3 Jun
2006
3 Jun
'06
3:02 p.m.
Not that I ever screwed around with SMD, but yeah,
troubleshooting is what
takes the time. Too bad it was such a PITA when I repaired things for a
living to get the customers to understand that sometimes...
Agreed. I once very nearly submitted a bill which read :
2N3904 transisotr : \pounds 0.10
Knowing how to find the fault, and discovring which transistor to
replace : \pounds 49.90
FWIW, this was on a very rare prototype HP calculator (not mine!), and
the owner was very happy to have a non-original part fitted if it meant
he could try programming it. Of course there was no service data
available then, not even a schenatic [1], but one of the more normal
production machines was similar enough to be a great help
[1] There is one now, but you have to put up with having it as jpeg files...
In general, at least on classic computer repairs, the components are the
cheap part.
-tony