keyboard spill on X41 tablet

[weepy]

Yesterday, like many others, I had an accident with ice tea spilled all over my X41 tablet keyboard . I pulled AC and battery off and dried as much as possible with cloth (it sucked many of the moisture out).. but the keyboard and the opening latch are sticky, they need cleaning. I found some of that sweet sh*t in the hdd bay (i hope the hdd vent is not glued). I don't know if the mobo is slimed too, but I want to check myself.. I act a bit panically now, so I'm unable to search the forum appropriately , how do I remove the keyboard and what is best to clean it? Distilled water + drying or alcohol which evaporates well? How best to prevent corrosion (drying should suffice, right?) and what is best to clean the mobo in case that the tea got there also?

You know, I cleaned desktop chips and PCB thousand times, with alcohol and sometimes even brutally... but you must agree, these thinkpads are matter of love .

Thanx for any advice

[teetee]

Sorry to hear about the accident.

I haven't spilled anything on my tablet yet but here is what I would do to get rid of the sticky stuff:
50% of Isopropryl alcohol(half bottle of 99% alchohol + half bottle of water) + extremely little baking soda. Apply the solution on the lint-free clothes before wipe clean anything.

It's probably safer to use 99% alcohol on anything that has metal contacts so the excess water won't stick on the surface too long.

Just my .02


teetee

[weepy]

Thanks .

Just bought a screwdriver and got to work with help of http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=58247 . They did not have ethanol, though, so I did no cleaning yet, only disassembly. I got the keyboard out and the underlying electronics looks clean. I need to separate the palmrest bezel, but it is like glued, all screws are out...

edit... it was glued - with the tea. I had to disconnect the microphone and then I wormed it out. it is slimy, but i can clean it with water. if i had a cf adapter, i could connect it with no problems now. I see some unused cavities inside, I can imagine hiding some flash disk inside and connect it via external usb port.. if there was some usb cable done right..

[weepy]

So I guess the story has a happyend. Though I took extreme caution, the microphone wire tore and i had to have it fixed by a pro. It looks like original, even with the isolation gum, only sign of accident is a tad shorter wire.

I cleaned the keyboard with 1:1 alcohol and water, i poured lot on it repetitively and then gently dried with hairdryer. No keys sticky, flawless result. I also cleaned the bezel and opener latch. Few drops of dry tea were on the board, gone with a no-alcohol screen cleaner . So thanx teetee, advice appreciated ).

[teetee]

You're welcome! I'm glad to hear the formula worked. Now I know what to do if I ever spill anything on my machine.(let's hope it's not going to happen)

teetee

[Jan_Hoho]

*reads this and silently pushes the Coors light can to the far end of the table*

Man, I'm glad it went so well for you.

[cmarti]

weepy, Maybe next time you should drink unsweet tea.

[weepy]

weepy, Maybe next time you should drink unsweet tea.

Loool, pity they don't make ice tea w/o sugar. Still the biggest problem turned out to be the microphone. Btw I thought there is some hole for the water to flow through to the bottom side, but I found none. The tea flowed around the edges out and partially inside.

[cj3209]

How do you get 2 GB RAM and an IPS touch screen on your x41 tablet, - out of curiosity?

CJ

[weepy]

all tablets have IPS, by adding a 2G module you get 2G, its as simple as that . The chipset treats the 2nd module as main memory and internally soldered 512 MB uses for GMA. 384MB is unused. There is a topic here on this issue .

[mgo]

Yesterday, like many others, I had an accident with ice tea spilled all over my X41 tablet keyboard .

I am so spill prone, that I do my drinking over the sink in the kitchen...

After reading so many posts about spills, I'm going to put up a big sign at my computer desk: "NO DRINKS WITHIN 50 FEET"

No, I'm not a spaz....I just get distracted and in a hurry and "slosh" things....

[cj3209]

Can you use the same 2G ram module that is used by an x60s or x61s on the x41t?

Thanks.

CJ

all tablets have IPS, by adding a 2G module you get 2G, its as simple as that . The chipset treats the 2nd module as main memory and internally soldered 512 MB uses for GMA. 384MB is unused. There is a topic here on this issue .

[weepy]

AFAIK they all use DDR2, it should work...