Bored? Dissect your Eee PC, then put it back together

Read a book, watch TV, cook - those are some of the things that most normal people would do to relieve themselves of boredom.

Try telling that to HEXUS.community member TAKTAK, who today decided that there's only one thing to do when boredom ensues; dismantle and restore an Eee PC!

That's right, with clearly too much time on his hands, TAKTAK has taken his Eee PC to pieces, and documented the entire procedure with over 30 pictures.

So, if you're bored, want to know what's ticking inside your Eee, or want to know if TAKTAK's Eee ever worked again, take a look at his complete dissection procedure in the HEXUS.community forums.

Eee-lovers be warned, it isn't for the faint hearted. Furthermore, TAKTAK states that he'll probably do a full dismantle in the near future, including the monitor. He promises to take better pictures - but first, he needs to get bored again.

Head on over to the HEXUS.community forums for all the fun and games.

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now… to remove that top plate

remove all of the screws from the plate (there is a screw under the warranty sticker)

set them to one side (you'll need them later ;))

push a screw driver in through the front and pry open the case… (there are two clips along the front near the trackpad, don't worry if you cath the button, it just pops back on)

next, turn the eeePC around and do the same (its harder to get the screwdriver into position and there are three clips along the back…

now… gently pry all of the edges up and lift the plate to about 40 degrees, then slide the top plate sideways (just so that it can get past the audio ports..)
and it should pop off.. if it doesn't want to come off check that you have removed all of the screws…
note that the top plate is essentially the heatsink…

now you get to see the top of the mobo and the proccy, thermal pads etc, etc

disconnect both wires in the top corner (speakers and webcam)

then disconnect the fan…

next it's the video connection that gets pulled…

remove the rubber bung from the modem port… just give it a push with the screwdriver (it gets in the way of removing the motherboard…)

time to remove the motherboard…
at the bottom there are two tabs holding the mobo in place… just lever the mobo out..

now give the motheboard a bit of a wiggle and it should come out (you need to tilt it to get the usbs out.)
now… hold off from just yanking it as the atheros wireless card is connected underneath…

just pull both wires off the micropci card and then the board will just come free…

here you can see the SSD that the eee uses (in this case 4GiB )

here you can see the bottom section of the case

closeup of the ickle fan

right… so that concludes the disassembly that i am doing tonight… (tis getting late.. and theres not much point with rubbish quality piccys…)

but.. you don't think i would just leave you right?

time to reassemble…

and for those of you that can't follow instructions backwards…

put the motherboard back in place like so (making sure that you connect the atheros wireless adaptor, and the wires aren't in the way of any screws… otherwise you'll be taking it apart again ;)):

now.. reconnect the cpu fan, webcam, vga, and speakers again ensuring that the wires don't get in the way of any screws…

now to put the top part of the case back on :)
make sure that the thermal pads are in place (one of mine is slightly damaged after catching it…)
and then lower the top plate on at an angle (so that the lefthand edge can get over the audio and mic connection)
press down all of the edges so that it is held in place with the plastic clips.
now screw the top plate back on…

now it's time to reconnect the trackpad, push the cable in (ensure that it is right in…) and then close the locking mechanism.
do the same with the keyboard, push the cable right in (to ensure a full connection) and close both tabs.

now to lock the keyboard down again…
note that on the bottom of the keyboard there a some ridges… place these into the top plate first and then lower the top edge and press down, so that the 3 clips engage again, thus holding the keyboard in place again…

now.. turn it upside down again…
put the flap back in and screw all of it up.

so… now it's complete again… so does it boot after fiddling?

the answer?

of course it does!!

i leave you with a compiz cube

and a piccy of the forums….

better add this…

to enable full desktop connect to tinternet..
press ‘alt+t’ to bring up the terminal
type ‘sudo su’ and hit enter
now type ‘apt-get update’ hit enter
type ‘apt-get install kicker ksmserver’ hit enter
and tell it to install without prompts when it asks… (type ‘y’ and hit enter)
go into the settings tab, go into settings and tick always boot into full desktop… and done…

and if you want to install compiz then add some repositories and install it using apt, then edit the config using nano, so that you get rid of the horrible black bars…

next up.. a custom boot screen…

*i wasn't sure where to put this… but it's kind of a project… mebbe?

edit: one thing i should add… enabling full desktop that way causes the system to double boot, it boots into easymode for a split second and then reboots to advanced everytime..

a quick google search for eeepc double boot will suffice, but the process could leave you having to do a restore (editing startupfull.sh and startupsomething.sh) (hence i'm not saying how to)

Have you nothing better to do… tut :p

Now all you've got to do is put it all back to together again! Yay! :P

Bored? Dissect your Eee PC, then put it back together

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