Hardware Failures

Computers are reliable, but components still do fail. Parts with the highest failure rates are those with physically moving parts: hard drives (spindles that rotates at 7,200 revolutions per minute); fans (usually running at 1k to 4k RPM); and optical media drives (CD, DVD).

Other components like the power supply, RAM, processor, or even motherboard can fail as well, but these are usually attributable to a power incident (power surge, too much amperage) or heat.

Did your computer suddenly die?

If your computer does not turn on, do not panic. Make sure all power cords are still connected.

If they are, do you hear the computer making normal start noises, but your screen stays black? If so, your monitor might have reached the end of its life.

But if you hear nothing at all when you press the power button, ‘bad things’ might have happened.

Replacing components inside of a desktop computer is usually easy, impeded only by the availability of parts locally. Should you reach Digeratius early enough in the day, most repairs can happen that afternoon.

Laptop failures are more costly and difficult. In a desktop computer, motherboards and power supplies can be replaced with third-party similar units; laptops are almost always designed to only accept parts from the original equipment manufacturer. Repair of laptops is dependent on availability of parts from the laptop manufacturer, and almost all of the time no local stock parts exist: we must wait for new parts to be shipped to Digeratius.

Hard Drive Losses & Backups

Digeratius can never guarantee the recovery or replacement of data on a computer storage device. However, there are many instances of ‘dead’ hard drives just needing a new power cable to spin up again.

Unfortunately, we can do very little about physical or electrical damage to hard drives. Hard drives can only be opened up in ‘clean rooms,’ something that we do not have normal access to nor the skills to operate. In the event of catastrophic data loss that must be recovered, we can refer you to speciality firms that recover data from dead drives. Sadly, most of their diagnosis fees begin in the $3,000 range.

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