Chosen Solution
Hello there. If I forget something important , I’m sorry, this is my first post here after all. A few weeks ago, I got an Acer Aspire E5-571 series laptop from a relative who didn’t need it anymore. While it is great that I was lucky enough to get a recent-ish laptop for school without having to spend a dime, I find it to far too slow. This is why I have decided to purchase a solid state drive to give it a new lease on life. However, to get to the hard drive enclosure I must take the whole keyboard apart and get to the motherboard. Not wanting to zap any component with ESD, I have done extensive research on how reduce that risk to a minimum and this is where my problem comes in. Accounts on wether or not one should use an antistatic wrist strap when working on a laptop seem to conflict each other. Some say they have worked on computers for decades without any antistatic equipment and have never fried anything, while others say it is very unsafe to work on electronics without such equipment. Grounding also confuses me quite a bit. If I do get an anti static wrist strap, where should I clip it? On a metallic part of a desktop case? On a metallic part of the laptop itself? Is it enough to simply touch a faucet before starting? I’m not really sure. Long story short: Should I use an anti static wrist strap and if so, how?
Hi Salif, Your laptop can be upgraded to 16GB of RAM in two banks of 8GB. This web site will check for you: http://www.crucial.com/usa/en/compatible… The SSD drive will speed up loading of software. RAM will speed up the running of apps….O.K. just saw your reply. Antistatic wrist straps are to be connected to the antistatic pad which you have placed on your bench. Look it up. BUT, if you are careful and just discharge your self by touching something metal, you should be alright. Just try to not touch any of metallic parts. Hold the RAM by the edge of its little circuit board, etc. Just work slowly and carefully. Take photos of each stage and keep track of the screws and where they go . I use disposable plastic take away sauce containers. I presume you have watched some of the videos for your laptop? Good luck! Mike
It only takes one time of fighting for days to discover ESD damage (that can be intermittent) to make a believer out you. And I’ve done it. Here’s a good guide on setting up an anti-static mat and/or wrist strap: How to set up your Anti-static mat and wristband Here is iFixit’s book on ESD: [linked product missing or disabled: IF145-313-1]
The rub is different people will encounter different conditions! Someone in a very dry environment can encounter ESD damage quite easily! Someone in a very humid environment is less likely to encounter this as a big a risk. Now here in Boston in the middle of the winter we have to be extra careful, yet today it’s like soup outside but the AC is going full blast so we have very dry cool air inside so we also need to be careful as the risk is heightened. Using a wrist strap is just a good move! Clipping the clip to the bare metal of the chassis of a system which is grounded via its power cord (I use a modified cord, where the ground pin in the plug end is the only pin, I cut the others off). If you take a logic board out you really need a good ESD mat and it needs to be tied to ground and your strap also needs to be tied to the mat. Bottomline here is be ESD smart! Don’t take the chance!
i have never used any esd protection either to replace hard drives or motherboards. if you want more speed try installing the maximum ammout of ram
