Thinkpads Forum

Well I have T42p I really like and I started having problem with GPU. Screen goes all scramble after about an hour or if I press the area around the HDD. I would love to get this fix but I don't know where to take it to or send it to.
I would love to take it to local area (Los Angeles, Ca)
If anyone know or would like to give it a shot fixing it please let me know.

scott

I think jamiphar offers this service. You might want to shoot him a PM.

At Jamiphar's recommendation, I dealt with a place in San Marcos, CA (Mini Micro Stencil) .. good guys to work with. I sent in a batch of 15 and got a good discount because of that. I don't know what they would charge for one - but there are two options: reflow (?$50) and reball ($90). The reflow just heats up the connection so the existing solder is 'reflowed'. With a reball ($90), they remove the chip, clean it, and 'reball' the chip (put solder balls back on). I've had success - and failure with the first batch I sent.
I sent them the 15 motherboards (they need to be completely stripped of all the tape, etc) with varying degrees of GPU failure. They first reflowed all of the motherboards. They then X-rayed the GPU chips to see if there were obvious solder cracks and failures (they tell me their x-ray can't guarantee a board is good but can tell if one is bad). Three had failed. Since they were important T4x boards with the finger-print reader, I went ahead with a reball ($$). Only one of the three reballs came back 'healthy'. One of the failures had a distorted screen (probably like yours) and the other wouldn't power on (so some other problem got introduced). Of the 12 reflows, I'm still testing them out, but have had at least 5 successful reflows (I'll update this post with an accurate count later). I'm in the process of working with them on the failures - they may give me another reflow for free (shipping not included).
If anyone has any success with any other company, I'm real interested to hear.
Hope this helps a little.

great post Bob....very informative.

I look forward to your update when you finish testing.

Richard

Considering I am a newbie
I would love to have some contact information please
Much appreciated

Thanks
Scott

BobA wrote:At Jamiphar's recommendation, I dealt with a place in San Marcos, CA (Mini Micro Stencil) .. good guys to work with.................. If anyone has any success with any other company, I'm real interested to hear.

So, Bob, is James (Jamiphar) not doing this any more, or is he just overloaded?

sktn77a wrote: So, Bob, is James (Jamiphar) not doing this any more, or is he just overloaded?

He suggested it would be cheaper for me to work directly with them since I had 15x motherboards to work with. Also, he gets busy. He's a great forum member.
Bob