✉ Email an Expert

Common Computer Faults

🔌 No Power

The Fault: The device shows no signs of life when the power button is pressed. This typically indicates a failure in the power delivery chain.

  • Common Causes: A dead or swollen battery, a faulty AC power adapter, a broken DC-in jack, or a critical failure in the motherboard’s power management integrated circuits (ICs).

💧 Water Damage

The Fault: Exposure to moisture (immersion or high humidity) causing immediate or delayed electronic failure.

  • Common Causes: Corrosion of copper traces on the PCB, short-circuiting of surface-mount components, or mineral deposits left behind after the liquid evaporates that bridge electrical connections.

💻 Screen Damage

The Fault: Visible physical trauma to the display panel, often resulting in “bleeding” pixels or obscured visuals.

  • Common Causes: Impact damage (dropping the laptop), pressure damage (objects left on the keyboard when closing the lid), or a cracked digitizer (on touchscreen models). This usually requires a full LCD/OLED panel replacement.

☕ Liquid Spill

The Fault: Direct contact with liquids (coffee, soda, etc.) usually through the keyboard or vents.

  • Common Causes: Sticky or non-responsive keys due to residue, or liquid seeping through the keyboard tray onto the motherboard, causing localized short circuits and damaging the keyboard’s internal membrane.

❓ No Display

The Fault: The computer appears to turn on (lights are visible, fans may spin), but the screen remains completely black or very dim.

  • Common Causes: A failed backlight inverter, a loose or damaged video cable (EDP/LVDS), faulty RAM modules preventing a “POST” (Power-On Self-Test), or a failed Graphics Processing Unit (GPU).

⌨️ Keyboard Faults

The Fault: Individual keys may be unresponsive, “ghosting” (typing characters on their own), or the entire keyboard module may fail to communicate with the motherboard.

  • Common Causes: Liquid ingress causing internal shorts, physical damage to the delicate scissor switches, or a loose ribbon cable connection.

🔌 Charging Faults

The Fault: The laptop may operate while plugged in but fail to increase the battery percentage, or it may not recognize that a genuine charger is connected.

  • Common Causes: A degraded battery cell that can no longer hold a charge, a faulty charging IC on the motherboard, or a failing power adapter.

🔌 Power Jack Faults

The Fault: Unlike a software or battery issue, this is a physical failure where the DC-in port is loose, broken, or pushed inside the chassis.

  • Common Causes: Repeatedly tripping over the charging cable, general wear and tear from plugging/unplugging, or a solder joint failure where the jack meets the motherboard.

💽 Hard Drive Issues

The Fault: The computer may become extremely slow, get stuck in “automatic repair” loops, or make unusual clicking and grinding noises.

  • Common Causes: Mechanical failure of the spinning platters (in HDDs), file system corruption, or “bad sectors” that prevent the operating system from reading data.

📟 Memory Upgrade

The Service: Rather than a fault, this is a performance enhancement for systems that struggle with multitasking or modern, resource-heavy applications.

  • Common Symptoms: The PC frequently “freezes” when many tabs are open, or you receive “Out of Memory” errors while running specific software.

System Performance & Software

🐌 Slow Performance

The Fault: The computer takes an excessive amount of time to boot up or launch basic applications like a web browser.

  • Common Causes: Too many background startup programs, a fragmented hard drive, or insufficient system resources for the current version of Windows or macOS.

🌡️ Overheating

The Fault: The laptop feels hot to the touch, the internal fans are spinning at maximum speed (loud noise), or the device shuts down abruptly.

  • Common Causes: Dust buildup blocking the cooling vents or thermal paste that has dried out and can no longer transfer heat away from the processor.

🟦 Blue Screen

The Fault: Also known as the “Blue Screen of Death” (BSOD), the system crashes entirely and displays a stop code.

  • Common Causes: Incompatible hardware drivers, faulty RAM modules, or critical system file corruption within the operating system.

🛡️ Virus & Spyware

The Fault: Unusual pop-up advertisements, redirected search results, or the sudden presence of software you didn’t install.

  • Common Causes: Downloading infected attachments, clicking malicious links, or running outdated security software that allows malware to bypass defenses.

🔍 Data Recovery

The Service: Specialized retrieval of files that have been lost due to hardware failure or accidental deletion.

  • Common Scenarios: Accidental formatting of a drive, a corrupted partition table, or a “dead” computer that contains important photos and documents.