On Fri, 2010-11-12 at 13:24 -0800, Dave Stevens wrote: > Any ideas? I mean ANY ideas, I'm out of clues on this one. References welcome. Well, I'd start by careful disassembly and inspection for any loose parts. Then careful reassembly with the minimum of parts, turn on, and observe. Take anti-static precautions. If you're not familiar with how and why, here's a brief synopsis. Electronic components are sensitive to static discharge. It can damage them instantly, or significantly weaken them that they will fail in a few weeks, months, or years later. By that time, you will not associate the failure with what you did, some time ago. It's not that they've developed some charge, that's a problem; it's a sudden (enough) change, that is. So the key is to keep things at the same potential as everything else. If you ever wear clothes that cause static charges when you move about (most of us have taken off a wooly jumper, and noticed that sort of thing, at some stage in our life), those are exactly the sort of thing that you don't want to be wearing while working with static-sensitive parts. If you do not have anti-static gear (slow discharge conductive desk mats and floor mats, and wrist bands), then take the following sort of precautions outlined below. The anti-static gear is poorly conductive, it will slowly drain away charges, all the time, so they can't build up. And whenever something with a charge comes in contact, it doesn't rapidly discharge. Ground your computer. Not by plugging it into the power, so you're working on a live box, but by connecting it to something else that's grounded. e.g. The video monitor. Do not ground yourself, ever. It makes it very hard for you to break a connection if you get an electric shock. The anti-static wristbands only have a poor conductive path, it discharges static, slowly, but shouldn't be able to carry enough current to electrocute you if you put your hands on something faulty, or in places that you shouldn't. Though tethering yourself to the desk does have the problem that if you move away without unplugging, you can drag things off the desk. Discharge yourself by touching your desk, it'll be the safest way to rapidly discharge yourself without upsetting any static-sensitive parts. Then touch your computer chassis, so that you're at the some potential as your computer, and the parts. Lean against it while you work on it, so you stay with the same charge. If you walk away, or move away enough, you'll build up a charge. Go through the discharge procedure again before touching any electronics. Leave your computer bits in their anti-static bags. Put them in touch with your computer before you take them out of their anti-static bags (rest them on the case, somewhere). While handling the parts, stay in contact with your computer. That keeps everything to the same potential. When it comes to removing parts, do something the same. Take a board out, rest it against the computer casing. Put it in an anti-static bag if you have one. Hang onto these anti-static bags whenever you get any. -- [tim@localhost ~]$ uname -r 2.6.27.25-78.2.56.fc9.i686 Don't send private replies to my address, the mailbox is ignored. I read messages from the public lists. -- users mailing list users@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx To unsubscribe or change subscription options: https://admin.fedoraproject.org/mailman/listinfo/users Guidelines: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Mailing_list_guidelines
