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In the following guide I’ll be taking apart a Gateway NX570X laptop. I think my disassembly instructions will work for other Gateway laptops in the NX570 line too. Please let me know if you have a different Gateway laptop and this guide works for you, you can mention your model in the comments below.
The laptop I’m fixing stopped charging the battery even though the AC adapter works properly and outputs correct voltage. I tested the adapter with a voltmeter. Actually, it’s charging the battery but only intermittently, when the AC adapter pushed in firmly. In order to charge the battery I have to adjust the AC adapter plug inside the power socket on the back of the laptop. Apparently, there is a problem with the power socket (aka power jack) and it has to be replaced or resoldered. OK, let’s take this lappy apart. I’ll be removing the system board so I can access and repair the power jack.
Are you looking for spare parts for your Gateway NX570 laptop? You’ll find them here.
STEP 1.
Turn off the laptop, unplug the AC adapter and remove the battery.
Remove seven screws (yellow circles) securing the memory cover.
Remove one screw (yellow circle) securing the keyboard. There are two more keyboard screws under the memory cover. You can see them in the step 5.
Remove one screw (orange circle) securing the Wi-Fi card cover.
Remove two screws (red circle) securing the hard drive. In order to disconnect the hard drive from the motherboard, you’ll have to slide the hard drive assembly to the left. Remove the hard drive assembly from the laptop.
STEP 2.
Disconnect two antenna cables from the wireless card, simply unsnap them from the card using your fingers. Remove one screw securing the wireless card and remove the card.
Remove both memory modules.
Loosen four screws securing the heat sink assembly (red circles).
STEP 3.
Carefully lift up the heat sink assembly from the laptop. The cooling fan is attached to the motherboard. Unplug this cable from the motherboard.
STEP 4.
Remove one screw securing the CD/DVD drive. Push the drive to the left and remove it from the laptop.
STEP 5.
Remove all screws from the bottom of the laptop. Two screws marked with green circles are securing the keyboard.
If you are replacing the keyboard, you simply remove one green screw in the step 1 and two green screws in the step 5 and then proceed to steps 7,8,9,10.
STEP 6.
Remove two screws from the hinge cover.
STEP 7.
Start removing the hinge cover with a small flathead screwdriver and continue removing it with your fingers.
STEP 8.
Remove the hinge cover.
STEP 9.
Lift up the keyboard as it shown on the picture below and place it upside down on the palm rest.
STEP 10.
Unlock connector on the system board. Release the cable and remove the keyboard.
STEP 11.
Release the wireless card antenna cables.
Unplug LCD cable from the system board.
Remove two screws from each display hinge.
STEP 12.
Carefully lift up and remove the LCD assembly.
STEP 13.
Remove four screws securing the top cover.
Unplug the touch pad cable from the system board.
STEP 14.
Lift up and remove the top cover assembly.
STEP 15.
Remove five screws securing the motherboard.
Unplug the speaker cable (left) and the Bluetooth card cable (right) from the system board.
STEP 16.
Start removing the system board from the left side.
You’ll have to disconnect one more cable shown on the picture below.
Finally, the system board has been removed.
Now you can access and repair the power jack. You can use these power jack replacement instructions.
When I was removing the power jack from the system board, it came out with the internal sleeve attached to the “+” connector. This sleeve connects traces on both sides of the system board and normally, when you unsolder the power jack, it stays inside the hole.
Now I’ll have to make a modification so traces on both sides of the system board are connected. I’ll have to connect traces with a cable.
If you find this article useful, please consider making a donation to the author. Thank you!
April 13th, 2009 at 12:23 pm
Thanks for the great site, was able to repair my gateway mx6447, the only difference was the cpu cooling attachment points, other than that everything was the same.
April 9th, 2009 at 11:38 am
Thanks for these great tips. I am a technical engineer who has done several laptop repairs/field replacements, and NEVER have I seen one as convoluted as this. The keyboard ribbon cable posed some trouble (hot glue took care of this), and the solder was a bit messy, but other than that, this guide was accurate, informative, and an excellent resource. Thanks for putting it together!
April 1st, 2009 at 10:15 pm
Beverly,
I cannot answer your question. It’s necessary to see the motherboard.
April 1st, 2009 at 8:04 pm
Hello and thanks for the instructions. These instructions are on point for the Gateway MX6447 as well. I followed the directions to replace the power jack, but it’s still not working. I scorched the motherboard just a bit while soldering the jack. Could this be the problem? Any assistance is greatly appreciated.
March 29th, 2009 at 8:40 pm
Excelent Job , congratulations , very clear instructions
March 29th, 2009 at 9:41 am
Guy Brunelle,
Recently I posted a disassembly guide for MT6740, it explains hot to take apart the display panel.
How to remove LCD screen from Gateway MT6704 (Model MA7)
Can you use this guide for replacing broken hinges?
March 28th, 2009 at 7:55 am
I am hoping you can help me. I have a broken left hinge on my mx6421. Can you tell me the steps in placing it. The cost to have a shop do it will be $200 including the hinge. I bought a hinge online, but now need to install it. Many thanks.
Guy
gabrunelle@yahoo.com
March 21st, 2009 at 4:10 pm
Sincere thanks for this post. It was crucial in helping me do my first ever laptop repair.
It looked like it was the usual DC connector problem but I noticed that the PSU light was flickering like there was short in the unit, Sure enough, when i opened the unit up, I found a decoupling capacitor was getting warm on the motherboard near the DC conector. Removing this component fixed the unit. I’m gambling slightly that the component was non-essential and, from the operation of the unit, hat seems to be the case.
Many thanks again for a very helpful page.
Cheers
Gerry Murray
Glasgow
Scotland
March 5th, 2009 at 11:56 pm
Thank you Very Much for this Post.
I am repairing Laptops on the side, and I am currently Learning. Instead of Having to take 3 hours to take apart a Laptop it took me 15 minutes with this guide for this particular Laptop, The laptop i took apart was NX570S So it works perfectly for my model laptop too. Thank you very much
-Happy Repair Tech
March 4th, 2009 at 11:54 pm
Bill,
Yes, my repair was successful.
Here’s what I did.
1. I found a not needed resistor and cut off one of the legs.
2. I made the hole for the “+” pin (the damaged one) in the motherboard wider with an awl.
3. I installed the power jack back on the motherboard. As the hole for “+” pin was wider, I was able to insert the piece I cut off of the resistor in the same hole.
4. I bent this piece so it touches traces on both sides of the motherboard and soldered it.
I hope you understand what I’m talking about. I posted this idea on a different blog, in this post: How to fortify damaged power jack connection in a laptop
Also, make sure to read the comment #22 in the post I just linked to. Peter Caines posted a good idea too.
I think this motherboard has only two layers. At least, I didn’t have any problem with my repair and the customer didn’t come back.
To be honest, I’ve repaired many jacks on many different laptop brands: Toshiba, HP, Dell, Sony, Gateway, but I haven’t seen a motherboard with multiple layers yet. Maybe I’m just lucky?
March 4th, 2009 at 5:27 pm
Hey Laptop Tech, thanks for the great pictorial and instructions. I was about to toss my NX570X notebook after 45 minutes fighting to split the shell. Your screw location discoveries were “on the money”. I stripped the connector off today, and like you, I pulled the plated thru hole out of the circuit board and the connection from the top to the bottom of the circuit board was broken, the same as you. Question: did your repair succeed to simply connect the top circuit to the bottom circuit? Some of the circuit boards have multiple layers and I am concerned that pulling out the plated thru hole might have broken a connection on an inner layer. There is a connector in the mail to my house from ebay for about $10 (including shipping). I will finish the job when it gets here.
March 2nd, 2009 at 9:00 pm
ok i have a situation… my plug started to malfunction and eventually stopped working.
i then bought some new jacks.
when i finished it, the solder job looked good but it didnt work so i took the jack back off.
i think i burnt the mother board with my cheap ass iron on the spot where the pin goes.
i dont know whats wrong please help
February 10th, 2009 at 10:34 am
Dear Sir
First , I want to thank you for all the dis assembly instructions, they are very helpfull.
I have the same Laptop Gateway NX570X, with different problem, but very close issue, (Power in the Motherboard). I hope you can assist me with this.
On the same Motherboard, in the opposite of the DC power jack, It seems that one of the Component has been BURNED. The Component is between the LEGS of the Power Jack…..Its write on the Print PC…PL.
I can NOT identify if its, A FUSE, or Capacitor or Resistor.
I can send you a picture as attachment, if I will have your email, if Necessary.
I will appreciate if you can help with this.
And If you know the Description of the Component, Pls let ,me know, where can I Buy it?
Thanks
Moshe
melkobi_at_gmail.com
February 9th, 2009 at 12:20 pm
February 9th, 2009 at 12:14 pm
Thanks for the info. however I don’t seem to be able to locate any locking mechanism on my board to release the keyboard. I have a MX6027 and the connector actually appears to be soldered to the board though I realize that this is quite unlikely. Any suggestions. I’m just about at the point of just chucking it for parts.
Your picture above looks like my connection though as do all the other illustrations.
February 6th, 2009 at 10:18 am
This tutorial was spot on. Awesome job guys. I was able to open up and fix my new boss’ daughter’s laptop and look like a hero.
Thanks a ton,
Trevor
February 6th, 2009 at 9:13 am
yucan2,
Very carefully! If you break the connector, you will not be able to fix it.
The keyboard connector has two pieces – the white base and the brown (black) locking tab. You open the connector the same way as you open the display on your laptop. One side of the connector stay attached to the base and the other side goes up at a 90 degree angle. I hope you understand what I’m talking about. You open the locking tab with your finger nail. When you do that, one side of the tab goes up at a 90 degree angle, but the other side must stay attached to the connector base.
After the locking tab is opened, the keyboard cable is released you you can pull it from the connector.
February 5th, 2009 at 3:30 pm
So how do you unlock the connector on the system board to remove keyboard?
February 5th, 2009 at 2:58 pm
I got it apart. I had to pop up the keyboard carefuly as not to break it an the hidden screw was under the left bottom corner of it. Switched out the screen after changing out some of the other parts and no improvement. There is a strip across the top back of the lcd that may be the problem but I was not comfortable trying to change that out without some guidance. would like to switch back to the other screen if I can fix it as it does not have the scratches on it.
February 5th, 2009 at 12:43 pm
I am trying to repair my gatway solo 5030. works fine except for the colors. It goes back and forth between ok to mottled. I am also having trouble getting the bottom cover off of the parts computer I am using. seem to have one more screw hidden by the mic and sound jacks. any suggestions?
January 29th, 2009 at 12:48 pm
thanks a million, you are the man
January 12th, 2009 at 3:50 pm
exellent instructions i am please, great work, very helpfull
December 30th, 2008 at 10:51 pm
I have looked through this guide and from my memory I believe it will also work on a Gateway MT6452 notebook. Thank you SO much for you help. I need to repair this computer for a friend and have searched the internet for days literally to find a guide and this is the first one I’ve found. Thank you very much.
December 30th, 2008 at 5:36 pm
This guide worked for the MT6711. The pictures look exactly like my laptop. Thanks.
December 29th, 2008 at 1:09 pm
Update
The pictorial was spot on and a really fine job.
The power jack however was totaly f*k*d so i solderd some pig tails onto the system board(as i have been unable to find a replacement) then added some nice 2 way connectors.
(Temporary) Job Done.
Thanks!
December 28th, 2008 at 1:35 pm
Nigel,
I’m not familiar with model #M320 but I can tell you that laptop disassembly procedure is very similar for most brands and models.
December 28th, 2008 at 8:30 am
hello i have gateway laptop computer model #M320 i am wondering if one has to go through the same procedure as with the model NX570X to repair the
power jack. thanks waiting for your reply
December 26th, 2008 at 5:06 am
Thanks!!
Had a go and took it apart.I solderd the connector out and it looks like i buggerd the whole thing up.
What can i do with this pile of scrap now any ideas??.
I was thinking i could convert it into a smart toaster???
Thanks again Doc!!
December 18th, 2008 at 6:49 pm
Thank you!!!
I have same laptop with exactly same problem!
Took it apart, reattached the power socket and it’s back to normal now.
Sam
December 15th, 2008 at 12:30 pm
Today I tried to install a generic copy of Windows XP Professional on this Gateway NX570X laptop and I got an error during the installation process.
The Windows installation was interrupted with the following message:
Setup did not find any hard disk drives installed in your computer. Blah, blah, blah…
The hard drive was installed and I even tried another one, but without any luck. Still the same error message.
After some research I found the problem, thanks to this site.You are getting this error message because the laptop is missing driver for the SATA hard drive. You have to load the SATA driver by pressing F6 right at the beginning of the installation process.
Here’s step-by-step walk through instructions:
1. Go to Gateway website and navigate to support and downloads.
2. Select HDD downloads.
3. Download driver for SATA hard drive. In my case I had to download file: D00455-001-001.exe
4. Unzip the file and press on F6flpy32.exe to create a floppy disk with SATA drivers. Follow instructions in the read me file.
In order to install SATA driver you’ll need and external USB floppy drive.
1. Connect the USB drive with the created floppy disk to the laptop.
2. Restart the laptop and start installing Windows XP.
3. Right at the beginning it will ask if you want to load additional SATA driver and you can do so by pressing F6.
4. Navigate to the driver mentioned in the read me file and load the driver.
Now you can install a generic copy of Windows XP on your Gateway NX570X laptop.
I guess you don’t have to go through this procedure if you use the original recovery disc because the SATA driver is preloaded.