Re: Cleaning Motherboards - ATTN SMOKERS!!
Amazing what they can stand up to given a good time to dry out!
Vaguely related - I just had an Acer desktop PC survive full immersion in silty river water for a period of 24+ hours in a recent flooding here. The machine had been disconnected and placed upright on a table, but still got immersed above the top of the cabinet. I retrieved it immediately after the water receded to ankle depth, and cleaned off all the exterior deposited mud and sludge within 48 hours of immersion, followed by drying in open sunlight for about 36 hours, followed by indoor drying for a full 3 weeks.
I opened it for the first time about 2 days ago, and it wasn't too bad inside. A bit of dry silt was present on all upward facing surfaces, and I left it alone. Motherboard showed some light corrosion at the terminals of the CR2032 CMOS battery holder. I cleaned and replaced the battery - the submerged battery showed a terminal voltage of 1.72 volts. The fans were a bit sticky, but released quickly when gently rotated by hand. I removed the DDR2 DIMM, cleaned the contacts with IPA and reseated it. I left everything else alone.
I powered it in on, in the hope of getting to the POST screen, but I was certain that the submerged HDD would not even spin up. To my surprise, the only error was the CMOS date/time reset, and after the date and time were set, the machine booted straight into Win7 and all data on the HDD is intact. This is a conventional rotating platter 320GB SATA HDD, not an SSD. It appears that all gaskets worked well and kept the water out, and the small hydrophobic membrane seal that allows air recirculation within the head/platter chamber also worked well and kept the water out.
Other contributing factors are that it had been powered down and disconnected completely before immersion; it was immersed only to about 1 foot above the top of the cabinet (thus keeping the hydrostatic pressure fairly low); the cabinet was upright allowing the sediment to settle harmlessly mainly at the bottom of the cabinet; and the extended dry-out period of 3 weeks that I gave it before powering it on.
In short, PCs from the last decade or so are far more durable that they're given credit for. For reference, the processor is a Core 2 Duo E5700 (Wolfdale-2M), the board is an Acer G31T-M5 v1.0, and the HDD seems to be a Seagate. Capacitors are mostly Sanyo and Rubycon, with a sprinkling of small Teapos at the audio and I/O locations. No electrolytic has bulged in about 4.5 years of normal household use.
The LCD monitor that came with it is also electrically functional, but the screen/polarizer has purple internal splotches all over due to the ingress of water. Maybe the splotches will diminish over time as the water evaporates - we'll see. The DVD-R/W drive is likely to be dead, but I haven't checked it yet - it's a relatively minor expense.
I opened it for the first time about 2 days ago, and it wasn't too bad inside. A bit of dry silt was present on all upward facing surfaces, and I left it alone. Motherboard showed some light corrosion at the terminals of the CR2032 CMOS battery holder. I cleaned and replaced the battery - the submerged battery showed a terminal voltage of 1.72 volts. The fans were a bit sticky, but released quickly when gently rotated by hand. I removed the DDR2 DIMM, cleaned the contacts with IPA and reseated it. I left everything else alone.
I powered it in on, in the hope of getting to the POST screen, but I was certain that the submerged HDD would not even spin up. To my surprise, the only error was the CMOS date/time reset, and after the date and time were set, the machine booted straight into Win7 and all data on the HDD is intact. This is a conventional rotating platter 320GB SATA HDD, not an SSD. It appears that all gaskets worked well and kept the water out, and the small hydrophobic membrane seal that allows air recirculation within the head/platter chamber also worked well and kept the water out.
Other contributing factors are that it had been powered down and disconnected completely before immersion; it was immersed only to about 1 foot above the top of the cabinet (thus keeping the hydrostatic pressure fairly low); the cabinet was upright allowing the sediment to settle harmlessly mainly at the bottom of the cabinet; and the extended dry-out period of 3 weeks that I gave it before powering it on.
In short, PCs from the last decade or so are far more durable that they're given credit for. For reference, the processor is a Core 2 Duo E5700 (Wolfdale-2M), the board is an Acer G31T-M5 v1.0, and the HDD seems to be a Seagate. Capacitors are mostly Sanyo and Rubycon, with a sprinkling of small Teapos at the audio and I/O locations. No electrolytic has bulged in about 4.5 years of normal household use.
The LCD monitor that came with it is also electrically functional, but the screen/polarizer has purple internal splotches all over due to the ingress of water. Maybe the splotches will diminish over time as the water evaporates - we'll see. The DVD-R/W drive is likely to be dead, but I haven't checked it yet - it's a relatively minor expense.
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