This guide will explain how to repair a failed or loose DC power jack on a laptop computer yourself. Here’s my previous post related to DC power jack related issues.
Disclaimer: I’ve made these instructions only for people experienced with soldering and repairing computers. If you don’t feel comfortable doing this job, please do not open the laptop or you can permanently damage your computer. Take your laptop to a professional repair shop instead.
Use this repair guide at your own risk. 
First of all, you’ll have to disassemble your laptop and remove the motherboard. Here you’ll find disassembly instructions for some major laptop brands such as IBM, Dell, HP, Compaq, Toshiba. If your laptop is not on the list, you’ll have to figure out yourself how to take it apart.
For this repair you’ll need the following tools.
1. Soldering iron or soldering station. I use Weller WES51 soldering station and for this job I set temperature to about 800-850°F.
2. I use high-tech rosin core silver-bearing solder from Radioshack with diameter 0.022″ ( Catalog #: 64-013 ). I think standard rosin core solder will work just fine.
3. Desoldering pump for removing solder around component leads. I use Edsyn Soldapullt pump, model DS 017.
4. 99% isopropyl alcohol and tooth brash for cleaning the motherboard from flux.
5. A new DC power jack, you can find a cheap one here.
Laptop DC power jack repair guide.
As you see on the following picture, the solder drop on the positive terminal looks different than on other three contacts. That’s where the problem is. The positive pin is not making a good contact with the motherboard and because of that power to the laptop cuts off when I move the power plug inside the power jack.
I’m going to desolder the power jack from the motherboard, clean contacts on both power jack and motherboard and then solder it back in place – this is the proper way fixing the power problem.
Start desoldering process with adding some new fresh solder to all three contacts. This will make old solder more flowable, easier to remove.
While heating one of the contacts, remove the solder from this contact using the desoldering pump. Repeat the same steps with all power jack contacts until you remove as much solder as possible.
Grab the power jack and carefully try removing it from the motherboard. Most likely you will not be able to remove the power jack the first time because there will be some solder bridges left between the contacts and traces on the motherboard. Carefully wiggle the power jack without applying any significant force and at the same time heat up all contacts one by one. This will help you to remove the power jack.
The DC power jack is almost removed from the motherboard.
Be careful. Inside the positive hole there is a copper sleeve witch connects the terminal on one side of the motherboard with the traces on the other side. If you are removing the power jack with force, you can pull the sleeve from the hole. You don’t want to do that.
UPDATE: If you accidentally removed the internal sleeve, check out this post: How to fortify damaged power jack connection.
So, do not apply any force and make sure the solder is melted when you are removing the power jack. I hope you understand what I’m talking about.
After the power jack is removed, clean all oxidized contacts with a knife.
Apply a fresh coat of solder to all contacts on the power jack.
The power jack terminals will look dirty because of melted flux.
You can remove the flux using the tooth brash and alcohol. It’s not necessary but it will make your job looking clean.
Apply a fresh coat of solder to all power jack terminals on both sides of the motherboard.
This side has been coated.
And this side has been coated too.
Now you can install the power jack back on the motherboard. Put something under power jack so there is no gap between the jack and the motherboard. Now you are ready to solder the jack back in place.
Solder all power jack pins.
The job is done and the laptop DC power jack is fixed. B-E-A-utiful!
Now just install the motherboard back into the laptop and you are done.
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September 5th, 2008 at 6:54 pm
Laptop Toshiba A30 would not charge while running and the battery was going dead in about a 1/4 of the usual time. Lights flickered when plugging in the power jack. Took it apart and re-soldered. Worked well for 2 days. Turned it off and left on power supply over night. Next morning the laptop would not boot. Press the power button and all sounds good for 4 seconds then the fans stop and it does not boot and the power light stays on but the hard drive light never flickers during this process. Then realized the power supply had burnt out. It must have been trying to boot from the battery. I believe the positive pin of the power connector must have eventually shorted thus burning out the power supply. I have two of these laptops so I tested the cpu, hardrive, in the good laptop and they worked fine. Took apart the laptop and could see an indication of a short next to the positive pin of the power connector. I believe the pin shorted on the corner of the silver grounding of the female video connector located on the M-board. So I now have a couple of questions.
1. Is the positive pin supposed to make contact on both sides if the M-board or only one side? If yes do you solder both sides?
2. Are there several layers of tracing on one side of the circuit board or is there just one on each side.
3. What other steps to trouble shoot can I do?
Clearly the positive trace on both the cpu and other side of the positive trace connector for the power input is still shorting to the ground on the video connector even though I have removed the power connector. Things are looking a little messy even with the great care taken. I am considering to take a sharp exacto knife to go around the area of the video connector corner where I believe the positive pin traces are shorting, to sever the short. I don’t believe there are any traces there but not positive.
Any feedback or comments from the pros would be greatly appreciated. (Toshiba A30)
Thanks in advance for your comments and help!
Stew Lockhart
September 4th, 2008 at 12:53 pm
Moa,
Here’s what you can try in order to troubleshoot the laptop. Disconnect the LCD screen cable from the motherboard. Minimize the laptop as much as you can. Remove hard drive, DVD drive, wireless card, unplug the keyboard.
In order to start any laptop you need only three parts: motherboard (I assume the video card is integrated), memory and CPU.
If the laptop still doing the same thing, most likely you have a problem with the motherboard.
Here are a HP Pavilion dv9000 laptop disassembly instructions if you need them: HP Pavilion dv9000 laptop. Removing hard drive, memory, wireless card, keyboard.
September 3rd, 2008 at 1:55 pm
gerald,
Your laptop shuts down because of overheating. You must keep the laptop on a flat surface. Apparently, there are cooling fan air intakes on the bottom of your laptop and when you keep it on the cushion, the air intakes are closed. Without air circulation inside the heatsink your laptop overheats and shuts down.
September 3rd, 2008 at 12:05 pm
Help! I have a Presario 2500. Once I’m in Windows XP the power shuts off at random. When trying to re-install XP the power keeps shutting off during the install process. There are times, where, I’m in XP desktop and the laptop is on a firm table, the computer will run for hours (with A/C power plugged in). Then, if I sit on the sofa with the laptop on the cusion, it shuts off in XP only after a few minutes. I ran a temperature program which only showed a yeelow flag warning on the hard drive at 56 degrees celcius. Sometimes I have to wiggle the A/C cord to get the laptop to come on. But I’m not totally convinced that the A/C power connector is totally at fault. Is there software that will check the memory, and hard drive? Is there software that will let the computer run without a windows enviroment? thnk you.
September 3rd, 2008 at 6:59 am
I’m also a repairer like you. An hp dv9000 laptop powers up with dead screen and after 20 sec again reset. This loop happens for ever untill I power off the system. Screen is dead. Does it belong to graphic chipset? I tried external monitor, again no screen. Only reset and reset after 20 sec.
August 25th, 2008 at 10:31 pm
Ann,
Make sure the jack is soldered properly. I cannot tell you what is wrong without looking at the laptop.
August 25th, 2008 at 10:25 pm
Jason,
No, it’s not necessary to clean contacts on the new jack, it’s ready to be soldered on the motherboard. You’ll have to clean contacts on the motherboard.
This tool will help you remove the old power jack.
August 23rd, 2008 at 8:23 pm
My power jack broke off so I replaced the jack and soldered it on firmly. Now the power only comes on if I hold the power adapter in firmly. Did I do something wrong?
August 20th, 2008 at 6:23 am
In this guide, you used / repaired the DC power jack that was originally from the laptop. Correct?
I am buying a new DC power jack, so I do not have to “clean all oxidized contacts with a knife” or “apply a fresh coat of solder to all contacts on the power jack”.
Also, I do not have a de-soldering pump, is this tool necessary?
August 17th, 2008 at 3:57 pm
I need help!!!! My notebook laptop won’t charge. I was told that it was the DC adapter. I don’t know anyone who knows or does this. Do you??? If so, what do you charge???