[CLUE-Talk] Local laptop repair?

[Matthew Porter]

Can anyone recommend a good local shop for getting a laptop checked
out and possibly repaired?  

My google of the Clue mailing list archives turned up an old
recommendation of Laptop Express in Denver, but their phone message
tells me that they no longer do retail laptop repair.

Here's my situation: My 2.5-year-old Compaq Presario 1700US is acting
flaky.  Could very well be a heat problem.  It boots OK with the
installed OS (WinXP Home), and seems to keep running if it's left idle
or used for low-intensity tasks like word processing.  However, if I
have it do something more intensive, like playing video, analyzing the
main HD partition with the defrag utility or running a virus check, it
will shut down suddenly after a short while. First the fan will turn
on, and between ten and ninety seconds after that it just dies.  It
reboots fine after that, sometimes requiring a disk check and
sometimes not.

<Required_Linux_Content>

I've also tried booting the machine from a
Knoppix CD that always worked in the past, but I get similar results:
First the fan cranks up, and then the machine dies, before KDE is even
finished loading. This suggests its not just a Windows software
problem.  I'm planning to use Knoppix to make this machine an
XP/Debian dual boot, but I need to get the hardware problem taken care
of first.

</Required_Linux_Content>

Ordinarily I might open the machine myself to clean it out, look for
cracked boards, etc., but at the moment I don't have the time or
patience to do that so I won't mind leaving it with a
reasonably-priced local shop for a couple of days.


Thanks,

 --Matt.

-- 

Matthew F. Porter
Littleton, Colorado

mfporter at c-creature.com