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Here are instructions for taking apart a Dell Inspiron 1720/1721 or Dell Vostro 1700 laptop.
You can use these guide for removing and replacing:
1. Laptop memory, hard drive, wireless card, modem.
2. CD/DVD optical drive.
3. Laptop keyboard.
4. LCD panel.
5. Heat sink, CPU, motherboard and other internal components.
Are you looking for spare parts for your Dell Inspiron 1720 laptop? Search here.
First of all, turn off the laptop, unplug AC power adapter and remove the battery.
Turn the laptop upside down and remove Wi-Fi, memory and hard drive covers.
Disconnect (unsnap) two antenna cables from the wireless card. Remove the wireless card.
Spread latches on both sides of the memory module and carefully pull the RAM module from the slot.
You can access only one memory slot from the bottom of the laptop. The second memory slot is located under the keyboard.
Remove three screws securing the hard drive. In order to disconnect the hard drive from the motherboard, lift it up by the black tab attached to the hard drive caddy. Remove the hard drive.
As you see, Dell Inspiron 1720 can handle two hard drives. You can increase laptop storage space by installing a second hard drive.
The BIOS (CRT) battery is located right under the memory slot. By the way, disconnecting the battery will not clear the BIOS password, don’t even try.
Now I’m going to remove the CD/DVD optical drive. Remove one screw securing the CD/DVD drive to the laptop base and open the drive with a paper clip.
Carefully pull the CD/DVD drive from the laptop.
Remove all screws from the bottom.
Remove two screws securing display hinges.
In the following four steps I explain how to remove the laptop keyboard. If you are replacing the keyboard, you can skip all previous steps.
Lift up the keyboard bezel with a flathead screwdriver. Remove the bezel.
Remove four screws securing the keyboard.
Slide the keyboard to the direction shown by the red arrow.
Lift up and remove the keyboard. Now you can replace it with a new one if needed.
As you see on the picture below, this keyboard doesn’t have a flat ribbon cable as most laptop keyboards do. The keyboard connector is a part of the keyboard base.
Unplug two LCD cables from the motherboard and remove one screw securing the grounding cable.
Remove the LCD panel.
Remove six screws securing the top cover assembly and unplug one cable pointed with the red arrow.
As I mentioned before, the second RAM slot can be accessed when you remove the keyboard.
The internal Bluetooth module can be mounted in the top right corner. My Inspiron 1720 came without internal Bluetooth module but it had the Bluetooth cable installed.
Lift up and remove the top cover assembly.
The top cover has been removed.
Loosen four screws securing the CPU heat sink.
Remove the heat sink. Do not forget to apply new thermal grease when you install the heat sink back.
Remove four screws securing the cooling fan. Unplug the fan cable from the system board. Remove the fan.
Remove two screws (blue circles) securing the dial up modem. Remove the modem.
Remove six screws (red circles) securing the PCMCIA slot board.
Remove the PCMCIA slot board.
Remove all screws securing the system board. Unplug three cables on the bottom (three red arrows). Unplug and remove the Bluetooth cable (yellow arrow).
Start removing the system board from the left side.
The system board has been removed.
In order to remove the CPU, you’ll have to unlock the CPU socket first. Turn the screw into the “Unlocked” position. Carefully lift up the CPU from the socket.
If you are replacing the system board, you’ll have to transfer the hard drive connector board to the new system board.
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February 2nd, 2010 at 8:30 pm
Hi, Thanks so much for the info and pics of how to remove my keyboard. I’ve had a problem with the words when I type where the cursor keeps zipping back to the start of the sentence. I’ve now taken it apart and cleaned it so fingers crossed this problem will cease. Many thanks.
February 1st, 2010 at 8:57 pm
Hi again,
I got my new motherboard and put it in but when I start up the fan doesn’t seem to be working. Does this take a minute to start or should it start like it usually does?
Trying to figure out if I need to buy a new fan and be in for a wait again.
Thanks,
Kirsty.
January 31st, 2010 at 12:17 pm
I just took my laptop apart a little, I didn’t go as far as you have here. I chickened out and put it back together. But when I did the screen did not come on. I can here that windows has started up. Log in etc. but I can’t see anything – it seems there is no connection to the LCD. Any idea how this happened? I have tried starting up holding function and f8 but that didn’t help.
January 21st, 2010 at 4:15 pm
LHUPA,
I think the laptop wouldn’t start at all with the graphics card removed. Apparently the graphics card is installed and works properly.
Can you see the Wi-Fi card in the device manager? Also, you can remove the cover on the bottom of the laptop and find out if the Wi-Fi card is installed.
That doesn’t make sense. You asked how to find if the Wi-Fi card is installed even though you said it’s present. WLAN=Wi-Fi
January 21st, 2010 at 3:40 pm
Kolby,
Sounds like the problem is not related to the power adapter.
I guess it’s either bad DC jack (the socket where you plug the adapter) or there is a problem with the motherboard.
I cannot tell which one is causing the problem.
It’s necessary to remove the top cover assemble and test voltage with a voltmeter on terminals where the power jack is connected to the motherboard. This will tell you if the motherboard gets power through the DC jack. If the motherboard gets power but will not work when connected to the AC adapter, there is a problem with the motherboard.
January 21st, 2010 at 3:08 pm
Hi, i have a 1720 and i cannot get any power through the power adaptor i have tryed 3 different power adaptors with 2 different computers and all the power adapters work. the computer will still run on battery just fine and will still boot into windows. this happend when i replaced my power adapter with the exact same dell branded model. please help
thanks
kolby
ps: i have already tryed removing everything from the computer hdd ram wifi etc.
January 20th, 2010 at 10:42 pm
I have to service a Dell Inspiron 1720 who seems to have no Wi-Fi system nor graphic card installed (despite any drivers installed)… I get these messages on the System’s details. But in the overall, the mother board seems to be correct. I have completely re-installed all Dell’s original softwares (on 4 CD-Roms or DVD’s) including the Windows Vista Home Edition also included, bundled to genuine Dell’s discs after reformatted the hard disk with DBAN. How to find if the Wi-Fi and the graphic card have been taken off from the computer? I have never seen in one of these machines!… It’s the first one! I service!!! Thinking that the mother board seems to be in perfect shape, Did some areas in particular of the mother board can be broken enough to get off the Wi-Fi and graphic card? The graphic card is presumably an NVIDIA. I have also noticed that two module parts seem to be missing: WPAN-FCM and WWAN-FCM each side of the WLAN (present). The “WLAN” is the wireless module for the Wi-Fi? – Despite I have seen your very sharp tutorial, I want to be sure prior to do anything!
Thanks a lot!
LHUPA
January 19th, 2010 at 3:28 pm
I forgot to ask;
If I put the motherboard in myself do I need to format my hardrives or reinstall windows? (I plan on getting exactely the same motherboard from ebay).
I don’t even have a vista disk because it was on there when I got the computer.
Also I am not sure what type of thermal grease is best for the CPU, any suggestions?
Thanks if you can help me, I really appreciate it.
January 19th, 2010 at 3:23 pm
Hi,
I have a dell inspiron 1720 and suddenly when I was playing The Sims 3 is just shut down and will not turn on again at all.
When I plug the power supply into just the motherboard (I have removed everything I can off it) the light on the power supply goes off.
I took my computer somewhere a few days ago and one of the guys tested my power supply with a voltameter thingo and he said it was fine.
Does this point to motherboard failure. I am so scared to buy one in case this will not fix my problem. I am also worried about the CPU and my dedicated Nvidia graphics card if they are damaged.
If I took the components in to the same shop would they be able to test them for me ?(I will pay them).
What is the best thing to put a motherboard in so I don’t damage it in my car.
January 18th, 2010 at 8:55 pm
nbarraille,
Nope, you’ll have find a replacement fan designed for your laptop.
January 14th, 2010 at 6:08 am
Very nice tutorial. Thanks.
Does any of you know if it is possible to replace the fan with some “standard” desktop fan?
I also broke the headphone jack (it is SO stupid to put it where you use the mouse…), do you know a good online shop where I can find parts for this laptop?
Thanks!
January 10th, 2010 at 5:35 pm
is it possible to install two wireless cards for dual boot purposes …. since their is 3 mini pcie slots ??
January 10th, 2010 at 2:41 am
“How do replace the audio ports were you plug in the headsets place plug on the inside broke?”
I have a broken audio port as well and need to replace it. Has anyone found out how to do this or what part is needed? I found this on the dell site.
But I don’t know if its compatible with the 1720. I might just have to fork over the 60bucks for the experiment…
January 4th, 2010 at 7:30 pm
i have a insipron 1720. can u please tell me where is the eeprom chip located? Thanks
January 2nd, 2010 at 3:11 pm
i have 2 bios’s, same bios but differenet updated version on one of them, A07 and A09, im swapping them around as i cant update the A07 one. If i do it carefully im not going to kill anything am i? :O
December 27th, 2009 at 3:46 pm
Where did you purchase your replacement motherboard? THX
December 26th, 2009 at 10:11 am
How do replace the audio ports were you plug in the headsets place plug on the inside broke?
December 23rd, 2009 at 1:06 pm
any shop to buy 1720 parts, dell’s shops are too expensive. i’m interested in display’s back cover(mine is green), and bluetooth device. thanks
November 27th, 2009 at 3:33 pm
Thanks for very nice walk through. Had to replace the motherboard in my laptop and this guide was perfect in helping me.
November 13th, 2009 at 9:48 am
esteban,
You’ll need a hard drive caddy connector kit for Inspiron 1720.
This kit included the hard drive caddy, SATA connector and screws.
Check out this post. It explains how to install a second hard drive.
November 13th, 2009 at 9:41 am
Hello,
I found very useful your article. I want to add an extra hard disk to my 1721, what do I need besides the new HDD?
Thanks in advanced,
Esteban
November 1st, 2009 at 6:42 am
You can replace the graphics card only if your laptop doesn’t have integrated graphics like the “Mobile Intel(R) Graphics Media Accelerator X4500MHD”
October 28th, 2009 at 2:56 pm
Robbie,
It depends. I don’t know if your video card is integrated into the motherboard or it’s a discrete module.
Some Dell Inspiron 1720 laptops come with a discrete video card. Not sure if Dell makes better cards for this model.
October 28th, 2009 at 2:41 pm
This is really helpful. I was always told that upgrading or changing laptop components was impossible. I have a question though.
I have a Dell Inspiron 1720 with an nVidia 8600m graphics card. Do you know how or if it’s possible, to upgrade it?
October 25th, 2009 at 3:22 pm
Kevin,
I checked specification Dell Inspiron 1720 and it says:
Memory type: 667 MHz SoDIMM DDR2 (PC2-5300).
PC2-6400 will work but slow down to PC2-5300 speed. You cannot make it run faster.