with your own AC adapter but not with your battery, and now it regains its
will to live with a known-good battery, this is a pretty good indication that
your battery has failed and should be replaced.The other possibility — and it isn’t good news — is that the power circuitry
inside your laptop or the motherboard itself has failed. This could be the result
of a short or break caused by a tumble, or electrically fried components. If
you’re semi-lucky, your laptop is still under warranty and the manufacturer
will repair or replace the system; otherwise, this may be a situation where it
would cost more to repair an older machine than buy a new one. Chapter 4
talks about where to go from here.Recovering from a Spill .................................................................................
Water and coffee and soda are among your laptop’s worst enemies. Just a
little bit of a mix could damage or destroy your machine or cause you to
lose data.Some laptops are more vulnerable to damage from a spill on the keyboard
than others, and it doesn’t always have anything to do with the price tag.
Some keyboards have a thin rubber membrane beneath the keys with electri-
cal contacts molded right into little domes under each letter; that design may
feel squishy and cheap to some users, but it stands up better to a splash or
a flood than a more traditional design with springs and exposed contacts.
How do you know which type of design you have? Take a look for yourself
by prying off a keytop; if you’re shopping, the information maybe available
from the manufacturer or a dealer.The best way to deal with preventing damage from a mix of liquid and elec-
tronics is to keep them as far apart as possible. Keep your laptop as far away
as possible from cups of coffee, glasses of water, and cans of soda. Having
said this, I know all too well the joys of doing my work on the seatback table
of a packed Boeing 737 with barely enough room to balance a paperback
much less a laptop. I worry that the kid front of me is going to go for a joy
ride and tilt his seat back, snapping the LCD screen in half. I keep a wary eye
on the flight attendant in the aisle and the passenger alongside me, assuming
that either one — or both — are capable of dumping a cup of soda on my
machine.All right, then: In the real world, stuff happens. If you have a choice of poi-
sons, take the water spill. A hot cup of coffee, a cold glass of soda, or a glass
of wine are each bad news; all of them are slightly acidic. Acidic liquids are
nastier than nearly neutral water because they can corrode metal contacts.
And both coffee and soda can become gummy and sticky as they dry.32 Part II: Explaining What Could Possibly Go Wrong