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In this guide I’ll explain how to take apart an Acer Aspire 5100 laptop. I’ll show how to remove and replace major laptop components such as CD/DVD drive, memory, hard drive, wireless card, cooling fan and keyboard.
In the next article I’ll explain how to remove LCD screen and replace inverter board.
First of all, make sure the laptop is turned off, the power adapter is disconnected and the battery is removed.
Both memory modules, wireless card, cooling and and hard drive can be accessed from the bottom. Remove four screws marked with red circles and loosen two screws marked with green circles. Remove both covers.
You can search for Acer Aspire 5100 spare parts here.
Find brand new replacement laptop batteries in stock and ready to ship your way.
Removing DVD drive:
1. Remove one screw (red circle) securing the drive.
2. Push the drive from the laptop with a flathead screwdriver.
3. Pull the drive form the laptop.
Removing hard drive:
1. Pull the hard drive to the right side until it’s disconnected from the motherboard.
2. Lift up the hard drive.
If you are replacing the hard drive with a new one, you’ll have to transfer the mounting bracket to a new drive.
My laptop had a 80GB 5400RPM SATA hard drive installed. You can upgrade it to a larger and faster SATA drive.
100GB, 120GB, 160GB and 250GB SATA drives should work just fine in this laptop.
Removing laptop memory:
1. Carefully spread latches on both sides of the memory module until it pops up at a 30 degree angle.
2. Pull the memory module by the edges.
Acer Aspire 5100 has two memory slots. You can install up to 4GB RAM total. Up to 2GB memory module into each slot. You should use PC2-533 DDR2-667MHz 200pin SODIMM RAM modules.
Removing wireless card:
1. Disconnect both antenna cables. Grab the antenna cable connector with your fingers and unsnap it from the connector on the wireless card.
2. Spread latches on both sides of the wireless card same way as you did with RAM modules.
3. When the wireless card pops up at a 30 degree angle, pull it from the slot by the edges. Remove wireless card.
Removing cooling fan:
1. Remove two screws securing the fan.
2. Carefully disconnect fan cable from the motherboard.
3. Lift up and remove the fan.
My laptop had a lot of dust trapped between the fan and heatsink. This dust buildup kills normal airflow inside the cooling module and causes laptop overheating. You can blow off dust using canned air.
Here’s how you can replace thermal paste between the heatsink and CPU.
Removing laptop keyboard.
In the following steps I’ll explain how to disconnect and remove the keyboard.
1. Lift up the keyboard bezel with a flathead screwdriver as it shown on the picture below.
2. Remove keyboard bezel.
3. Remove two screws securing the keyboard.
4. Carefully lift up the keyboard, it’s still attached to the motherboard.
5. The keyboard is connected to the motherboard via a flat ribbon cable. Before you can remove the keyboard, you’ll have to unlock the connector and release the cable.
6. Carefully move the black tab about 1-2 millimeters up with your fingernails as it shown on the picture below.
DO NOT SEPARATE THIS TAB FROM THE CONNECTOR, IT HAS TO STAY ATTACHED TO THE CONNECTOR.
If you break the keyboard connector, you’ll have to replace the whole motherboard. Be careful.
7. Now you can release the cable and remove the keyboard.
July 7th, 2011 at 5:24 am
i have a Acer 5100 Turion that will not boot, no post, but does power on…. that’s it though. i removed drive, memory, battery… still can’t get it to get into error. no beeps are heard after initial power on either.
anything else to try?
July 6th, 2011 at 4:32 pm
Gee whiz, and I thghout this would be hard to find out.
July 5th, 2011 at 9:08 am
My Acer Aspire 5102 keyboard and mouse won’t function. Help? I have tried everything and only the power button works. USB keyboard and mouse don’t work either. I can’t boot into anything else and can’t use BIOS
July 2nd, 2011 at 12:24 pm
Hi
Issue – No Sound (Acer 5103 WLMi)
No entry in the Sounds and Audio Devices Properties/Audio/ Sound Playback Default Device
Any clues?
Thanks
June 27th, 2011 at 2:24 pm
Hi guys , i have a problem here …
my laptop after iniciate , i start to ear some music and suddently it stops and the speakers start to make really bad noises , 1 minute later the computer keyboard doesnt work and on the screen it apears a blue image….
Can some1 help?
June 13th, 2011 at 11:07 am
If you are having start up issues and going to BIOS to reset settings does nothing and you wind up with the same DOS screen try to remove the hard drive , becareful with the pins, and wipe the connections with a cleaning solvent, not water based, reinstall hard drive , watch the pins, make sure the connections are lined up, screw cover back . reboot, for some reason this model has a loose hard drive connection so repeated dropping or jarring of the lptp will cause this problem.
June 13th, 2011 at 2:36 am
Hi there
Thanks for providing the info here, it really helped me when my Acer as5103 was overheating.
Are you able to help me with an issue regarding the ‘clickability’ of my left mouse button? It works (so assume all s/f is ok) however it becoming more difficult to get it to respond when clicked, sometime i have to click 3-4-5 times (pushing very hard) before it responds.
I’m guessing the components have worn out (it’s 4 yrs old) and need replacing. Would you be able to provide instructions as to how I might be able to do it and also what replacement component I need to buy?
Thanks
June 5th, 2011 at 9:18 pm
I found a 4gb DDR2 soDIMM memory chip and I was wondering if it would work for the aspire 5110 http://www.memoryc.com/computermemory/ddr2sodimm/4gbgskillpc25300sqseriessingle.html
May 30th, 2011 at 8:41 pm
@ Rob,
This could be heat related issue.
Maybe you forgot to plug in the cooling fan or forgot to apply thermal grease on the CPU.
The laptop starts and runs fine until the CPU gets too hot. After that the laptop shuts down. It will not turn on right away because the CPU is still hot. It will turn on later again when the CPU cools down.
Check the cooling fan. Make sure there is thermal grease between the CPU and heat sink.
May 30th, 2011 at 7:31 pm
I took my acer apart recently to fix a motherboard problem, it seemed to run fine, but after it was on for a while, it suddenly switched off. The battery charging light even went off. And it refused to turn back on. If I plug it back in, the charging light comes on, then I press the power button and the power light would flicker for a split second, then nothing, and the charge light would go off again. I thought she was done for, but after a few minutes, it powered back on again fine. This doesn’t seem good, and I assume its not a problem that is just going to go away. Do you have any idea what this may be?