Ot I can't believe my Macbook didn't die

[gemship]

Sitting at my desk with a pint, crackers and cheese just checking out the days news and from out of nowhere my cat jumps up on the desk between the mac and edibles. Well as I picked him to set him on my lap the inevitable happened, I never thought it would, I knocked over my beer, all over the keyboard. I just sat there stunned.... At first I was like okay it still works but there is a lot of spillage all over the keys and this isn't water proof, shoot! I unplugged the power cord and then remembered the battery, next tried to shut down and then I think at that moment the beer started to take effect because as I selected shut down mode onscreen the command just didn't take. So I said to heck with it flipped it upside down and popped the cover off and took the battery out. Tried my best to dry out the mac, put the battery back in about ten minutes later and without even hitting the power button she had power but was frozen with that white grey screen and no spinning egg timer. Battery back out and proceeded to do a better job drying the mac out touching all keys with beer oozing out with each depress, took off the whole back panel. I know nothing about computers but I figured I would at least see the extent of what got wet inside. I ended up setting the mac beside my wood stove for another half hour. Put it back together, battery, memory cards and bottom panels. Voila, she works.

Now lets say this think dies on my a couple of days from now or a week from now, it's only two years old and I did purchase a three year warranty thru BestBuy. Would I be covered? So long as I didn't mention the spilt beer? I can't believe it, by rights this thing should be dead, music still cranks, she sucks in and spits out disks, everything seems to work with the keys, unbelievable. Please tell me otherwise because I know nothing except this thing should be dead.

[rustychisel]

when beer dries it gets very icky, you're right to think you may have trouble coming, so you should probably back up all data on to an external HD as soon as possible.

If you need to go down the warranty route you should confess for the cat and the beer. About the first thing the service department would find would be beer residue under the keypad

[AngryScientist]

i would throw it in a ziplock bag for a day or so right now with a whole bunch of rice around it. like a ton of rice. works for drowned cell phones a lot of the time, the rice should pull any remaining residual moisture out.

besides that, you may not be out of the woods yet, as the electronic connections oxidize and otherwise corrode, they're still may be some ill effects, but sounds like you made out pretty lucky. :hello:

[gemship]

Yeah I thought about the beer getting sticky but if you could see the dust that collect in tight spaces beneath the panel near the fan. I don't know... it seems like it works fine now. How could it get any worse? I mean I can understand liquids and electricity being bad but if it all dries up, I want to guess that I'm in the clear?

[gemship]

i would throw it in a ziplock bag for a day or so right now with a whole bunch of rice around it. like a ton of rice. works for drowned cell phones a lot of the time, the rice should pull any remaining residual moisture out.

besides that, you may not be out of the woods yet, as the electronic connections oxidize and otherwise corrode, they're still may be some ill effects, but sounds like you made out pretty lucky. :hello:


Yeah for the most part it was pretty dry in that area / printed circuit board beneath the panel where the memory cards attached too. there was a slight trail of dampness and I dried it with a towel. I think most of the wet ness just seeped out of the keys.

[gemship]

I really can't believe the music is just blasting out with it's usual tinny but loud sound, loud considering there these puny things that live inside it.

[1happygirl]

Hmmm. Beer and Emailing. Hope you weren't emailing the boss.

I keep telling peeps Apple tests their Macbooks this way. They r diehard and rock.

Didn't know about the rice, hmmm.neat.


i would throw it in a ziplock bag for a day or so right now with a whole bunch of rice around it. like a ton of rice. works for drowned cell phones a lot of the time, the rice should pull any remaining residual moisture out.

[gemship]

three hours later after the spill and it is still fully functional.

So now I'm thinking I may actually be past this, I mean if the damage were to happened it would of shorted out something on contact with the beer. At this point I'm thinking i may have a sticky key problem at some point. I don't it seems like a crap shoot at this point. Could I be wrong, at least I was drinking cheap watered down Milwaukee Best :beer:

[Ken Robb]

when Best Buy has tried to sell me their warranty they have said things like "if your phone falls in the toilet, etc. we'll replace it with a current model. Read your warranty and see what it says.

[1happygirl]

three hours later after the spill and it is still fully functional.

So now I'm thinking I may actually be past this, I mean if the damage were to happened it would of shorted out something on contact with the beer. At this point I'm thinking i may have a sticky key problem at some point. I don't it seems like a crap shoot at this point. Could I be wrong, at least I was drinking cheap watered down Milwaukee Best :beer:


Definitely like the previous back up idea. haha Quit drinking and start backing up, just in case.

[130R]

i ran my macbook over with my car during a whirlwind rush to get to my finals on time.

it was bent.

i bent it back.

good as new :hello:

[gemship]

when Best Buy has tried to sell me their warranty they have said things like "if your phone falls in the toilet, etc. we'll replace it with a current model. Read your warranty and see what it says.


Yeah that's the thing, I'll have to see if they post something on their site because I never received any specific literature on their warranty but I do remember the salesman saying that it would cover a accident like me dropping it in a similar manner like they told you. Not sure I would believe it but I just figure if it were to die at this point then I imagine everything would be dried up and it may be hard to tell it was from spill damage and even still they may not even care assuming they could tell. I don't like the idea of sticky residue and corrosion but even that I sort of wonder about, I mean it's not like I expect the mac to last me much more than six years by that point it will most likely be obsolete in many many ways.

[Ken Robb]

cell phones have little indicators inside that tell if the phone has been wet and that voids the manufacturer's warranty but not Best Buy's. I don't know about laptops.

[gemship]

Definitely like the previous back up idea. haha Quit drinking and start backing up, just in case.


ha,ha. the mac drank it all! I just got home from my work day, no computer access during work hours, this is my reward. I don't have much info to back up. I'm pathetic, two years ago I bought a mac because of ease of use, familiarity with the O.S. and everybody at best buy just liked it better than their other products. Other than a few photos I really don't have anything to save and even the photo aren't that special. My mac is essentially a glorified internet browser :hello:

[rice rocket]

You're lucky you have the option to take out your battery... I don't have that option w/ my 2009 13" MBP w/ those stupid Y headed screws. :mad:

If you want to be impressed, see this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d7cvi00OZDM&NR=1

IBM/Lenovo has probably the best thought out anti-spillage design. The keyboard is isolated from the rest of the laptop with a giant metal plate, with drainholes in it that go through the whole chassis to the bottom. If things get sticky, a new keyboard is $70 and is user serviceable.

[weiwentg]

the moshi keyboard covers do help protect agains spills, although water can still seep in through the speaker holes.

[gemship]

oh shoot. Now the keys are getting stickier :mad: It started with the space bar but now the letters are feeling pretty sticky, more so to the left side of the keypad.

and it kinda smells like a beer :mad:

[Steevo]

Check your Best Buy warranty. I had an extended warranty on my DSLR camera which included accidental breakage. The camera fell off the tripod and had some minor breakage - Best Buy fixed the camera. A few years later, close to the end of the warranty, the zoom function of the lens just locked up. I took it to Best Buy, and they replaced the 3 year old camera with a new, similar model. I purchased another extended warranty for the new camera. Pretty good coverage IMO.

[rounder]

I think the issue is not whether or not you are covered by insurance. I think the issue is what happens if your computer crashes (for whatever reason) or something happens and you lose important stuff. In our work, we always recommend that everyone save their files to a network drive which is backed up daily (easy if you are at work) or a backup hard drive. I did not listen to my own advice a few years ago. Our home computer died and we lost a lot of photos that could not be replaced. Everything else could be replaced.

[jpw]

Thinkpad laptops have a drainage hole underneath for this problem. The beer would have flowed under the keyboard and out the bottom of the machine.

I don't think Apple laptops have this design.

[martinrjensen]

the next time this happens the first thing to do is tho flip the laptop upside down. then shut of and remove the battery. BTW keyboards are cheap and easily replaced. Your hard drive is completely sealed and it's unlikely you will loose any data

[rice rocket]

Hard drives have vent holes actually. Check when you have it open next time, you'll see a hole that says "DO NOT COVER".

[gemship]

Well I did pop the back panel off again, the one with access to the two memory cards and I cleaned the mother board with a isopropyl alcohol just for some peace of mind but this macbook is solid and functional. As of yesterday the stickiness with one side of the keyboard has gone away. Very lucky and a lesson learned. No more drinks near computer. :beer: