So, Some time ago, in June 2009, I bought a nice laptop. Decent specs, good OS, and not *too* expensive. It was a Toshiba. It served me faithfully for a couple years, but towards the end of its warranty period the unit was showing its age. The chassis was worn, the screen discoloured in the corner. The battery barely held a charge and the cooling system just couldn't keep up anymore. Don't even get me started on the failing hard drive.
I decided it was time to give the thing some TLC, and sent it in for warranty repair and maintenance. All seemed well - when I got it back, I was barely holding the same unit! They'd replaced the LCD. They'd replaced the battery. They replaced the Chassis.
They replaced the motherboard. They replaced the hard drive. They replaced the wiring harnesses.
That's where the trouble started. Some time later I tried to use the fingerprint reader on the unit. Oops, that didn't work anymore, and Windows couldn't find it! Well, it was too late to do anything about it, and at least I never really used the reader. Cue trying to use the USB ports on the other side of the chassis than normal.
Oh. Those aren't working either. Shiiiiiit. Welp, time to get used to playing games with everything plugged into the working side of the laptop. Oh wait, it just overheated and shut down. Seriously?
A few days ago, I got tired of the CPU and GPU constantly overheating and triggering a thermal shutdown. So I check the thermal pads on the GPU.
They are so badly cooked that they have gone brittle and darkened. Great, so that's why I can't use my GPU. Guess I'll just have some replacement pads expressed up. I don't need the GPU much, but can I at least get the CPU working? Good thing the GPU is socketed, and thus removable.
Pulling off the entire cooling assembly, I'm greeted by the sight of what should be white thermal paste apparently so badly degraded it has turned a shade of blue. I carefully clean all of this blue shit off the CPU and northbridge, and re-apply some premium paste. Reattaching the cooler, I power on the laptop and check my temperatures. Simply re-pasting the CPU lowered its idle temp by 40°C, and it can get past 75% load without going anywhere near 105°C.. in fact, it maxes at 66°C like it should! I am happy with this, and leave the system alone for now.
We rejoin yours truly this morning. I am sick and tired of the USB not working... and pull out the motherboard to take a proper look at the USB connection to the fingerprint reader. Note, I long ago removed a lot of the peripheral boards, including the 'dead' USB ports. That's when I noticed it.
A small connector, plugged into the motherboard... and running under the thin orange insulating film. Going to.. nowhere. That makes no sense, what are.. the... wi..res. . . .
Red. Black. A twisted pair of brown and green. Cue rage. This connector. This stupid, goes-nowhere connector. It's a USB connector - and it *should* be plugged into the fingerprint reader. Quietly raging, I plug the connector back in, and retrieve the peripheral board that normally houses the additional two USB ports I previously could not get to work. I carefully and PROPERLY reattach them, since the connector isn't polarized.
Whoop, power on. Laptop boots (still no GPU, remember) and I access remote desktop and bring up device manager. Oh, hey. There's some hardware here marked as problematic...
Oh. OH.
It's the Fingerprint Reader. Windows needs to install drivers for it. And hey, there's the USB keyboard I plugged into the dead ports!
...
Seriously? I spent TWO YEARS without those ports and that reader, because the techs couldn't be bothered to MAKE SURE ALL THEIR CABLES WERE PROPERLY SEATED?
Toshiba repair techs, pray to whoever you believe in that you never meet me.
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