Bah, computers.

So at the start of the month my laptop's power-supply and keyboard both turned dodgy within a week of each other. I sourced a replacement power supply off eBay, and I know I can get the keyboard, I just haven't ordered it yet.

But that reminded me that my desktop has been out of action for most of a year. It's on-switch had been getting gradually worse and it gave up entirely while I was away from home last summer. Making matters worse, the case design is dire and a metal clip  to hold the motherboard in place also pins the on-switch connector onto the motherboard (which is definitely powered, an LED lights when you plug it in). I finally found a way to get it out without trashing anything this spring, but the connector isn't wired in a straightforward manner, six wires feed seven pins of a nine-pin block, so you can't replace it with a standard two pin switch.

Ordering laptop bits made me realise I might be able to source a replacement switch, given I had the part number, and indeed I could. A fiver got me a brand new OEM switch, which arrived this morning. Plug it in, power on, and nada.... Looks like it's a dead motherboard, not a dead switch. Which means completely rebuilding the desktop. I have a much better case I can frankenstein components into, but at a minimum it means sourcing a new motherboard* and I'm not certain I'll be able to transfer the processor, which is potentially worth doing as, while it's 8 years old, it's also an early i7, so potentially still more powerful than the i3s and i5s most new PCs use. I'll have to do some digging to judge.

Of course, whichever route I take, I'll still need to reseat the processor in the new motherboard, and my coordination isn't exactly great. In fact I think it's measurably worse than the last time I did this, tw computers ago, and I got help then. I may need to lure my neighbour into offering to help.

Bah, computers.

 

* Plus a Win 10 license and a new primary drive - it was running Vista, which I'm not prepared to connect to the net anymore, plus I don't want to overwrite the existing drive, so I'll swap that to being a slave