Replacing a laptop CPU

Clone Sergeant · Post by **Clone Sergeant** » 2003-10-18 08:02pm

I am wondering if it will be possible for me to replace the CPU for my Toshiba laptop. What I've read so far leads me to believe it will be either very difficult or outright impossible. Does anyone have any experience with this? Any advice will be appreciate.

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2003-10-18 08:27pm

Nope. Most CPUs are soldered directly on the mainboard. You'd have to replace that to get a new CPU.

TrailerParkJawa · Post by **TrailerParkJawa** » 2003-10-18 08:32pm

Depends on the brand of laptop. Ive done it with a Dell. It basically means taking the whole laptop apart and having lots of little peices laying around. If you dont have a service manual ready, it is easy to miss a screw or clip and break something. Not to mention having a screw or clip left over when you put it back together.

Unless you have no choice, it is a process best left alone.

darthdavid · Post by **darthdavid** » 2003-10-18 09:50pm

Find a store that sells cpu's and have them replace it for you.

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2003-10-18 09:52pm

darthdavid wrote:Find a store that sells cpu's and have them replace it for you.

That won't work.

darthdavid · Post by **darthdavid** » 2003-10-18 09:56pm

Why not? Most electronics stores will do that. If they can't, no problem you still have a functioning laptop. If they break it, well makesure you get someplace with a gaurentee on proper work being done. If they can you get a new cpu installed without the hassle. What's the prob?

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2003-10-18 10:05pm

darthdavid wrote:Why not? Most electronics stores will do that. If they can't, no problem you still have a functioning laptop. If they break it, well makesure you get someplace with a gaurentee on proper work being done. If they can you get a new cpu installed without the hassle. What's the prob?

On a laptop? Most laptops have the processor soldered on the mainboard and those that don't use the special laptop-packaged processor which isn't exactly common. Furthermore, doing so is almost certain to break the warranty on the laptop.

This isn't exactly like upgrading the processor on a desktop.

TrailerParkJawa · Post by **TrailerParkJawa** » 2003-10-18 10:35pm

phongn wrote: On a laptop? Most laptops have the processor soldered on the mainboard and those that don't use the special laptop-packaged processor which isn't exactly common. Furthermore, doing so is almost certain to break the warranty on the laptop.

This isn't exactly like upgrading the processor on a desktop.

The only place I know of to get a new CPU for the laptops is from the manufacturer. And this is only for Dells. If you do it yourself unless you are a certified Dell tech you void the warranty. And finally it is not like you can make a significant jump in cpu power. Usually it is only to replace a faulty one of equal speed.

Listen to the Phongn. We speaks with much wisdom. *queue music*

Seggybop · Post by **Seggybop** » 2003-10-18 10:51pm

I've never seen a laptop cpu soldered to the mobo. Every one that I've dealt with had a socket and some kind of special laptop-sized cpu. If you could attain one of these cpus, you should be able to do it. But the motherboard might not recognize it properly.

Clone Sergeant · Post by **Clone Sergeant** » 2003-10-19 12:55am

Ok, I had a feeling changing the processor would be more trouble than it would be worth. I had originally planned on getting an entirely new laptop but then I decided to see how much I can upgrade the system I currently have.

I guess I'll have to save up the cash for a new one. Thanks for the help guys.

The Kernel · Post by **The Kernel** » 2003-10-19 02:07am

Seggybop wrote:I've never seen a laptop cpu soldered to the mobo. Every one that I've dealt with had a socket and some kind of special laptop-sized cpu. If you could attain one of these cpus, you should be able to do it. But the motherboard might not recognize it properly.

You must be smoking some mighty fine crack there dude...

Seggybop · Post by **Seggybop** » 2003-10-19 02:49am

You want pictures or something?

The Kernel · Post by **The Kernel** » 2003-10-19 03:12am

Seggybop wrote:You want pictures or something?

Dude, a long ass time ago (I'm talking 486/P5 days) they used specially packaged notebook CPU's that you could remove and replace. Also, some companies today use desktop CPU's to drive costs down. However, the VAST majority of systems use laptop chips that have a BGA package that is soldered directly to the motherboard.

Even the systems that have desktop CPU's aren't so easy to replace. Usually there are BIOS problems that won't be fixed with updates (the manufacturers really don't want you doing this), not to mention the cooling systems are specifically designed around certain thermal levels and if you put in a higher clocked CPU, chances are you will be running it beyond its specified termal limits.

My point is: even if you can do this (which is unlikely), you shouldn't do this. Laptops are designed to run a specific CPU and should only be upgraded by the OEM, unless you want to void your warrantly and possibly destroy your machine in the process.

Laird · Post by **Laird** » 2003-10-19 04:16pm

My friend had an old laptop where it used desktop cpu's,you could change out the chip pretty easily,IIRC he had a amd k6 466 in it last time I talked to him?

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2003-10-19 04:32pm

That was before, this is now.

GrandMasterTerwynn · Post by **GrandMasterTerwynn** » 2003-10-19 04:46pm

Clone Sergeant wrote:I am wondering if it will be possible for me to replace the CPU for my Toshiba laptop. What I've read so far leads me to believe it will be either very difficult or outright impossible. Does anyone have any experience with this? Any advice will be appreciate.

A) What model of Toshiba is it? If it's Pentium II or better then it may be possible to replace the CPU. A fair number of laptops had their CPU and half of the motherboard chipset (Northbridge) mounted on a 2x3 inch card using either the PMC-1 (PCI video) or PMC-2 (AGP video) form-factor. Usually the laptop manufacturer sells these cards. But they tend to sell them for a very high price. And they're not carried by stores who don't specialize in laptop upgrades. eBay is a good resource for this, but with all eBay transactions, you have to do your homework first. Some laptops will only accept a certain range of CPUs due to things like clocking limitations of the mainboard and how much CPU cache the BIOS expects to see.

B) Replacing the CPU of a laptop is a nontrivial procedure. A laptop is generally held together by a whole bunch of screws of two or three different sizes. And most of these sizes happen to be very small, which makes the screws easy to lose. Additionally, there are stickers on the laptop that cover some of the screws saying "Warranty void if removed." If you choose to perform any sort of work on the laptop yourself you will completely invalidate your laptop's warranty! That means that if you fuck it up and have to have the laptop serviced, you're going to pay dearly.

C) Once these screws are removed and carefully labeled, one must note that the laptop's keyboards, it's speakers, and it's LCD screen are connected to the motherboard by very thin plastic ribbon cables. The solder joints at the end of these cables are not designed to withstand any force whatsoever. If you are not very, very careful in removing them from their sockets, you will break those cables. And they tend to be ridiculously expensive to replace.

D) The CPU card is generally mounted to the motherboard by a handful of tiny screws. These screws also hold the heatsink. Remove them, and carefully set the heatsink aside. Then, gently remove the CPU card and insert the new card. You will have to make sure the card is firmly seated in it's socket before reassembling the laptop. This is especially true in the case of the older PMC-I CPU cards.

E) If you follow all these steps very carefully then there's a good chance you will now have a faster laptop. There's also a good chance you will have a legwarmer which will leave second-degree burns on your lap. Again, it is vital that you do your homework beforehand.

Now with that being said, there are undoubtedly local computer shops in your area who specialize in laptop repair and upgrade. It is probably better for you to let them handle this.

(* - All of this comes from personal experience. I upgraded the CPU on my IBM Thinkpad 600 from the old PII 233 MHz to a PII 300 MHz.)

Clone Sergeant · Post by **Clone Sergeant** » 2003-10-20 03:27am

GrandMasterTerwynn wrote:snip

It's a Toshiba Satellite 3005-S303. Based on all of the work you described I think I'll be better off getting a whole new system. I'm not terribly hardware savy and there aren't any computer repair places in my area I'd trust with my laptop.

I was just wondering about replacing the CPU because it can't run any of the newer PC games very well and I wanted to see if I could avoid the cost of a new computer.

The Kernel · Post by **The Kernel** » 2003-10-20 03:54am

Clone Sergeant wrote:
GrandMasterTerwynn wrote:snip
It's a Toshiba Satellite 3005-S303. Based on all of the work you described I think I'll be better off getting a whole new system. I'm not terribly hardware savy and there aren't any computer repair places in my area I'd trust with my laptop.

I was just wondering about replacing the CPU because it can't run any of the newer PC games very well and I wanted to see if I could avoid the cost of a new computer.

That is a videocard issue, just as much as a CPU issue. Might I suggest you pick up a laptop with a Radeon 9600 mobility? I just got one and it screams on the latest games. No other good choice for a mobile GPU today, although hopefully that will change soon.

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Replacing a laptop CPU

Replacing a laptop CPU

Re: Replacing a laptop CPU

Re: Replacing a laptop CPU

Re: Replacing a laptop CPU