Components guides
Identifying and testing the parts you meet on a laptop motherboard.
- Components
Inductors on Laptop Boards: How to Test Them
Inductors on laptop boards: power inductors, chokes and small RF parts, their markings and ratings, signs of failure, coil whine, and choosing a replacement.
- Components
SMD Component Marking Codes: How to Identify Unknown Parts
How to identify unknown SMD parts from their markings: resistor and inductor codes, polarity marks, short transistor codes, IC top marks and datasheets.
- Components
Signs of PCH (Chipset) Failure in Laptops
Signs of a failing PCH (chipset) in a laptop: missing sleep-state signals, shorted chipset rails, dead USB and storage, heat, and how to rule out firmware first.
- Components
Polymer and Tantalum Capacitors: Failure Modes on Laptop Boards
How polymer and tantalum capacitors fail on laptop boards: shorts, rising ESR and lost capacitance, burning tantalums, polarity marks, and choosing replacements.
- Components
Laptop Motherboard Repair vs Replacement: When It's Worth It
When to repair a laptop motherboard and when to replace it: fault types, cost and age, data on soldered storage, replacement board sources and risks.
- Components
Laptop Motherboard Fuses: Finding and Testing Them
Laptop motherboard fuses explained: where designers put them, chip fuses, PTC polyfuses and eFuse chips, their ratings, markings and replacement.
- Components
Shorted Capacitors on Laptop Boards: How to Find Them
How to find a shorted capacitor among dozens on a laptop rail: splitting the rail, millivolt drop mapping, injection, visual clues and safe removal.
- Components
Diodes and TVS Diodes on Laptop Boards
Diodes and TVS diodes on laptop boards: where they sit and why, Schottky, Zener, TVS and ESD arrays, the ratings that matter for replacements, and typical failures.
- Components
Current Sense Resistors in Laptop Charging Circuits
Current sense resistors in laptop charging circuits: where they sit, Kelvin sense lines and filters, how a damaged shunt misleads the charger and how to check one.
- Components
Crystals and Clock Problems on Laptop Boards
Crystals and clock problems on laptop boards: which chips need a crystal, how oscillators fail, measuring clocks safely and choosing a replacement.
- Components
Common Laptop Motherboard ICs and What They Do
The ICs you find on every laptop motherboard — PCH, EC, BIOS flash, charger, PD and voltage controllers, codec, LAN and more — what each does and how it fails.