Water Damage

littlejp

Got caught in the rain yesterday with my laptop in my bag. It got fairly soaked. It powers on but the screen is damaged. There's a big blotch of colour on it.
Is this something that should repair itself given time?
Does anyone know a way to speed up the process?

Alanstrainor

Well. First off, i wouldn't have powered it on at all so soon after being soaked. I would have taken it apart and dried as much as possible and put it in the hot press for a few days.
As for the damage to the screen, i would guess that it's not something that's just going to disappear. But i would give it a few days powered off and see. Also it's worth keeping in mind that water damage can only show it's ugly head after a few days, even if things appeared to be working initially, it could all go belly up.
I'd wait it out.

Solitaire

If you think you're about to get soaked and don't have a waterproof satchel for it please take the battery out of the laptop before walking into our typically Irish monsoons. Then leave the unit in a hot press for a good while before even thinking of putting the battery (or mains!) back in

=================

Off the top of my head that laptop sounds like the screen was faulty and water managed to infiltrate it and/or condense inside it. Once you applied power to the panel without drying it out first the contacts of the transistors in the pixels were shorted by the water and blew out a section of the panel, inflicting irreversible damage. I could be wrong but I can't think of any other way you could get irregular blotches of colour in the crystal - a damaged GPU or panel controller would typically manifest in straight horizontal or vertical bands of colour.

Overheal

Irish Monsoons... lol

You guys in fairness have never seen Rain. I mean, like, 2 inches in an hour kind of Florida Thunderstorm Rain.

How exactly did the laptop get water in it? What way was it positioned in the bag?

littlejp

It was in a sleeve but the sleeve was open. And the top of my bag wasn't sealed properly. Would have been in line with my back...
It was feckin sunny when I left!