The problem with main rail shorts on gaming laptops - LFC 

I'm not sure how you can make a video about laptop repair simultaneously interesting, relaxing, entertaining and informative, but I hope you don't stop. Thanks for taking time to capture, edit and post. I enjoy watching your professional approach to troubleshooting and (when possible) repair.

I'm Up for the Rabbit holes and dead ends Videos, for all us newbies and hobbies that's pure gold we will learn and will know that not all repairs are a win. great content thank you.

Rabbit holes or dead ends make ok videos. Can't tell you how frustrating fix videos are when you've tried them but nothing works. Wins are great but fails teach just as much, at least in the mechanic fields. I always told my troops not to cover up a mechanical error because now I can teach them something else/new. Thanks for the video, always enjoy watching

Sorin: Ok, let's try to flash the BIOS with the new tool

Given that I've killed my first attempt at a component level repair of a shorted 3.3V rail via liquid damage, I so appreciate videos like this that give me more knowledge and context to what I should look for the next time i try it.

That was an interesting dive, thank you. Successful repairs are great but diagnoses of failures can be both interesting and useful, as this video shows. Think "Hmm... I remember watching Graham diagnosing a fault similar to what I'm seeing and he proved it by doing X, so I'll do that." and "Hmm... I wonder if Graham has had a look at a similar issue? Let me check on RU-vid..."

One thing I hate the most is reading a book only to find out it is missing the last few pages, with that in mind, I enjoyed watching you follow this fault to a logical end, it was educational and interesting. Thank You...

Done watching, thank you very much for the detailed troubleshooting procedure. I hope you will soon have a mini-series for Schematic & Boardview-free Voltage/Power Rail Tracing[12V/18-20V Main Voltage Rail, 5V, 3.3V, CPU/GPU Core Voltage Rail, DRAM Voltage Rail, IGPU Voltage Rail, System Agent/Northbridge Voltage Rail, PCH Voltage Rail, BIOS Voltage Rail, Battery Power Rail] and BIOS Bin File Editing.

Fascinating as always keep up the good work

Yet another very informative video. Thanks!

18:30, i think you are right in the money, thats why after changing the Mosfet you still have a short on the induction side (CPU side) but not before the Mosfet on the main power rail, i'm learning so much from your channel, i was able to fix a spare laptop board that i have for a project fallowing your voltage injection video (it was a shorted cap... as always lol), thank you.

Great watching your videos. I have noticed, when you are looking for shorts using your meter in ohms range, you don’t zero the meter. By shorting the leads and press the REL button will compensate for lead resistance. Sorry if you that already

hey Adam great vid lots of interesting info thank you for sharing

Thank you for explaining things throughly in detail. I had similar scenario Similar ACER nitro laptop (AN 515 model) that died on me after 3 months of purchase which i sadly voided the warranty. Already gone to 3 repair shops and they all that the cpu is most likely dead. I think they already come up with the same situation before. Now i am finally accepting that CPU can die and i just throw away my very first job salary away buying acer cheap laptop. I seriously hated it now when it happened to me. I know others are fine with purchasing acer and i congratulate them. but im not gonna be the one anymore to buy their stuff Again, thank you. i now accept i had to say goodbye trying to revive whats dead

New intro music is growing on me

Very entertaining, thank you. 🙂

I do wonder why the manufacturers don't have any circuit that will sacrifice itself to protect the CPU and GPU. It would probably be far cheaper for the end user as they might not then need a new motherboard

Love the channel.

Well done 👍👍

Sometimes, you get the bear. Other times, the bear gets you.

This guy is amazing.

What I find strange is when I do repairs like this it’s not the end, I remove cpu and put another one on. So I don’t see the problem here, only if customer doesn’t want to spend for the work. I mean in a lot of cases the mosfet is at fault, most repairs I do are 70% or more a mosfet problem.

Isn't this a design flaw? I think so! Why do all the mosfets have a thermal pad to the heatsink except the one that shorted out? Surely a tiny bit of copper and a thermal pad doesn't cost THAT much, especially in an expensive gaming laptop, right? Acer, you wouldn't shave off any penny you could to save cost, would you now?

Wow! How do you know / learn this stuff? I'm officially hooked - thanks.

If there was that much at stake, the Acer would have found a way. You must climb the steps to Mount Seleya.

Exellent video sir

I have one of these machines with a similar issue, but I think mine is slightly different as it does charge the battery but won’t power on. Any ideas where I can look to find the issue ?

atleast i see parts that can be reused, ram, wlan card, battery, screen, fans.

Contrary to popular belief, this video was useful.

I've got the same laptop... owner must've OC'd and didn't consider power draw the higher the OC goes.

I've had this exact model in the shop and after removing a shorted cap it had the same behaviour as yours. I let it turned on for a while hoping it was just ram learning ecc. But nothing. Then I've found out this is a common behaviour for this laptop: black screen, keyboard lit but nothing. After resetting cmos, turning on/off a few times (long pressing ecc) it turned on. But yeah a shorted MOSFET is far more likely to have killed your CPU

why they don’t put veristors or some kind of protrction if mosfets short out?

I found that really interesting actually

I fixed the chargers with a 19 v battery drill, using it as a generator. The chargers started to work again. The method didn’t work with usb chargers. Chargers are often disabled by the default battery manager installed by the manufacturers. Gamers must uninstall this software, if the laptop can hibernate properly. Hibernation is needed, or else other malfunctions may happen. Some office work or copying and viewing doc xls files can enhance the performance, and only needs to be done once.

Very good ❤

regardless these are still interesting and there is something to learn for some of us. Thanks

You wouldn't catch me owning a laptop with SMD CPUs if I can help it. If it's not socketed forget it. I have older stuff that I know I can fix unless it's not worth the cost of repairs. When possible I'll upgrade older stuff before I buy some of this new junk, as I've always got a OS for it.

guy you did your best !

I'm having a similar issue with a gaming laptop I'm working on. The main power rail was shorted to around 3 ohms. After some searching, I found a shorted mosfet near the dedicated GPU. I removed it and the main power rail resistance is back up in the Megaohms, however the laptop still doesn't power up and also multiple components(inductors, caps after the shorted mosfet still read 3 ohms. Does this mean the dedicated GPU is dead? As it got the full 19v momentarily. Is there anyway to disconnect this GPU and use the iGPU? Thanks!

Film everything! Its all content and youtube is lacking in board repair stuff

(15:44) Just after plugging in the 19Vdc adapter I thought I saw a momentary "spark" just above the black cloth a few centimeters away above the second fan and thought I'd check there. On the other hand, I would have replaced, in addition to the damaged Mosfet, also the other four (in case they were connected in parallel) in that area with substitutes from a manufacturer recognized for their reliability (better quality) and they are not expensive. If doing that doesn't fix the fault, then I stop the repair: AON6962 (Alpha & Omega Semic) = SH8KC6TB1 (ROHM Semic) $1.27 bucks each piece at mouser. All the best.

shame about the laptop. But on a side note since it is a *GAMING LAPTOP* I would let your clients of future gaming laptops know that they could get up to 30% more performance if another memory module was installed in the vacant slot for dual channel mode. The extra memory bandwidth will make a big difference. I mean you already have the laptop open up anyway, It wouldnt be such a bad idea to shoot the idea across to them and see what he/she thinks. 30% is still quite a hefty chunk in terms of performance. as always. love watching you work!

Re: "Unlocking the LATENT POWER of my old graphics cards (April Fools 23)": it turns out, that particular Corsori brand of air fryer is under factory recall, (no joke) due to some kind of "fire hazard" recently found with the internal wiring. It might be interesting to dis-assemble & inspect (and potentially repair). Corsori has notified Amazon purchasers to sever the power cord and take photos to prove that was done, before they then ship out a free replacement.

Hello 👋, ineed help please, i have dell inspiron aio 3280 not read hdd sata , but reading usb with cable data usb , i was flash bios chip without copy backup, now my computer is not power on just blinking 2-1 light orange , any solution , thank you.

Gnarley goop.

Wow good one.

Can't fix them all Graham!

Why are only repair 19V short circuit?

nice one, would be great if you had explained how to find a main rail 👍

i see that you say that the reading is not good, but what is the reference?

Fan spin for a sec or 2 after power on , and then stop is actually of on the known sighs of a dead CPU/GPU One more thing, very low resistance under 1 ohm is actually a good thing, it mean probably dead CAP and not CPU

I don't know about 5 ohm being a short. I've seen Vcore on CPUs at 11 ohm, and GPUs get down around 1 ohm in normal operation. I would still like to see a IPA single point hot spot. Normal running it's usually the whole die that gets hot, ie, not a single point.

did you take electronics in school/college/uni? or just kinda on your own as you went?

soldered dead CPU = economically irreparable

What is that chip monk thing, have you done a video on it?

It's never the cpu, unless it is.

If you hadn't swapped parts for the video. What would you have done instead? If the customer doesn't want the laptop would you hold onto it for parts or would take it somewhere to e-cycle it?

When you replaced that chip I noticed it was the other way round compared to the one next to it, does that make a difference, I'm just guessing?

Need your tech help please. My friend bought an Asus ROG Strix B550 m/board and a Ryzen 5 5600g CPU. Everything was fully working with the m/board UNTIL he decided to plug in the 4x pin 12v power cable (next to the 8x pin 12v power socket) and his m/board went "Pop" with a little bit of smoke. I've tested his CPU on my AM4 m/board and that's fully working still but although his m/boards logo lights up, when i try and power on his board, all i get is a quick "Click" sound and nothing. The board totally refuses to power on. Without doubt a component or maybe more will have blown on his m/board somewhere along the 4x pin 12v power rail. Is there a way i can contact you direct (off this channel) in order for me to fault find which component/components will need replaced on his board please, bud ?

Every. Last one. Of these gaming laptops with a main rail short on the CPU I've seen have had Ryzen CPU's. Absolutely horrible.

Quick question: If the CPU is dead, would replacing it fix the issue?

Can't win them all. Seems odd (to me) that the main rail was 5.7 Ohms (with a shorted mosfet), 1.8 when the mosfet was replaced, then partially attempted to power up (with a missing mosfet). May have been worth rechecking the main rail, other voltages etc.

As soon as you said "acer nitro" I said suckface, took me ages to think I'd heard it from Dawid.

what would be a normal resistance on main power rail?

What temperature do you use in you heat gun?

Which company makes the least reliable gaming laptops, please answer

Genuine question: Would it be possible to replace the dead cpu? If so im curious from a business perspective why you wouldn't want to try it

Why didn’t you programme the bios just incase.

Is it possible to change the cpu in that laptop?

That mosfet is an intentional time bomb. Anyways, I wantch a guy from Russia who can swap that CPU in no time.

nice

Yeah, that's Acer.

Is it worth making a CPU swap in the case of this laptop?

👍

i was not aware that 6 ohm into the vrm was a short (maybe it is, and i am just ignorant) ...

Similar repair with similar Acer laptop: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-bGK5Xn2zXUk.html

I like content like this too, so go ahead and make 'em =)

Ofcourse it will not power up since 19v power rail is shorted.

Watching the video on this exact model of laptop. Don't know if that's a good thing lol

true, because i have motherboard dead CPU, Vcore 5,2 Ohm

you made laugh . Its Totally plastic and it is "stone dead" . small things amuse me .I would say the same but the plastic was ironic

Acer did it again :( Just like before the invention of the TVS diode :( Just like if it was hard or impossible to install one on the CPU and GPU power lines so this does not happen.

Nice video but i am not convinced if the cpu is dead. It can be other problems too .

Isn’t there any way to check if the cpu is working or false such as frequency check or power good signal because your diagnose is not enough may be superio or corrupt bios failure gives same symptoms

planned obsolescence. IN THE OLD DAYS YOU COULD JUST CHANGE THE CPU ON ANY NOTEBOOK!!!

Smile, at least it's not an Asus so the CPU has some chance of not being damaged.

can you swap the cpu? put an identical one in

Hey friend I have laptop Sony Vaio I love. Do you help me please let me know. Thank you

More experienced techs. I’m trying to learn off you and I’m lost from what your saying. Shooooot

I'm assuming replacing the CPU and the mosfets would not have solved the issues, correct?

Apparently Acer went the Apple route with this idiotic design flaw. I'd hope it was not done on purpose, but I would not be surprised if it was. No one associates Acer with quality, this isn't helping them in regards to that statement.

do new CPU

Don't buy a laptop with gpu, gpu is the main enemy of laptop. If you need gpu, buy a desktop instead,