How to Deal with Liquid Spills onto Your Laptop

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It's a common tradition. We are all guilty at some time or another of having liquids or drinks next to our mobile computers. Although the unique marriage of coffee and a laptop seem to be an inseparable pair (been to Starbucks recently?), there is some risk involved. Accidents certainly happen, and the results of a liquid meeting with the insides of a notebook can be ugly!

The Panasonic CF-18 notebook can handle it, but yours probably can't!

If you are one of the lucky few to have a Panasonic ToughBook CF-18, then please disregard the rest of this article. However if you are one of the other 99.9% of laptop owners and have a machine that doesn't get along with liquids very well, we have some steps that you can take to save your investment when an accident happens.

&quot;Don't Go Into the Light, Stay With Us!&quot;

Don't plan to bury your notebook just yet...

1. Assess the situation before taking action. Is the notebook hooked up to AC power or running on battery? If the machine is running on battery power and is NOT connected to an AC outlet, your first line of defense in to swiftly shut the machine down. Be sure the device is not sitting in a puddle and the power switch area is dry. The quickest method to shut down is to hold the power button until the device powers off. Next remove the battery and place it off to the side.
   
   If the machine is connected to an AC outlet, try to separate yourself from any contact with the liquid. Make sure you're not touching any metal with your body (place your opposite hand in a pocket and check to see what you're standing or sitting on) and then quickly yank the plug from the AC outlet. Then follow the instructions above to remove the battery, etc.
   
   
2. Now that you are out of immediate danger to yourself, you have the opportunity to care for the machine. Remove all USB components, PCMCIA cards or any other external device. Be sure to carefully wipe off the notebook and all components carefully and place them out for the drying process.
   
   
3. Time to play the waiting game. Surely you are anxious to see that your machine is still functional and your data intact. Here is the good news; providing you did not here any &quot;buzzing&quot;, see smoke, notice an immediate malfunction or notice any obvious problems prior to shutting down, the machine is most likely in good shape. At this point you MUST allow at least 24-48 hours to be absolutely sure the device has indeed dried out completely. Make sure to leave the laptop open so air can circulate. If you have a cooling rack, commonly used for cooling baked goods, it might even be helpful to place the notebook on that to make sure air is circulating as well as possbile.
   
   
4. After waiting for your notebook to dry properly, try powering up with the battery first. If the battery is dead, replace it in the unit and charge it for awhile. For your &quot;first powerup&quot;, you will be best off performing this on battery power. Does all appear well? Congratulations and Amen to that! Notice anything funny? Immediately shut down the machine and bring it to an authorized service center.

One simple thing to remember is that data travels between all components in your computer via an electrical current. Once any liquid - even a minute amount comes in contact with any of these components while the unit is powered on, you are sure to fry something inside of that case! Luckily most accidents involving spills are only a minor setback provided proper steps to power down and dry your device are taken. Hopefully our advice will come in handy in case the unexpected occurs.

 

I had this problem a few days ago. A half full gallon of water sitting on a chair and undernear the chair i had my notebook resting closed. Somehow the plastic gallon of water broke on the bottom and maybe 2 cup fulls of water dripped down underneath the chair and onto the laptop. it was not turned on when this happened and i have not tried to see if it works yet. Its been almost 3 days since i discovered it. The carpet and outside of the notebook are completely dry right now.

 

I think these are good tips, but personally after following the power yanking process I would think about at least tilting the laptop vertically to gently shake out any excess liquid after 48 hours to make sure no puddles of liquid are still up in there. If there is still moisture I would wait another 24 hours and repeat the process, but that's just me.

 

If you're lucky enough to have a recently made ThinkPad they have two drainage holes within the keyboard so water goes out to the bottom. I think that design is great.

Great advice here though.

 

Great answer to a common question here at NBR! This guide will come in handy. I particularly like the photo of the notebook in a casket .

 

I've always been told (and been known to repeat this myself), that if the spill goes in through the keyboard or elsewhere on the top part of the laptop, to let it dry upside-down, so that the liquid seeps out back the way it came, thus limiting the componants coming into contact with the water.

 

Someone beat me to it, but I too spilled some soda on a notebook a few years back and turned the laptop upside-down. I figured that the liquid was on the keyboard, and the keyboard had a solid (no holes) circuit board underneath it, so at that instant the liquid was only on that relatively non-vital component and it would take a little time to flow over the edges onto the important stuff (CPU, memory, etc) underneath. Of course I held the power button to turn it off while doing this. Ultimately I did only lose the keyboard. The rest of the system was fine.

 

I spilled some water on my notebook keyboard a few days ago. I instantly shut down the machine, removed the battery, tore out the USB connections, and turned it on its side.

The machine is fine except for the keyboard. Most of the keys are fine, but

When I type "r", "r9" or "9r" comes out
When I type "9," "r9" or "9r" comes out
When I type "f," "fl" or "lf" comes out
When I type "l," "lf" or "fl" comes out
When I press "Del," the delete function works, but also inserts a "v"

I own a Toshiba M55. I use an external keyboard, so this is only a minor nuisance if I have to travel. Is the only way to fix this keyboard problem to replace the entire keyboard?

 

I wasn't even as technical as you have described. I immediately turned the machine on the side to all it to drip off and then I dabbed off the rest of the water with a paper towel.

Nothing happened.

 

FREN, the only way to fix that is to replace the whole keyboard. The good news is, keyboards tend to only be about $35.

 

Who opens a bottle of Fiji Water just to spill on a laptop?

 

Keyboards can often be resurrected by removing them from the computer and giving them a good bath and scrub in warm water containing washing up liquid and then rinsing with clean water and allowed to dry.

John

 

I spilt half a bottle of squash onto the keyboard (don't ask).

Had one of those moments were time seemed to stand still and I thought to myself I should get moving.... meanwhile the squash was seeping in through the keys I got some tissue paper and soaked up the remaining surface liquid. I have no doubt in my mind, the electronics have easily taken at least 500ml. Didn't turn the laptop off as well! Flatmates would not have been happy if I tripped the power!

Thankfully things have worked out. Initially keys pressed themselves (nightmare for email and forum sign-ins), or pressing one resulted in a "double-press", and you got two adjacent keys pressed when you only pressed one.

Now it works like the day it was bought.. well nearly. Some keys have a slightly more audible tap

I praise HP for their business class build quality.

 

Hang on, if the plug is live, and your other hand is touching ground, won't that make the current pass through your body (and your heart), no matter how quickly you touch the plug?

I thought the touching ground advice was for if you are working with electronic components, not if you're about to risk electrocution!

 

You're right, grounding yourself while touching a live wire is a great way to die. To the writer: please change that, so ppl don't actually follow it.
I was about the say the exact same thing but you beat me to it.

 

why would i want to ground one arm while pulling the plug? doesn't that help make a nice circuit directly through my chest (heart) which is extremely sensitive to electrical activity?

also, when dissasembling notebook, watch out for large capacitors on d/a converter. they might give you an unexpected jolt.

i would also blast the whole thing well with canned air. that will break up any large drops of water and speed drying.

 

As an Electrical Engineer, let me echo the comments of the previous posters. If you think you might accidentally touch a live wire, put one hand in your pocket to reduce the chances that any current that might pass through your body does not pass through your heart. Do NOT touch metal to ground yourself. This is dangerous advice and should be removed.

 

Changed that one, thanks for catching that 100% opposite of safe "advice" there.

 

Please do *not* ground yourself before pulling on the AC plug unless you want to increase your risk of "shaking hands with the devil." If liquid has spilled onto the AC adaptor then use something nonconductive like a wooden broomstick to disconnect the AC. If the liquid has not spilled onto the AC adaptor (or yourself) then you can disconnect it from the PC as you would normally.

What kind of havoc a liquid wreaks with electricals depends on the nature of the liquid. Pure water is nonconductive. Water with electrolytes (e.g. chloride ions) is conductive, and you need only trace quantities for conduction to happen. I suppose that whether the residue remains conductive after the water has evaporated depends on how much electrolyte is there. I think that liquids like Coke and hot drinks with sugar are likely to leave a conductive residue.

So what to do depends on what you spill into the computer. If it is water then you stand a good chance of no ill effects once the thing dries out. If has sugar or electrolytes in it then you may be in for trouble.

 

Might I add that since time is the essence and you are dry you can shut it down in 2 seconds using something like a wooden pencil .

Then I would take care to plug it out , take the battery out ( without fliping it ) and dry it .

At the subject of drying I would remove the keyboard and see if any liquad is below it .

If its an expensive laptop I'd take it to a dependable tech center to check it BEFORE trying to power it up again , sure it will cost you some $ but it could save you replacing the whole mobo .

Question :
I got a keyboard with one key that goes on its own after using some alcohol to clean the keyboard , would the tip of cleaning it with warm water help ?

 

I had spilled half a glass of coffee with tons of milk and creamer on my laptop some time back... It stayed on and I was a bit shocked (it was only half a year old!) so I didn't turn it off. After half a minute or so later, it rebooted itself, and again while it was booting up, and it was only then that I removed power. But it was too late; the damage was done.

The damage was actually minimal since the only thing that changed is, I couldn't charge battery. But since there are no separate battery chargers sold, that pretty much turned my desktop replacement into a desktop. Eventually I ended up replacing the whole mobo for $550. The repair shop said that if I didn't do it then, it was only a matter of time until it would stop working altogether since all the stuff from my coffee was eating away at the board.

On the up side, they replaced the keys of my keyboard from black to white at my request, a $100 value absolutely free! T3 in California, they're cool, though it sucks that ground shipping cross-country takes a whole week. Ironically, when the laptop was away, I spilled water on the keyboard of the desktop that I had borrowed to tie me over, killing the keyboard. In my defense, I have to say that it was many months after the first spill, so I'm not a serial spiller ;D

In the end, I feel closer to my laptop. We've been through so much together! And I think I'm prepared for the next time I spill coffee - and coffee it'll be, since I've been drinking water out of bottles to contain possible damage!

Malia

 

what about water damage to the lcd? there was a leak in my apartment and my laptop got wet, which i'm still really mad about. anyway, i can see water streaks on my screen that look like stains. will it "resolve" on its own or will the water kill my screen eventually?

 

Did you go to the person on top of you and angrily ask for money? There's a chance they'll agree to pay for repair. I got flooded once by my upstairs neighbor (hehe it was funny my roommate who just moved in a cpl days before woke me up with "Malia do you usually have water in your kitchen???"), and some of the water fell right on my computer monitor. Luckily, the desktop was under the desk so no damage was done there, but the monitor was done for. So I went up and I was like, uh yeah so you know the little flood the other day... - actually I meant to be all angry and stuff but she turned out to be such nice lady I couldn't be mean! So she agreed to pay for a replacement. I got a new CRT monitor from a friend for free and got $150 from the lady. So, while a new LCD would cost more than that, it's still worth a try, who knows! Good luck!

Malia