There was a customer who brought his computer in for some type of service. Probably a dead hard drive.... and probably because the hard drive was so caked in fuzzy, insulating tobacco tar that it over heated and died prematurely.
Inside? Tobacco bunnies all over the bottom of the case. Between the drives? Tobacco. The heat sink? It was one fuzzy blob of tobacco tar. The fan? It spun, though a bit slowly. The machine was clearly thermal-throttling to oblivion, but the user's only concern was the hard drive. There was only so much (little) extra that vacuuming it out would achieve.
This computer reeked of cancer. When it came in, somehow I got the job of "fixing" it. So I did. It was open for as little time as possible. I wore latex gloves whenever I had to go near it. It made the whole damn lab reek of a rank ash tray. Not wet -- that's a far more ashy smell -- not dry, but tar-ry.
Once I was done, I slid a tight-fitting trash bag down over the top. Partly to help seal in the smell. (Not a single person in the place complained of my suggestion, not the secretary who gave it back to him when he came to pick it up, not even the small business owner that had to deal with my antics. Unfortunately I wasn't present when he came to get it to have been able to give him the stank-eye.) Honestly, partly it was to provide a little bit easier of a disposal option for the customer: this computer was toxic, noxious waste, and it needed to be dropped into the nearest dumpster. Preferably triple-bagged. Whether or not it had all RoHS components, it was toxic waste.
You're not the only one to notice how smoking and cooling fans are a bad mix. Back before the pandemic, my lifetime-smoker sister came to me thinking that her laptop had a virus on it. We fire it up, and the fan is sounding like a jet taking off. I went through it and found no trace of malware. At this point, I opened it up, and found it was just choked with tobacco fuzz. After cleaning that out, the laptop ran a lot better, for some reason.
I'm just glad she didn't run a heavy-duty gaming rig in a high-airf
I remember cleaning out a computer similar to that and by the time I was done I had a nicotine high the likes of which I never experienced. Mind you, I don't smoke and never have so experiencing that high was truly something else.
Computer repair (Score:5, Interesting)
There was a customer who brought his computer in for some type of service. Probably a dead hard drive .... and probably because the hard drive was so caked in fuzzy, insulating tobacco tar that it over heated and died prematurely.
Inside? Tobacco bunnies all over the bottom of the case.
Between the drives? Tobacco.
The heat sink? It was one fuzzy blob of tobacco tar. The fan? It spun, though a bit slowly.
The machine was clearly thermal-throttling to oblivion, but the user's only concern was the hard drive. There was only so much (little) extra that vacuuming it out would achieve.
This computer reeked of cancer. When it came in, somehow I got the job of "fixing" it. So I did. It was open for as little time as possible. I wore latex gloves whenever I had to go near it. It made the whole damn lab reek of a rank ash tray. Not wet -- that's a far more ashy smell -- not dry, but tar-ry.
Once I was done, I slid a tight-fitting trash bag down over the top. Partly to help seal in the smell. (Not a single person in the place complained of my suggestion, not the secretary who gave it back to him when he came to pick it up, not even the small business owner that had to deal with my antics. Unfortunately I wasn't present when he came to get it to have been able to give him the stank-eye.) Honestly, partly it was to provide a little bit easier of a disposal option for the customer: this computer was toxic, noxious waste, and it needed to be dropped into the nearest dumpster. Preferably triple-bagged. Whether or not it had all RoHS components, it was toxic waste.
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You're not the only one to notice how smoking and cooling fans are a bad mix. Back before the pandemic, my lifetime-smoker sister came to me thinking that her laptop had a virus on it. We fire it up, and the fan is sounding like a jet taking off. I went through it and found no trace of malware. At this point, I opened it up, and found it was just choked with tobacco fuzz. After cleaning that out, the laptop ran a lot better, for some reason.
I'm just glad she didn't run a heavy-duty gaming rig in a high-airf
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I think my oldest daughter was about 10 when a friend offered to ship her old computer to us if we paid the $30 shipping.
My friend had *just* given up chain smoking . . .
There machine was at least as disgusting inside as you would suspect.
I made my daughter help me clean it. Not because I needed help, but for the lesson.
I can guarantee you that she has *never* considered letting a cigarette near her mouth . . . best $30 I ever spent.
Nearly 20 years later, she still cringes when I mention it . . .
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