Soda Spilt on Acer 3004WCLi? Warranty?

Ave,

I'm not sure what to do! My cat spilled soda on my ACER 3004WCLi. Although everything is working fine, about 6 - 8 keys on the right edge (Cursor keys, Pg Up, Pg Down, etc.) are very sticky. They are hard to press, sometimes stick down and don't come up. They are still working.

The notebook is still covered under Acer's 1 Year Warranty. It's about 6 months old.

My Question is, if I called up Acer for Repair/Replacement - Would they cover something like this under warranty? If not... what are my alternates?

Thanks!

When you said replace the keyboard... did you mean replacing the one which sits on the notebook? I didn't know it could be replaced! For that matter ... I didn't even know the keys could be snapped out & cleaned and snapped back in!

If I were to send it in for repair/replacement within warranty - I don't necessarily need to tell them what happened (Unless someone can confirm that liquid spill is covered) - but I'm assuming they would come to know what happened and deny warranty based on it.

Thanks.

Actually, I'm the kid who fixed everything that everyone else broke, so I'm not really mechanically challenged, so to speak. I think I'll get some details on this and give it a shot!

Gotta appreciate & thank you for all the advice. I'll let you know how it goes.

Totally Screwed!

I took off the keyboard - it was real easy. Just a few screws at the back, and two at the top.
Soaked Keyboard in water for a few minutes - took it out - dried off using Hair Dryer. Keyboard seemed absolutely dry. The keys were soft & looked working again! They pressed real easy again - like they did before the Soda Spill! Keyboard felt fixed!

I put the keyboard back in - hooked up the notebook.

Notebook turned on fine - the Keyboard Was Completely Dead! Not a single key working.
I check out the Cable that snaps from Keyboard to Notebook twice! Everything seems to be in place! Yet the keyboard is completely dead!

The rest of the notebook is working absolutely fine - no problems. Just the keyboard is completely dead!

But that is what everyone said to do!! It's all over this forum as well... do a search on Soda Spill! I was told to remove the keyboard and submerge the Keyboard alone in Water to get rid of the Sugar Deposits from the Soda Spill.

As a matter of fact...the Soda had spilled all over my keyboard, and gone inside the keyboard - yet the keyboard continued to work flawless - except the Keys were sticky & tight.

Don't tell me I wasn't supposed to submerge the keyboard in water!

I hear you - problem is - I was never the expert in this area, which is why i relied on people here & posts in this forum - and this is where I learnt about removing keyboard & soaking it in water to get rid of soda spills.

I was as amazed at the process as you may think - yet I believed what I read here, and curbed my personal instincts.

I'm pretty sure now that submerging it in water killed the keyboard.
I'm still under warranty - I think i'll send it in to Acer to get it fixed. There is no trace of Soda Spill now because all Sticky Keys & stuff is back to normal. I'll tell them the Keyboard died.

Sigh!

I'll call them up & see what happens.

Thanks.

Alright, just wanted to give you guys an update.
I started having some other issues with the notebook - like it wasn't turning on instantly - and sometimes the Cursor & Selection was acting up - and it felt like a key is continously pressed. Experiencing all of this, I decided to call Acer, they hooked me up for Service/Repair under my Warranty. Two days ago I shipped out my notebook to them. (It only cost $10 actually, via UPS).

Now i'm waiting to hear back from them. I've been assigned a case # and i'll be getting in touch with them soon to find out what's going on.

Thanks.

Ave,

I'm no expert, having busted my notebook - but I personally don't think that's what he's trying to say. I think what he's trying to say is that Some "Components", even though electrical in nature, may be able to survive water treatment effectively if properly subjected.

It's not as far fetched. Coming back to notebook keyboards, I guess if you really got down to Googling it, there's way too much testimony to it's water treatment working for it. I honestly believe now that I didn't let it dry completely - as a matter of fact - I don't think I allowed it to dry at all. I just blew some Hair Blower on it and put it back in after like 7 minutes of taking it out of the water.

Ave,

Just wanted to update you guys.

So I sent in my Notebook for repair to Acer. Called them up today to check the status and they told me that they identified Liquid Spill (Due to stains on the Motherboard) and since Liquid Spill is not covered under warranty, they will be charging $499 to repair the notebook. They explained they'll be replacing the motherboard ($300) and keyboard ($10) and the rest is Labor.

I told them the notebook costs $500 retail - why would I pay you $499 to fix it! They said that's what Customers usually do - they go out and buy a new one instead of paying $499 to fix it.

I told them to send the notebook back to me un-repaired. I purchased a replacement Keyboard from them, for which they charged me $20 ($10 plus Taxes & UPS Ground Shipping), which they are including with the return shipment of the Notebook.

So basically by the end of this week I should get my notebook back from them, un-repaired, and the replacement keyboard. Before I sent in the notebook, all that was wrong was the keyboard - so i'm hoping to replace the keyboard with the new keyboard and hopefully it should start working again. I don't think I have any more options left and that's about it with this notebook. I'll update here once i've replaced keyboard.

More then likely, i'll end up selling this notebook on eBay if the new keyboard works & the notebook starts working again. I've been looking at a Toshiba Sattelite P105-6197 notebook at newegg for $1349. I like that notebook and i'm probably going to buy it.

Well that's the update.