i-Buddie 4 Desknote Review

Plug pulled out

Hi once again. It is a amazing since my first post here. That so many people have been having trouble. Well the pin pulled out, but the good news is that it did not melt the power adapter. I think it just worked its way out do to the unplugging and plugging it in. I sent an email to David to see how much a new one would cost to put in. Thanks to the person who provided the link. My laptop does not over heat since David fixed the heating problem.


Dell is taking care of its problem and why isn't ECS?


PS looking for instructions on how to tear down laptop.
 
instructions on tearing down and resoldering the plug

I have just ahd the final meltdown of the the plug, so I should solder a new one to the motherboard, also I should change the power adaptor's plug.

I would like to know wetehre there are problems and things to know before tryng to open the case to extract the motherboard.

I plan to have a new plug soldered to the motherboard by a professional electronic repairer but the disassembling and reassembling will be my job.

PS

Anybody has good sources for new high capacity hard disks in Europe?
 
Also, my model (P4 2.4 ghertz, 512 ram etc ) has a li-ion batetry pacjk that died very quickly, so had to use it with power adaptor all the time.

The vendor sent me a replacement that was the wrong size ...

Important: I noticed last month that opening the lower "hatch" that hosts the processor and blowing away the dust did stop the fan from running mad in a few minutes so overheating was eliminated .

I discovered it too late: this unit is oversensitive to dust.


The plug was already too compromised and half melted down, so it broke apart anyway, this wouldn't hapeen if I had regularly opened the hatch so blowing dust away.
 
twmackey said:
Hi once again. It is a amazing since my first post here. That so many people have been having trouble. Well the pin pulled out, but the good news is that it did not melt the power adapter. I think it just worked its way out do to the unplugging and plugging it in. I sent an email to David to see how much a new one would cost to put in. Thanks to the person who provided the link. My laptop does not over heat since David fixed the heating problem.


Dell is taking care of its problem and why isn't ECS?


PS looking for instructions on how to tear down laptop.
Click to expand...

ECS's lameness is keeping David in biz, a good thing, ECS would cost you more [time money headaches] to fix the problems for "free" then David costs anyway. Count your blessings for that.
 
CMOS battery low

Now I have a question. Can someone tell me where the CMOS battery is? All the times I've had the memory, harddrive, CPU out I don't recall seeing it. Is it like a watch battery? Anyone know the part number?
Thanks--
AL
 

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cmos battery and taking desknote apart / reassemle it

the battery is not really accessible without removing the top cover and the metal shielding under the top cover.


When you know how-to, it's not a difficult thing, just a lot of work because of the multitude of screws. Risk is really only not to apply the proper length screws in the proper positions. This can result in the screws causing little protrusions up in the plastic of the top cover.

Remove DVD (necessary) and HDD (optional if you don't want to take the board out of the bottom cover)

1) put the a928 upside down
2) unscrew and remove three screws that fixate the DVD (above type sticker); remember which screw came from which hole; remove DVD by sliding it sidewards out
3) open HDD compartment and take HDD out; stick 2 screws to HDD cover with scotch tape
4) open DDR memory compartment, stick screws to cover, remove metal cover, remove DDR unit, remove bottom shield and stick the screw that holds it with tape to the shield
5) loosen 8 screws around the perimetry, three screws in the edge where the DVD was, and three screws where the DDR memory shield was. Don't take the screws out of the holes but put pieces of Scotchtape on the openings so the screws cannot fall out.
6) put the a928 in normal position and take the keyboard out: gently pull right bottom tip of keyboard up and one by one press towards the front the little click-fits that you find down from the down-arrow, microsoft key, alt key, and ctrl key; gently pull a little towards the front the brown flatcable fastener and pull the flat cable out; remove keyboard and the shield underneath.
7) remove the hinge covers by pulling back and front outward so they unclick and lift them up. Remove plastic LED cover
8) unscrew power-key panel and stick its screws to it; unplug it and mark orientation of the plug vs. receptacle.
9) pull cables of the LCD after having marked their orientation.
10) unscrew 4 LCD hinge screws and put the LCD in safe place with its screws
11) unscrew and remove the 9 or 10 screws that hold the top cover; one may be under warranty sticker; tape them to the top cover oriented with were they came from.
12) remove the touchpad flatcable from its socket like you did the keyboard one
13) now lift the cover a bit and pull out the microphone plug; note orientation; remove top cover
14) remove 4 screws along front of metal cover, one in top right corner and one in top edge metal frame and stick them to the shield cover such that you know what came from where; pull up the metal frame

Now, after unscrewing 43 screws ...., you'll see the CMOS battery. I.m.h.o. it was a design mistake to put it there, so difficult to access.

Good luck
 
Last edited:
Thanks for the info. The pic from Muckshifter makes it look to be soldered in. Nothing I can't deal with I guess. Rather be working on my car though...
Thanks--
AL
 
Last edited:
Muckshifter's picture is not of a A928 motherboard (the A928 has a PLCC packaged bios memory) but just decorative.

The battery is a standard CR2032 3V Lithium battery and can be taken out of its holder without soldering; you may need to use a sharp object though to lift the thin battery up from one of its sides, out of the socket. Note that one of the contacts has been designed to retain the memory in the socket, so pull it upwards with the sharp object on the other side.
 
little over 1 hr...

Thanks for the great tips, doddel. CYIMS (Can you imagine my suprise) when I turned it on and it worked first time? Even replaced a screw that had rattled loose and was stuck to the speaker. Now what do I do with the 43 pieces of tape stuck to the edge of the table?
 
The 928a master strikes again!

I am yet another satisfied customer of David Cai. Through this forum I was able to ascertain why the very hot burning rubber smell was emanating from my 3 year old 928A! My first email to David was answered very promptly with a complete explanation and the full cost of repair. I received it back exactly one week from when I sent it to Toronto from west coast of Vancouver Island! He also replaced a faulty speaker that has been so from my 3rd week of buying it. It was easier to plug in externals than tackle all those screws...........

If you have an ECS unit with these same symptoms, take it off the shelf and send it to David, it will come to life and be a useful member of the family once again for very little cost.

[email protected]

David Cai
DC SYSTEM, Tel: (416) 788-6788

Cheers and thanks for maintaining a great site here, there are some real avid hobbyists here, my kind of place!

Zhenya
 
Go David Go

I raise my glass to David who saved my computer!!! I'm recommending this guy to every one I know that has an ibuddie. I've always liked the A928 but to have it serviced overseas is not in my budget. David was courteous and on time. I'd trust this guy with anything.

Thanks again David.

Another feather to your hat.

Denis.
 
Contacting David Cai

How can I get in contact with David Cai? What is his email address and his phone number? Please contact me at (e-mail address removed)

Thanks,


Seng said:
I had my I-buddy 4 since 2001-2002 and last week the ground pin melted and came out as I unplugged the ac adapter from the computer.

Found out on this forum that David Cai repaired that kind of problem.

Sent him the computer, from Montreal, on a Monday, it came back on thursday. That, my friend, is FAST!

He even fixed problems I had with the cpu fan and the ethernet jack at a reasonnable additionnal charge. In total, it cost me 170.56$ wich is little money to save the investment I've made on this computer.

Everything is working perfectly now and the computer is never as hot as before.

I really really recommend having your I-buddy 4 repaired by David Cai if you have that melted ground pin problem.
Click to expand...
 
If you go up the page 2 posts all the info you need is there. My 928A is still running cooler than it has for a long long time! Thanks again David.........

Zhenya


mmastudios said:
How can I get in contact with David Cai? What is his email address and his phone number? Please contact me at (e-mail address removed)

Thanks,
Click to expand...
 
Hi! I have a i-buddie 4 A928 and there is one problem.... i can't hear sound and under device meniger is error... This device cannot start, I try a latest driver sis7012 from sis hompage, but there are still this error! please help me?
 
Thanks again to David Cai

I just had another episode with my iBuddie. I have now had it for 4 years and the first repair was done by ECS in year 1. The next year I sent it to David and he did an excellent job. This past fall, I was just about to give a presentation when I went to move the laptop and one of the pins fell out. (Thankfully I had another laptop to use...) I had a friend who had a junked iBuddie and we attempted to swap out power sockets. It worked for about a month. This happened while I was on a trip to Ontario so I just went to the local PO and posted the laptop to David. He fixed it up and also fixed a couple other problems.

If you have any trouble, just send it to David. Actually, I've decided to move on to a desktop/Macbook solution. It's nice to have something new. ;-)

Umiwangu
 
in 24

On a side-note, I was recently watching reruns of the TV show 24 and saw that they used iBuddies in a couple scenes in Season 3. I wonder if they were left-over junkers...
 
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