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My laptop hinge just ripped its screws right out.

I’ve just finished getting my laptop set up the way I like it, including maximising the RAM and upgrading the screen. I opened it up to use it, and the screws on the hinge tore through the plastic.

To top it off, the plastic on the bottom of the laptop, the side that’s been removed here, has also broken.

My wife definitely didn’t drop the laptop while she was tidying up though…

EDIT: Apologies all, I’m having trouble with Lemmy today, and it’s not letting me reply.

I’ll try to reply tomorrow, but in the meantime;

It’s a Stonebook branded Clevo n751BU, a 7th gen i5. It’s held up respectably well until it appears to have been knocked in the corner where the hinge is. The plastics on both sides of the hinge have given out.

I’ve ordered a replacement base, but the palm rest which is pictured is not available anywhere that I can find. I’m going to dismantle the hinge to clean and oil it, then reassemble it slightly less tightly, and epoxy the screws into place. The reason for taking it apart in the first place was to add a third hard drive. It has an nvme drive, and I had two HDDs going spare that can hold my documents and music. They’re being synced now as I was having problems doing it remotely, but once they’re in they can be managed with Syncthing. The laptop shouldn’t need to come apart agin afterwards :)

I’ve been building and repairing computers and laptops for about 30 years, so I’m comfortable with completely stripping it, and can use it as an excuse to give everything a clean again. Short of replacing these HDDs with SSDs, there’s nothing else that can physically be upgraded, so I’m half tempted to glue it shut so that I don’t get tempted again :D

IMongoose ,

At least it didn’t crack the screen with the bad hinge. I think it happens when the screws get a little loose and the angles shift. I work k-12 edu and have seen hundreds of Chromebooks do this.

Tippon OP ,

Don’t scare me, I haven’t fixed it yet 😅

IMongoose ,

You’re already working on it so you’re good. We’ve just had kids ignore it too long which causes more issues. Just don’t force it lol.

Concave1142 ,

This happened on a decent spec’d HP laptop I bought my mom a couple years back. No easy way to repair without ordering new hinges that were impossible to find and the PC repair shop quoted over $500 repair on a $700 laptop when it was new.

Now she just leaves the laptop open in the 180 degree position with the laptop being held into a stand & bungie cord strapped to it to prevent it from falling foward. It is now a desktop PC and no longer a laptop.

herrcaptain ,

I assume she’s using a separate keyboard/mouse, right? Though I’m enjoying the mental picture of someone trying to touch type on a vertical keyboard.

Concave1142 ,

I did not want to deal with the remote IT support of it all, so I plugged in a mouse/keyboard and a second monitor to make it more like a desktop PC setup, lol.

herrcaptain ,

That’s the way to do it. I used a broken laptop like that as my daily driver for a few years after losing my desktop and being unable to replace it.

Tippon OP ,

I was debating doing something similar, and putting it behind the TV to replace the Fire Stick, but I’ve found what looks like compatible plastics on ebay. My base has broken quite badly too, so replacing both is going to be my best bet.

Daft question, but have you tried ebay for the hinges, or a spares or repairs listing?

Concave1142 ,

I gave it a very short search back when it broke last year. I went with the cheapest way to get it back up and running which was just convert it to a desktop. She never goes anywhere with a laptop in the first place so there was no need to make it portable again.

She’s retired and just used it to surf the web. A Chromebook would work perfectly for her if she was not dead set of having Excel for her recipes and bill tracking.

Tippon OP ,

Fair enough :)

She sounds similar to my mother. She’s got a laptop that never moves too, but refuses to consider a desktop 🤷🏻‍♂️

pearsaltchocolatebar ,

You could also just keep it closed and set it to do nothing on screen close. Then enable WoL.

My work laptop lives under my router, and I just remote into it daily.

socphoenix ,

JB weld epoxy might be a good choice if you either don’t plan on replacing the screen again, or to recreate the holes and patch the cracks if you pull it all the way apart again. I did it to the back of a tv when the vesa screw mounts ripped and it held for another 5 years.

Tippon OP ,

I’ve been looking at replacing the mounts with brass ones, but as it’s an old laptop, I should be able to get a replacement case for around £40. I don’t really want to spend any more, but if I can get the case I’m going to go down that route :)

socphoenix ,

For sure take the case if it’s affordable! It’ll look much nicer afterwards too

henfredemars ,

Oh I hate these shitty joints that are designed to fail eventually. It’s just not made to last.

BeardedGingerWonder ,

Counterpoint, sometimes stuff is designed to break so something else more critical of expensive to replace does not.

EddoWagt ,

Sure, but in this case that’s just not true

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