of the aps are in the cloud.

 

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Tue, 12 Aug 2014 13:07:43 -0700 (PDT), Tim R <timothy42b@aol.com>
wrote:

On Tuesday, August 12, 2014 11:41:55 AM UTC-4, Jeff Liebermann wrote:

Incidentally, for the laptop tightwads, the $130 laptop:

http://www.groupon.com/deals/gg-acer-116-chromebook-with-14ghz-dual-core-processor

I have several and they run Ubuntu 12.04LTS quite fast and fairly

nicely.

Interesting. No conventional hard drive, just a 16G solid state.

Most of my stuff is now in the (Google) cloud or one of half a dozen
cloud servers that I'm having difficulty tracking. Locally, its on
either a flash drive, USB 3,0 hard disk, NAS box, or various customer
servers. I don't need to carry everything I own with me.

I gave a talk on the install to the local Linux abuser group:
<http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/FLUG-talk-2014-07-26/>
It's just my noted and totally disorganized. Web page to follow if I
can find the time.

>Do you find that a limitation? or just run an external?

The SSD is easily upgradeable:
<http://www.androidcentral.com/how-upgrade-ssd-your-acer-c720-chromebook>

With Ubuntu 12.04LTS 32 bit loaded, the "Disks" program shows a 14GB
partition (after subtracting 2.1 GB for the swap, and 2.1 GB for
something else I left on the drive. Out of the 14GB, I have about 7GB
free (after substracting out several 1GB movies). Yeah, a bit tight
after loading LibreOffice and a bunch of big CAD programs.

The 2GB RAM is amazing. I monitor the swap with "System Monitor". I
have to run a mess of programs before it even begins to swap. With a
SSD, I hardly notice any slowdown. 4GB would be better so that I can
run 64bit Ubuntu, but 2GB is adequate, especially at the price.

What impressed me most is how fast everything runs compared to my
assortment of other laptops. About 20 seconds to boot from a cold
start including the login and loading a bunch of drivers I added.
About 5 seconds to shutdown.

Oh wait, I just googled chromebook and realized most of the aps are
in the cloud.

I tried running ChromeOS for a while and learned to hate it. I
assumed that I could run Android apps, like on my Android tablet and
phone. Nope. ChromeOS is a differenet animal with very few useful
apps. There are now laptops that run Android, but I don't want to pay
the price. Besides, I like Linux better.


--
Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

 

On Tue, 12 Aug 2014 15:10:51 -0700, Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com>
wrote:

On Tue, 12 Aug 2014 13:07:43 -0700 (PDT), Tim R <timothy42b@aol.com
wrote:

On Tuesday, August 12, 2014 11:41:55 AM UTC-4, Jeff Liebermann wrote:

Incidentally, for the laptop tightwads, the $130 laptop:

http://www.groupon.com/deals/gg-acer-116-chromebook-with-14ghz-dual-core-processor

I have several and they run Ubuntu 12.04LTS quite fast and fairly

nicely.

Interesting. No conventional hard drive, just a 16G solid state.

Most of my stuff is now in the (Google) cloud or one of half a dozen
cloud servers that I'm having difficulty tracking. Locally, its on
either a flash drive, USB 3,0 hard disk, NAS box, or various customer
servers. I don't need to carry everything I own with me.

I gave a talk on the install to the local Linux abuser group:
http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/FLUG-talk-2014-07-26/
It's just my noted and totally disorganized. Web page to follow if I
can find the time.

Do you find that a limitation? or just run an external?

The SSD is easily upgradeable:
http://www.androidcentral.com/how-upgrade-ssd-your-acer-c720-chromebook

With Ubuntu 12.04LTS 32 bit loaded, the "Disks" program shows a 14GB
partition (after subtracting 2.1 GB for the swap, and 2.1 GB for
something else I left on the drive. Out of the 14GB, I have about 7GB
free (after substracting out several 1GB movies). Yeah, a bit tight
after loading LibreOffice and a bunch of big CAD programs.

The 2GB RAM is amazing. I monitor the swap with "System Monitor". I
have to run a mess of programs before it even begins to swap. With a
SSD, I hardly notice any slowdown. 4GB would be better so that I can
run 64bit Ubuntu, but 2GB is adequate, especially at the price.

What impressed me most is how fast everything runs compared to my
assortment of other laptops. About 20 seconds to boot from a cold
start including the login and loading a bunch of drivers I added.
About 5 seconds to shutdown.

Oh wait, I just googled chromebook and realized most of the aps are
in the cloud.

I tried running ChromeOS for a while and learned to hate it. I
assumed that I could run Android apps, like on my Android tablet and
phone. Nope. ChromeOS is a differenet animal with very few useful
apps. There are now laptops that run Android, but I don't want to pay
the price. Besides, I like Linux better.

I have an older Asus laptop that was made to do graphics. The hard
drive it came with died so I put in an SSD and the 20 second boot time
from a cold start has been my experience too. However, I have been
told by some of my computer guru friends that the SSD will have a
shorter life than a regular hard drive because of the physics of the
way stuff is stored. There ways to minimize rewrites and so on to
lengthen the life of the drive and my son has implemented some of
these but I don't really know anything about it. I just love how much
faster the computer is now.
Eric

 

[William Sommerwerck]

wrote in message news:19alu9dlvumdn0fc1r71v25oqtmgk470i3@4ax.com...

However, I have been told by some of my computer guru friends
that the SSD will have a shorter life than a regular hard drive...

Unlike HDs (which can last a week or several decades), SSDs have a known
finite lifespan. It has to do with trapped charge that eventually makes it
impossible to erase and rewrite.

You don't want to use an SSD on a system where huge files are constantly being
written and rewritten. You should install the largest drive you can afford, as
it will sustain more write cycles.

When I bought a new computer two years ago, I used the SSD solely for the
operating system and files that didn't change often. (Mail, temp files,
indexing, etc, were assigned to a large hard drive.)

 

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Wed, 13 Aug 2014 06:19:09 -0700, "William Sommerwerck"
<grizzledgeezer@comcast.net> wrote:

wrote in message news:19alu9dlvumdn0fc1r71v25oqtmgk470i3@4ax.com...

However, I have been told by some of my computer guru friends
that the SSD will have a shorter life than a regular hard drive...

Unlike HDs (which can last a week or several decades), SSDs have a known
finite lifespan.

Not a "known" lifetime. More like a bell curve of estimated lifetimes
based on uncorrectable errors. If it worries you, run the
manufactories diagnostic software to track the errors. For example
Intel Toolbox and Samsung Magician:
<http://www.intel.com/design/flash/nand/managessd.htm>
<http://www.samsung.com/global/business/semiconductor/samsungssd/downloads.html>
I deal with about 8 machines running Intel and Samsung SSD drives. In
about the last 6-12 months, no new errors. With a failure rate of
about 1.5% per year (as compared to 5% for rotating HD storage), I
don't expect to see too many failures with such a small sample.
<http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2014/01/30/are-ssds-reliable/>
Failure rate by brand:
<http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/108284-huge-list-of-failure-rates-on-pc-components-french-but-i-translated-nearly-everything/>
(Search for "SSD").

It has to do with trapped charge that eventually makes it
impossible to erase and rewrite.

Nice article comparing reliability and failure modes of rotating
storage and SSD:
<http://www.idema.org/wp-content/downloads/1879.pdf>

You don't want to use an SSD on a system where huge files are constantly being
written and rewritten. You should install the largest drive you can afford, as
it will sustain more write cycles.

Probably good advice. None of my machines or my customers machine or
even their servers fit that description. In my case, it's a small
number of fairly small files that written, erased, and copied
constantly. Various filesystems that are designed to even out
read/write cycles throught different cells on the SSD help quite a
bit.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_file_systems#File_systems_optimized_for_flash_memory.2C_solid_state_media>
I use YAFFS for weather stations running on CF cards.

When I bought a new computer two years ago, I used the SSD solely for the
operating system and files that didn't change often. (Mail, temp files,
indexing, etc, were assigned to a large hard drive.)

I've had more problems with corruption due to unplanned power failures
than anything else. Fortunately, it's repairable by running an erase
cycle (takes forever), and restoring from an image backup.


--
Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

 

[William Sommerwerck]

"Jeff Liebermann" wrote in message
news:61qnu9dbv0hl74hat0t28ogvutug7engn5@4ax.com...
On Wed, 13 Aug 2014 06:19:09 -0700, "William Sommerwerck"
<grizzledgeezer@comcast.net> wrote:

Unlike HDs (which can last a week or several decades), SSDs have
a known finite lifespan.

Not a "known" lifetime. More like a bell curve of estimated lifetimes
based on uncorrectable errors.

I have to disagree. If a cell is good, on average, for 6000 write cycles, one
can easily compute how much data can be written to the drive before it becomes
useless.

Those unfamiliar with SSDs need to know that such drives -- including flash
drives -- include "leveling software" that spreads writes across the entire
disk. If a cell is good for 6000 writes, than a 256GB drive can tolerate
1536TB of data being written to it before becoming useless. (Of course, it can
still be read.)

A major problem with SSDs is that, to make them cheaper (for a given
capacity), the cells have to get smaller. And smaller cells won't tolerate as
many write cycles.

My boot drive is a 256GB SSD. Only about 25% of it is used, and most of the
files are OS files that aren't often updated or changed. Barring "some other"
disaster, I expect it to last 20 years or more.

When subjected to inappropriately heavy use, SSDs can fail rapidly.

I've had more problems with corruption due to unplanned power failures
than anything else.

Don't you have some sort of power backup?

While we're on it... I sometimes hear my SPS "buzzing" for no obvious reason.
The computer then often goes into Sleep mode, also for no obvious reason.

 

Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com> wrote:

Failure rate by brand:
http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/108284-huge-list-of-failure-rates-on-pc-components-french-but-i-translated-nearly-everything/
(Search for "SSD").

That's an interesting article. Thanks for posting it!

Hmm... these two 500 GB Seagates have been spinning for about 6 years
now. (24/7, RAID-1.) Perhaps replacement disks would be a good idea...

Matt Roberds

 

[Tim R]

Update, being typed on the broken laptop.

I have the week off and decided to take the ten minutes a day working on it advice given earlier. I cleaned off the table and picked up the basement room and got mentally ready.

But first, I took it in to the geek squad dept at the local stationary store and asked them to check it one more time. Yeah, that jack looks loose, it shouldn't move like that, let me plug it in with your power supply - nothing - let me plug it in with the store's power supply - hmmm, powers up fine. I bought a universal power supply and am back in operation.

 

[William Sommerwerck]

"Tim R" wrote in message
news:c8dfd617-6ce4-4072-ac2e-d1b803da5f13@googlegroups.com...

I have the week off and decided to take the ten minutes a day
working on it advice given earlier. I cleaned off the table and
picked up the basement room and got mentally ready.

But first, I took it in to the geek squad dept at the local stationery
store and asked them to check it one more time. Yeah, that jack
looks loose, it shouldn't move like that, let me plug it in with your
power supply -- nothing -- let me plug it in with the store's power
supply - hmmm, powers up fine. I bought a universal power supply
and am back in operation.

Life Is Not Fair. Especially when all the symptoms point to one and only one
cause -- which isn't it.

 

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Fri, 15 Aug 2014 04:25:16 +0000 (UTC), mroberds@att.net wrote:

Hmm... these two 500 GB Seagates have been spinning for about 6 years
now. (24/7, RAID-1.) Perhaps replacement disks would be a good idea...

I've come to the anecdotal conclusion that it's not how many hours you
run the drive, but how many times you turn it on and off. I have a
1995's vintage Conner Peripherals CFA1080A SCSI drive running in my
Xenix server. The box has been up since about 1989, but various parts
and pieces have been replaced along the way. The drive was installed
in 1996 and has been running flawlessly for the last 18 years.

I get somewhat less lifetime with my server drives and RAID NAS boxes.
Leave the drives spinning and they seem to last nearly forever. Run
them in start-stop mode, and they die quickly.

--
Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

 

[William Sommerwerck]

"Jeff Liebermann" wrote in message
news:asf7v9t4ps7noevg31nfucacpnd3i22p8h@4ax.com...

I've come to the anecdotal conclusion that it's not how many hours
you run the drive, but how many times you turn it on and off.

This seems to be the consensus. My previous computer was rarely turned off,
and ran 11 years with no problems.

With my current machine, I switch it to Sleep most nights, so the drives are
not being shut down more than about 300 times a year.