Useful Reuse: Chromebooks by Sebastian Fadel

 

Now that our Samsung Chromebooks are two years old, we are witnessing screen damage, trackpad jams, spine distortion, charge port warping, and missing and/or damaged hinges. The warranty  has expired so to salvage as many devices as possible, I have reused the broken chromebooks for parts and repaired the salvageable  ones for student use.

To change a Samsung screen, I snap off the front cover and unscrew the four screws holding the screen in place. Then, I remove the broken screen and disconnect it from the motherboard. Then I connect the new screen to the motherboard and then screw it into place.  Then the cover is snapped back on to the device.

To repair a broken trackpad, I unscrewed the back panel of a chromebook (this device had already been reused for screen parts). Then I removed the following in this order;  the battery, motherboard, speakers, and keyboard. To safely be able to remove the trackpad, I snapped off the connectors to the plastic case and then carefully disconnected the wires. Then I repeated the process for the chromebook that needed the trackpad replacement, but this time, I left the plastic connectors intact by prying off the trackpad from the base of the chromebook. I then installed the new one and connected it to the motherboard. in full disclosure, this method only worked one of three times.

As I continue to “frankenstein” chromebooks and other devices, I will continue to blog about my work here at the LHS help desk.