Comments on: How To Deal With Spilled Coffee or Coke on Your Macbook

By: How To Quickly Fix A Phone or MP3 Player With Water Damage | Beyond Tech - Technology Ahead Of Your Imagination

Sun, 22 Nov 2009 19:34:12 +0000

[...] This is a quick fix to a problem almost everyone will have at some stage. For more of my articles relating to cell phones – see my authors page. Or what if you got your Mac computer wet? Make sure to check out Jackson’s article on how to deal with spilled coffee or coke on your Macbook. [...]

By: Ling

Ling — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 14:39:23 +0000

Thanks so much for the comments. What I did was go to the Apple store anyway, sent my macbook pro in for a repair without saying why or how my trackpad stopped working. And of course, prayed HARD.

THEY WERE AMAZING ABOUT IT!

I got my laptop back a few days later, with a new trackpad, i think they replaced my keyboard as well (because there were a few tiny blobs of superglue on 2 or 3 keys, also they replaced my on/off button because there was a tiny dent there before.

Good on Apple for picking out the smallest details! I didn’t even realise it was back in perfect condition until 2 days after I had my mac back safe with me

By: How To Quickly Fix A Phone or MP3 Player With Water Damage | EMDMA

How To Quickly Fix A Phone or MP3 Player With Water Damage | EMDMA — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 08:22:22 +0000

By: Online Business Management Software and Services » Blog Archive » How To Quickly Fix A Phone or MP3 Player With Water Damage

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 23:11:05 +0000

By: Anders Frost

Anders Frost — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 17:14:55 +0000

If your computer dies and it is filled with various liquids, then pour Cuisine alcohol through it. It cleans it and then evaporates. Tracks from the accident have been removed.
Then go to the store and complain and try to get it replaced

It worked for one of my friends

By: Anders Frost

Anders Frost — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 17:09:42 +0000

Having spilled coffee twice in my MBP unibody and working as a technician I speak of experience.

I’m sorry I have not read all of the reply’s. But the way it have been descriped here sounds like it is importent to work slow. That is not the case.

The proces has to be.
Shut it down, pull the plug, turn it around, with the keybord facing directly downwords. Take out the battery. Do it fast!
Open the casing an find a cloth and use Cuisine alcohol to clean it. Unlike water it evaporates and therefore do not damage electronics.

This should hopefully make sure, that you stop the liquid, before it get’s to deep into the computer, so you’ll be able to skip most of above suggestions for repair

By: Ling

Ling — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 12:34:35 +0000

I spilled a bit of water on my macbook pro 15″ 2 hrs ago but it was maximum 3 DROPS!!! as it was just a case of wet hands after washing them.

My clicker became a bit dodgy whilst typing up and assignment but I could still right click. After about 5 mins the clicker didn’t work anymore. HELP??

There’s an Apple centre just down the road from me so I’m thinking of bringing it there tmr. Just wondering if little drops could tell technicians there was a minor MINOR spill?

By: Ray Butarbutar

Ray Butarbutar — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 19:44:22 +0000

Hi Jackson! Thank you so much for your website.
I did these things intuitively (thank god!) and visited your site after the fact. Being a VERY clumsy person, i spilled wine on my laptop. But then right away i disconnected the power and started to dab & dry with a blow drier. I managed to get everything working as usual (Whew)…but there is a few hiccups here and there. #1) my screen wouldn’t adjust brightness even though the transparent box shows up when i press the F1/F2 keys (it tells me that i’m adjusting the brightness, but nothing is actually happening) and #2) when starting up or when i wake it up from sleep, there are these lumpy gray areas on the bottom of my screen…but oddly it disappears after 1-2 seconds. Do you have advice to fix these problems.
Thank you so much!!

By: Jackson Chung

Jackson Chung — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 14:57:31 +0000

All the best, Frank. Hope you’ll manage to fix it…

By: Jackson Chung

Jackson Chung — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 14:39:03 +0000

Yikes, DIY repairs are not for the faint-hearted and a lot of research is required before attempting to disassemble your Mac. If you’re not up for it then I suggest getting it professionally repaired. HOWEVER, if you’re still up for it, then a little isopropyl will get the cola right off.

By: frank

frank — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 19:19:20 +0000

hi Kate

I’ve just had an incident with a glass of cranberry juice and my MacBook – I don’t suppose you have that guys number please?

frank (almost in tears)

By: Kate

Kate — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 15:50:25 +0000

Hi,

24 hours ago I spilled a giant mug of delicious sweet coffee right into my brand new 13 inch MacBook which I am using right now. It was so bad coffee was coming out of the back vents. I turned it off, took the battery out and tried to drain it, before taking it to the London Regeants St Apple store who said I could have an appointment at the Genius Bar in 4 days and it would likely take 2-3 weeks for repair, if possible. I work from home and realised that it needed to be looked at straight away to avoid more damage so rang an independent repairer who allowed me to drop it off at his home after hours so he could start drying it straight away. I picked it up at 11am the today, clean as a whistle and working perfectly. The guy said the longer I had waited the more damage would have happened. The repair cost me £199 (as there were small parts which needed replacing) but was definitely worth it as he said there was even coffee behind the screen (and I will get the money back from insurance). The best thing I can suggest is just take it somewhere ASAP and leave it in more capable hands than your own. Cheers!

By: Mark

Mark — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 16:14:26 +0000

I spilt some cola in the top right corner of my unibody macbook. It’s still working but the eject, delete and “\” keys are all pretty sticky. I tried to search around for what to do and everything I saw online said to take the keys off. I tried and unfortunately, even though I carefully watched 2 or 3 tutorials on how to remove the keys properly, the first time I tried I broke my “\” key. A little piece of plastic flew off which came from the scissor mechanism under the key itself and after replacing the key back into the topcase it’s quite wobbly and unsturdy, not to mention still sticky. I really don’t want to fork over the money to have it fixed, I thought that I could do it myself and be able to laugh in Apple’s money covered face, but now I don’t know what to do. Any ideas?

By: Jasmine

Jasmine — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 03:57:51 +0000

I’VE GOT WATER INTO MY MONITOR – basically my macbook pro was submerged in some water in my bag for around 30 seconds before I even realized. It’s good that I had at least a plastic cover on and the battery was removed, or else it would have been fried immediately. I removed the plastic covers, wiped it down, and because I wasn’t really using my head, I switched it on real quick to see if there’s anything wrong with it (after putting the battery in) and I see these HUGE WATER MARKS inside my monitor. The lights of the monitors kept on flashing. The water is INSIDE my screen. However for the few seconds it was on it seemed that the hardware itself isn’t affected since there was no freezing or anything. Right now i’m just letting it dry by itself after aiming the hairdryer at it for around five hours. Should I turn on to check again tomorrow or bring it directly to Apple after Columbus Day?

By: Tyler

Tyler — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 00:29:50 +0000

I had the exact same issue, with spilt coffee. All I did was semi close the book till it looked like a V then turned it upside down and let the liquid run out. The keys are a little sticky but it works fine!

By: Jackson Chung

Jackson Chung — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 17:22:41 +0000

Hi Kaitlyn,

No worries, I’m glad that you fixed your Mac

By: Kaitlyn

Kaitlyn — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 16:56:18 +0000

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU. I am a 20 year old girl with absolutely no clue about things when my computer acts up. I googled “coffee macbook spill” as soon as i spilled coffee all over my keyboard. this was the third option that showed up, and it completely worked!!! i went from tears to smiles. i can’t believe i was able to fix it myself. thannnnkyouuuuu!!!

By: pdave

pdave — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 20:46:45 +0000

The same thing just happened to me (with water though), and now my keys are lit up the same way, in that V shaped position. Have you figured anything out? I am trying to decide whether I should take it to the Apple Store, because I am under Apple Care, but I am afraid I’ll get denied because of the submersion detectors. I’d love to hear what you did.

By: Brah

Brah — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 16:54:13 +0000

I’m not sure if this would make a difference but I had cream in my coffee with made it thick and possibly why it was easier to soak up, time will tell..

By: BRah

BRah — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 16:45:33 +0000

I just accidentally spilled my coffee on my MacBook but I believe I was lucky because the spill partially occurred on the right as it wasn’t a full spill. After it spilled I grabbed my shirt on the ground soaking up the coffee right away then grabbed a hair dryer and drying it on a cool setting. After I took a small flash light for a closer inspection and it seems the coffee never had a chance to leak under the keyboard into the motherboard.

I was able to tell this because of the dust between the keys was untouched, so I believe I was very lucky with a lesson learned..

By: ken

ken — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 16:22:42 +0000

I had the same incident as my 100plus spilled into my macbook. After removal of my battery, I found that there was some burn mark and some sort of green stuff stick with the battery connector of macbook. Is the burn mark and green stuff cause by the water spilled? or possibly overheat of macbook before the water spilled incident.

By: Eric

Eric — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 10:02:38 +0000

Hey Nik,
I had a similar problem: a small coffee spill on the left side of my macbook keyboard led to my battery not being recognized. I have since gotten it working again, and though I can’t guarantee it will work for you, it’s worth a shot. This is what I did:
1. I turned the machine upside down, let the coffee drain out.
—-after letting it dry for a day, I powered it up. It worked fine with the a/c adapter, but couldn’t recognize the battery—-
2. I opened the computer up. I realize now that there was no need to let it dry out, because any liquid on the board will lead to corrosion. It needs to be cleaned out first!
3. I noticed that I didn’t have any coffee on the logic board itself, since no dust was disturbed on it. But I found a crust on the battery connector, where it connects to the logic board.
4. I unscrewed and unplugged the battery connector, and removed it from the logic board. Then, with an old toothbrush and some 91% isopropyl alcohol, I scrubbed off the crust on all the pieces. This corrosive crust was probably causing a short, and thus preventing the macbook from recognizing the battery.
5. After cleaning the keyboard as best as I could, I reassembled it. Voila! The macbook once again recognized the battery!

This website provides a step-by-step guide to accessing and removing the battery connector. You can also buy a replacement battery connector if yours is no longer functioning.
http://www.ifixit.com/Guide/Repair/MacBook-Core-2-Duo-Battery-Connector/525/5

By: PIF

PIF — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 22:50:03 +0000

On a related note, today I managed to accidently spill a small amount of vinegar on my keyboard (MacBook Pro 15 inch).

All seems well in terms of function, but what alarms me is that now the presumed affected keys (specifically f,b,v,r) are visibly brighter, more radiant, even, than the rest of the keys.

Is this the spill sensor? Is there a way to make this even…turn off the brightness???

Furthermore, it seems ironic that the affected keys would be brighter and essentially better suited for low-lit environments than the others. :/

By: Jackson Chung

Jackson Chung — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 22:58:18 +0000

I highly suggest that you send it to an Apple Store. Spillages are never covered by warranty so you may have to fork out a reasonable sum of money to get it repaired. But at least you have an option. Sounds like the PMU is fried.

By: nik

nik — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 07:23:33 +0000

just spilled half cup of coffee to my macbook, dry it out with hairdryer, and now it seems working, however seems like the battery is not recognized. there is x black symbol and and @about this mac there is no battery recognized by system, im afaid to burn the logic board….any suggestions?

By: Jackson Chung

Jackson Chung — Sat, 20 Jun 2009 17:06:36 +0000

If it is working, then I don’t see any reason to disassemble it, apart from cleaning any crusts of sugar that may be coating the components — which may cause your laptop to heat up because the heat dissipation will be screwed up.

Regarding your keyboard, try removing and cleaning the keys in warm, soapy water.

By: Gabrielle Ferrari

Gabrielle Ferrari — Sat, 20 Jun 2009 16:13:10 +0000

What if your computer has dried out for a few days and all appears to be working?
mine is except to left and right arrow keys don’t work. Should I still disassemble and try to clean it up?
The coffee will have dried by now, but is it worth it to go in anyway?

By: Felipe

Felipe — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 09:26:29 +0000

Hi…on a related issue…perhaphs someone could comment on a predicament we have here (perhaps diagnosing a problem)…a friend of mine just fried the screen of his iBook G4. He spilt a little wine on the screen itself; thankfully for him, he had a spare LCD monitor around and surprisingly, upon connecting it to the laptop, he’s getting video out just fine…so apparently the issue is the laptop’s screen. Now here’s the catch: we are expats posted in India. We don’t even want to bother checking with Apple India since they’ll charge an arm and a leg to fix the problem. I spent a little time on Ebay and we stumbled upon all these people selling parts out of Hong Kong. We would appreciate if someone could comment on what parts we might want to order/replace. Thanks!!

By: February Roundup : Make Use Of Authors | MakeUseOf.com

February Roundup : Make Use Of Authors | MakeUseOf.com — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 18:16:35 +0000

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By: David Collins

David Collins — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 17:11:14 +0000

You were misreading it. The breaking into multiple pieces only refers to damage from an impact. It doesn’t refer to what the service technician will have to do while repairing your laptop. Most laptop repairs require the system to be taken apart into multiple pieces.

It’s a minor mistake, though, since extensive liquid damage almost always ends up costing more to repair than the computer is worth. Better to do it yourself like you did.