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In this guide I explain how to disassemble a HP Compaq 6730s – 6735s notebook and remove the cooling fan which is mounted under the motherboard. Basically I will take the whole notebook apart and remove all internal components one by one.
Why wouldn’t HP make a door for the cooling fan? Why should it be so complicated to replace the cooling fan?
Let’s start to disassemble the notebook.
If you need new replacement parts for you HP Compaq 6730s-6735s notebook, you can find them here.
STEP 1.
Remove the battery.
Remove covers from the hard drive, wireless card and memory.
STEP 2.
Remove one screw securing the DVD drive (red circle) and pull the drive from the notebook.
Remove memory modules (in my laptop I had only one module installed).
Remove the hard drive, you’ll find details instruction on the sticker glued to the hard drive caddy.
Unsnap two antenna cables from the wireless card. Remove two screws securing the wireless card (green circles). Remove the wireless card.
STEP 3.
Remove five screws securing the switch board cover (red circles).
Remove two screws securing the laptop keyboard (green circles).
Remove eleven screws securing the laptop bottom cover (yellow circles).
STEP 4.
Lift up the switch board cover. You can separate the switch board cover from the bottom cover with a piece of soft plastic. I’m using a guitar pick.
Be careful, the switch board cover is attached to the motherboard. Do not pull the cable from the connector yet.
STEP 5.
Lift up the keyboard and place it on the switch board cover so you can access the keyboard cable connector.
The keyboard is connected to the motherboard via a flat ribbon cable. Before you pull the cable and remove the keyboard, you’ll have to unlock the connector.
On the picture below you can see the keyboard connector unlocked. Now you can pull the cable and remove the keyboard.
STEP 6.
After the keyboard has been removed, you can release the switch board cable and remove the cover.
STEP 7.
Remove four screws securing the notebook speakers.
Unplug the speaker cable from the motherboard.
Remove both speakers.
STEP 8.
Release the wireless card antenna cables.
Unplug the webcam cable from the motherboard.
Remove four screws securing the display hinges (red circles) and one screw grounding the video cable (green circle).
STEP 9.
Lift up and remove the display panel assembly.
In the next guide I’ll explain how to get inside the display panel and remove/replace the web camera module.
STEP 10.
Remove two screws securing the top cover assembly.
STEP 11.
Carefully lift up the top cover assembly.
Be careful, the touch pad cable is still attached to the motherboard.Release the touch pad cable and remove the top cover assembly.
STEP 12.
Now we can access the motherboard.
Unplug three cables pointed with arrows.
Remove three screws securing the motherboard.
Lift up and release the RJ11 (modem) jack.
STEP 13.
Start removing the motherboard from the laptop case.
The motherboard has been removed.
STEP 14.
Finally, you can access and replace the cooling fan.
Simply remove one screw securing the cooling fan to the laptop base and replace it with a new one if needed.
If you are replacing the motherboard you’ll have to transfer some parts to the new board.
Transfer the DVD drive connector, modem card, heat sink, processor and modem cable.
January 23rd, 2012 at 11:28 am
@ Amir,
It’s hard to tell what is causing the problem because it’s intermittent.
1. It’s possible you didn’t assemble the laptop properly and the screen goes dark because of grounding.
2. Could be motherboard failure.
When I have to troubleshoot a laptop with similar problem, I do the following. Disassemble the laptop as much as I can. Basically I strip it down to bare bone system and start testing with an external monitor. If it works fine, I start adding parts and test after each step. This technique helps me to find out which component is failing.
There is no simple answer to your question.
January 20th, 2012 at 7:34 am
PLEASE HELP!!!!!!
I open my HP6735s laptop 6 months ago with small difficulty but nothing big and cleaned everything and put everything back just like on pictures and when I press power button it didn’t won’t to start windows (it was black screen) and led lights wasn’t like usual (caps lock led was blinking like it’s countdowning something and stop and led for hard drive was orange).I opened again until step 10 and put back everything and it started windows.Now when I take laptop to move around screen just go black and I must hold power button to turn him off and when I power it on everything is OK, but it’s not always.Sometimes past few days or 2 weeks to not go black (with hard touches and throwing on bed) and sometimes it’s go black 5 times in one day (with gentle moving around).I’m afraid to open again completely.I was not using thermal paste if that has anything with this for heat sink.Search on google everywhere and nothing help.Don’t now what to do anymore.I’m going crazy because of that.ONCE MORE PLEASE HELP!!!
January 17th, 2012 at 6:40 pm
@ Tony,
Does it start on the battery power?
Are you using the original HP AC adapter?
Did you test if your adapter output correct voltage?
January 16th, 2012 at 3:36 pm
Hello,
I have an HP 6730S,
And wenn i plugin the power i get an half blue and orange light.
And then it stays orange.
Can somebody tell me what needs to be fixt?
Graphic chip dead? i can get a refurb mainboard at 150euro.
But i don’t know if its worth it.
Any help is welcome.
Thank you
January 11th, 2012 at 2:49 pm
@ Cshaba,
Not sure what tape you are asking about.
January 11th, 2012 at 2:37 pm
@ Csaba,
First of all doublecheck if all screws securing the motherboard are removed.
You start motherboard from the part which is closer to the screen.
Lift up the motherboard a little bit and at the same time apply some pressure on the laptop case in the VGA port area. You’ll have to release the VGA port as it shown on the step 13.
After the top side of the motherboard lifted up, move the motherboard towards the display a little bit to relase audio jacks.
Finally, lift up and remove the motherboard.
It’s hard to explain how to remove the motherboard, you have to feel it.
January 11th, 2012 at 12:09 pm
@ Mitch,
Not sure why you having this issue. I believe your keyboard has regular keys like many other keyboards. You should be able to unsnap the key cap and push it back in place without any problem (unless you have something damaged on the key).
As a last resort, you can replace the entire keyboard. I think you can find a new one on eBay for about $15.
January 9th, 2012 at 3:11 am
@Csaba:
Do not pull hard at this point, what you should do is pulling the motherboard at the top and in the same time you try to recover it from left side, just do some efforts because the vga port is a bit out of laptop bottom cover and it make this a bit strong to remove , before this lift the heat sink unit out and it will be easy!
You pull at top part and in same time you push it in its left side, that’s all ! and especially don’t bend the motherboard too much !!
January 9th, 2012 at 3:10 am
It is out. Sorry for whining.
Next question, can I take of that litle part of tape, which is on the side of the fan’s air intake?
January 9th, 2012 at 2:38 am
So, are you totaly sure? I feel like I’m just brakeing the stuff here.
Also, what’s up with the audio jacks? Aren’t they are mounted in as well? Is the black plasctic part, which you can see from the outside as well, is going to come out?