Computer Repair Tips

Here are a few external hard disks that we recommend. At the time of writing, all of these products are available at Amazon.co.uk (more…)

What is a Reflow?

The term ‘reflow’ describes a process of briefly melting (reflowing) the solder on an electrical circuit board.

Why would you perform a Reflow on a laptop?

The solder used in laptop motherboards tends to degrade over time, becoming brittle and weak. It can change from being a solid block of solder into more of a honeycomb structure. This weaker solder joint can fracture causing tiny broken connections in the circuit, invisible to the naked eye. The idea behind performing a reflow is that it melts the solder, allowing it to form a solid block again and joining up the electrical circuit. (more…)

Technorati Tags: laptop repair, motherboard, video

CrystalDiskInfo is a great little free tool for checking the general health of your hard drive.  It works by reading the S.M.A.R.T. data off your hard disk and displays it in a simple graphical format.  It can work with internal or external hard disks, with either IDE (ATA/PATA) or SATA connectors, and it even works for hard disks plugged in via USB.

Each of the S.M.A.R.T. parameters has a threshold, beyond which it could indicate a drive starting to fail.  If CrystalDiskInfo determines that any parameter is showing potential problems, it will highlight that row in the results table. (more…)

Technorati Tags: hard disk, repair tool