A31P : Damaged USB port - Advice requested

[Joedy]

Hello everyone. I've been lurking on this forum for a few weeks now and have recently purchased my first Thinkpad A31P model.

This Thinkpad was advertised as, "Very Good Cosmetic" condition and when it arrived, it indeed meet and even exceeded this description.

The only drawback, though, was the discovery of an unexpected damaged USB port that the seller did not know of. Once discovered, the seller offered compensation for this damage and the deal was closed out to everyone's satisfaction.

Since the A31P comes equipped with two USB plugs, luckily, the remaining one is not damaged and works fine.

Since (on an unrelated topic) this laptop did not come with a Wifi card and the wifi antennas were not apparent when I opened the access door, I disassembled the Thinkpad to discover that the supposedly embedded wifi antennas are truly not installed. I've ordered an antenna set and a wifi card and will install this myself.

While I had everything disassembled, I took a moment to see if the mini stacked USB housing could be replaced, and it appears that some soldering will be required.

This is not an obstacle for me to do this myself.


What I would like to check with everyone about is:

1) Has anyone replaced a stacked USB housing on a Thinkpad before?

The only replacement source that I have been able to find is on eBay. From what I've seen of other computers that utilize a dual, stacked USB housing, they all appear to be of the same dimensions:
(http://cgi.ebay.com/Laptop-Low-Profile- ... dZViewItem)



I've checked into the warranty on this Thinkpad and it expired one year ago.

I've also looked into getting a new motherboard for this model, but the motherboard prices are more than what I paid for the entire Thinkpad!

I also suspect that the repair costs to IBM/Lenovo will also be too expensive.


This USB housing appears to be very straightforward, but it's always nice to check with others who might have already done one in the past.

Thank you for your time and kind assistance.

Joedy Drulia
Shenandoah Valley, Virginia

[JHEM]

Personally, I wouldn't bother attempting to replace the stack. Simply get an external USB hub for those times when you need more than one USB device connected.

Regards,

James

[smugiri]

I second James.

You might kill a $700 laptop trying to replace a $5 part.

If you have to have multiple USB ports, get a hub or one of these PCMCIA USB/Firewire cards for just $5 instead

[underclocker]

I had a similar situation occur on an A31. The plastic portion of one of the two stacked USB ports broke and was lost. Luckily the other worked, but I wanted to restore the A31 to it's near original glory.

Solution? I grabbed a needle nose pliers and carefully snapped the plastic tab off of the USB port from an old motherboard I had. I then Krazy glued it to the A31 and quickly inserted a USB memory key to hold the plastic tab in the correct location while the glue dried.

Result? Perfection. The USB port works fine and the plastic tab has held up after numerous insertions and retractions.

Good luck.

underclocker

[Joedy]

Thanks for the suggestions, everyone.

The PC Card/USB option is not a viable one for me since I have two CF and SD memory card readers equipped in these slots. I primarily use this notebook with my digital photography field setup. Ideally, I would like to have a minimalistic setup configuration since there is less likelihood of forgetting or losing a USB hub or a another loose PC card.

I also entertained the notion of using the guts from another USB port, but these pins are bent rather badly. It is readily apparent that the previous owner or IT guy spent some time in bending them back and only ended up making them all the more crooked.

I've discovered the source of these low profile stacked USB ports. There is a simple four solder point mounting. Since I have a lot of experience in working with electronics, this will be a simple task and should take longer to free the system board than to remove and reinstall the new USB port.

I'm still waiting on the internal WiFi antenna to arrive. This will be a good time to repair the USB port.

I can take some photos of the process. Is anyone interested in seeing them?

-joedy

[underclocker]

Definitely. Please post pix and results.

Good luck.