Club soda'd t42, need new mobo, upgrade Q's

[oldsguy]

So my friend decided to spill club soda on my laptop, instantly rendering it dead as a doornail. He claimed to have spilled only a little bit on it, but I didn't see it. We took the keyboard off to look inside and try changing out the power switch with another T42, but that didn't work. So we wiped off all the liquid residue (not much) and made a warranty claim; unfortunately for me I was not aware that they kill warranties for liquid damage (but then again, I wasn't aware I had a warranty on this computer until last week.)
They told me I needed a new motherboard and sent it back to me. So now, I am interested in getting the best motherboard possible to replace this one. The model is a 2373-R93, which AFAIK has a radeon 7500 and is pretty plain-jane. Are the 64mb models particularly hard to find?
What's the best motherboard I can hope to replace this one with?
Is it a bad idea to buy a used one?
Thanks
Chris

[carbon_unit]

There are a few threads on here about guys cleaning the spill off and drying the mobo out and bringing it back to life. You may want to try that.
A used mobo is as good as the guy selling it. Find a good seller and you will be set. IBM puts used mobo's in for warranty replacements anyway.
You could probably put in a mobo from a T42P which would have a much better graphics card. You can put in a ~2 ghz CPU also.
Make sure to get the Hardware Maintenance Manual to help with the disassembly and reassembly. http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... 39298.html

[Johan]

My nephew some time ago spilled a cup of tea (with milk, but no sugar!) on his T42, and it immediately "died": It just shut down by itself, and would not start again. After however disassembling it - removing keyboard, battery, CD-ROM, HDD etc., and carefully cleaning it with - minimal - clean water (on a soft cloth), and afterwards drying it with a hairdryer, with the temperature set to lowest possible... it came back alive, and has lived happily ever after! No loss of memory or other defects as a result of this accident.

It might be worth a try - before going the sad route and purchasing an all new motherboard. If you search for "spilled" in this forum, you may find quite a few stories with a happy end ... and some also with an unhappy...

Good luck!

[Johan]

... I hope you have gotten your T42 back alive by now. Otherwise, if you need some hope, check this!

You just may be equally lucky! Found it here (Turbo Audi's post of Sun Jun 17).