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In the following guide I remove the motherboard from a Compaq Presario CQ50 laptop. Also this guide should work for Compaq Presario CQ 60/CQ70 and HP G50/G60/G70 laptops.
If you need replacement parts, you can find them here. Just search by the part name and laptop model.
Start laptop disassembly with removing the battery.
STEP 1.
Remove memory, hard drive and wireless card covers.
STEP 2.
Remove three screws securing the hard drive assembly.
Slide the hard drive assembly to the right, disconnect it from the motherboard and remove from the laptop.
STEP 3.
Remove both memory modules.
Disconnect two antenna cables from the wireless card. Remove two screws and remove the wireless card from the laptop.
STEP 4.
Remove one screw securing the DVD drive.
Pull the DVD drive from the laptop.
STEP 5.
Remove all screws from the bottom of the laptop.
Disconnect the CMOS battery cable from the motherboard.
STEP 6.
Carefully lift up the keyboard as it shown on the picture below.
STEP 7.
Access the keyboard cable connector underneath the keyboard.
Unlock the connector before removing the keyboard.
In order to unlock the connector you’ll have to move the locking clip (white) about 2-3 millimeters towards the LCD screen.
The locking clip must stat attached to the connector base (dark brown) as it shown on the picture below.
Now you can release the cable and remove the keyboard.
STEP 8.
Unlock the power button cable connector.
On the following picture you can see the connector in the unlocked state.
Now you can remove the power button board cable from the connector.
STEP 9.
Remove the plastic cover.
STEP 10.
Disconnect the video cable connector from the motherboard.
Disconnect the webcam cable.
Pull the wireless card antenna cable through the opening in the top cover.
STEP 11.
Remove screws securing the display hinges.
STEP 12.
Remove the display assembly from the laptop.
In the next post I explain how to remove the LCD screen, inverter board and hinges from the display assembly in HP G50/G60/G70 laptops. It’s similar for Compaq Presario CQ50/CQ60/CQ70 laptops.
STEP 13.
Disconnect the touch pad cable from the motherboard.
Remove screws securing the top cover assembly.
STEP 14.
Start separating the top cover assembly from the laptop base.
You can use a guitar pick in order to split the laptop case.
STEP 15.
The top cover assembly has been removed.
STEP 16.
Remove one screw securing the left speaker.
Remove the left speaker from the base.
STEP 17.
Remove four screws securing the motherboard.
Disconnect four cables from the motherboard.
STEP 18.
Remove the motherboard from the laptop base.
STEP 19.
Disconnect the cooling fan cable from the motherboard.
STEP 20.
Loosen four screws securing the cooling fan assembly.
STEP 21.
Remove the cooling fan assembly from the laptop.
STEP 22.
In this model the power jack is not soldered to the motherboard.
You can unplug the power jack cable from the motherboard and replace it with a new DC jack harness if it’s bad.
April 14th, 2011 at 7:58 am
I was just working on a CQ50-130US and upgraded the memory to 4GB 800MHZ (which it doesn’t run at only 667) Replaced the hard drive to a 7200rpm black drive and I was trying to install a P8400 (I had a spare) into it but it won’t start. I installed everything correctly because I put the old T3200 back in and everything works like a champ. HP’s guide says it can be done but it’s not working…. Any Ideas???
I Updated the bios to the latest, F65 I believe from Compaq’s site.
I tried putting one stick of memory to see if there was a problem.
I pulled the CMOS battery and reset the settings (Time and Date only things compaq allows).
The CPU is a good CPU because I just put it back into my HTPC and it works fine….
I know there were differences between different P series chips but I can’t seem to understand it.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Daniel
April 8th, 2011 at 2:13 pm
james,
Go the BIOS menu. Maybe you can change the motherboard serial number in there.
On some motherboards you have to run special utility to set up the serial number (available only for HP certified technicians).
April 4th, 2011 at 6:07 am
worked great thanks, only problem is that its giving me a invalid serial number on startup, how can I fix this, please email me back.
March 31st, 2011 at 5:17 am
thx alot dude for the guide…. keep rocking
March 20th, 2011 at 12:27 pm
HANK YOU!!!!!! i had my android tablet with ur webpage on while i tore apart my cq50.. with ur guide this so was SSSSOOOOOOOOOOOOO easy….. i got the new trackpad faceplate thing from ebay for 12$!!! i thanks you a million times for this page…… you rock…(took me anout hour to do it .. i had to reset mouse /pad after though )
richook
March 18th, 2011 at 10:18 am
Luke,
Does your laptop turn on at all? Can you hear normal hard drive sound? Can you see the hard drive light flashing?
You said the screen failed but maybe the whole system will not start, not just the screen?
Can you get any image on the external monitor?
Here’s my guess. If you removed the CPU, it’s possible you didn’t install it back into the socket correctly. Or you forgot to lock the socket.
March 18th, 2011 at 9:50 am
DGrex,
Bad memory maybe?
Try removing memory modules one by one and test the laptop with each memory module separately. One of the modules could be bad.
When you remove the bad module, the laptop might start properly.
March 17th, 2011 at 7:37 am
Hello
Thanks first, for a very uesful guide – my laptop fan burn out and the laptop kept shutting down. I have since replaced it with the help of this guide but a new problem has arisen. The screen seems to have failed – no backlight, no dark text. I’m unsure what’s wrong since i checked the connections and made sure the screen wasn’t badly connected.
Any advice?
Luke.
March 16th, 2011 at 2:00 pm
ref posts 132 & 133
My power button blinks continually and laptop fan is running …just no picture
laptop continues to have power ‘on’ button flashing until I crash the laptop off by holding down the start button
Battery and power supply are all good
March 12th, 2011 at 1:56 pm
Natalie,
It’s hard to tell what could be wrong without seeing the laptop. Maybe incorrectly plugged connector, grounding issue, etc…
Try disconnecting everything from the motherboard and start assembling it back together testing after each step.
Something like it explained here: http://www.laptoprepair101.com/laptop/2008/06/14/laptop-dead-troubleshoot-the-problem/
If your motherboard, CPU and memory are good, it should start with an external monitor.