Is it cheaper to repair to replace my laptop?

We get asked ‘Is it cheaper to repair or replace my laptop?’ daily at Manchester PC. But the answer is not straightforward because we have to consider so many different factors before providing you with the most suitable solution. 

In this article, I will share my thought process in deciding if the repair of your laptop will be a cheaper option than buying a new one. First, I will start by asking you a few simples questions:

#1 The make and model number of your laptop

The make model number is essential to me because I can use this information to find the full specification of your laptop. Such as the CPU, the amount of memory, whether it has a hard drive or SSD installed, whether it has a touchscreen or a standard type of screen, etc. 

The most common laptop brands are Asus, Acer, MSI, Apple, Microsoft, Dell, Lenovo, and Toshiba. The make of the laptop will tell me if your laptop is easy or difficult to repair. Some of the largest laptop manufacturers don’t want their laptops repaired. Because they would rather you purchase a new one as this is how they make their money. For example, some Microsoft Surface laptops are nearly impossible to repair, which seems crazy when all you need is a replacement screen, battery, or keyboard. However, you will only find this out when the problem occurs and not when you purchase. On the other hand, I have found Dell and Lenovo to be good solid laptops and easy to work with.

Another problem with modern laptops is that many don’t have any upgradable parts. For example, newer Apple MacBooks no longer have removable SSDs or memory. If you purchased a MacBook with 250GB SSD and 8GB of RAM, but a few months down the line, you realise that you need more space or ram, the only option open to you is to buy a replacement MacBook. In my opinion, such irresponsible design it’s not good for the consumer or the environment. Other laptop manufacturers have followed in Apple’s footsteps. But I think this trend will change over the coming years as consumers turn toward more ethical brands. 

#2 Did your laptop do what you needed it to do?

If your laptop doesn’t do what you needed it to do, I wouldn’t recommend you proceed with the repair. This would be a perfect time to start searching for a laptop that meets all or most of your requirements. Because even after we repair your laptop, you will still not be happy, which is not the outcome I would like for you. 

For a laptop repair service to function, we must be ethical and honest about the result. However, the answer to “did your laptop do what you needed it to do?” is not always black and white.

For example, maybe your laptop was slow, the battery was no longer holding the charger, or even you couldn’t open certain programs due to a lack of storage or memory. I can resolve most of these problems with SSD or RAM Upgrade and battery replacement. But only if your laptop is one of the upgradable models. 

If your laptop has a mechanical hard drive, then a 15 times faster SSD is all you need to make your laptop super fast. You may be surprised that some new laptops still come with a hard drive, which is crazy, as they are so slow compared to an SSD but do cut on the costs for the manufacturer hence why they still install them. 

If I can find a solution to why you don’t like your laptop, we can proceed to the next question. But you may be happy with your laptop already, in which case we can proceed without any further discussion.  

#3 What is the problem with your laptop?

I have left this question to last because it’s the most time-consuming part of deciding if you should buy a new laptop or repair it. It can take over 20 minutes from receiving the laptop repair request to issuing a quote. For this reason, I leave this question to last to maximise our productivity so that we can provide you with the best possible and most cost-effective laptop repair in Manchester. 

Once I have all the information about your problem, I will determine if it will be cost-effective to repair your laptop. In most cases, the answer will be yes, as it’s very rare for the repair to outweigh the cost of purchasing a new laptop. I will find the value of a brand new laptop of similar specification and use this information to decide if your laptop is worth repairing. I don’t use second-hand or used laptops for valuation purposes because you just don’t know what you are getting. Replacing a bad apple with another bad apple doesn’t resolve your problem. 

At Manchester PC, we only carry out quality laptop repairs and don’t cut corners. Our goal is to fix all the big and little problems we find during our initial investigation. We charge a set fee for our laptop repair service, so you will not pay extra for our time and experience if we have to replace or repair something, not on the initial quote. However, you will need to pay for any extra parts, which you will need to approve first. 

Unlike many of our competitors, we will not turn a blind eye to any problem we find. We will be honest with you and repair the issue as part of the service if no parts are required. If parts are needed, we will explain why you should pay a little extra to fix the problem. We do this because I don’t want your laptop to fail within a few months of the repair, as this would not be a good experience for you, and you may never have another laptop repaired in the future. Also, some problems are interlinked. For example, your laptop DC jack has failed. The replacement DC jack costs £12.99; however, we find that the DC jack holder has snapped off on examing your laptop. We can install a new DC jack add a little super glue, and you will be none the wiser. However, the DC jack will likely fail again in a few weeks or months. I don’t want this to happen to you. For this reason, we will inform you that you also need the upper chassis replaced. The little extra you pay now will ensure you protect yourself from future problems and unnecessary costs. 

Liquid damage is the hardest laptop problem to resolve cost-effectively. Some companies offer liquid damage laptop motherboard repair. However, you have to be careful about paying for this service. Because you first need to know the full extent of the damage. 

Liquid damage is the hardest laptop problem to resolve cost-effectively. Some companies offer liquid damage laptop motherboard repair. However, you have to be careful about paying for this service. Because you first need to know the full extent of the damage. I have tested a few of these services and found that they may repair the motherboard but not the keyboard, battery, or touchpad, even though these parts also showed signs of liquid damage. My view is that the repair has to be complete to be successful. 

If your laptop has suffered liquid damage, we will need to know how the laptop came into contact with the liquid. If you spilled the liquid over the laptop’s keyboard, we would look to replace the keyboard as a minimum because the liquid will create permanent damage to the keyboard’s circuit. The waterproof keyboard membrane will stop the liquid from reaching the laptop’s motherboard if you are lucky. But we can’t know this until we open the laptop and put the motherboard under a microscope. Therefore, we can’t tell you if it’s worth repairing your laptop until we take a closer look.  

#4 Is it cheaper to repair to replace my laptop?

Yes, if your laptop was manufactured by a repair-friendly brand such as Asus, Acer, Dell, Lenovo, HP, MSI, MacBook (limited), etc., and meets your current and future needs. Also, the problem is not too complex to resolve, and we can source the parts if any are required. Here is a small list of the most common laptop problems we repair: The laptop casing is coming apart when opening the laptop, the laptop screen has cracked, the boot device is not found, not enough memory to open this program, laptops running slow due to old mechanical hard drive, failed laptop keyboard or certain keyboard keys are not working, damage to the outer casing, webcam not working, USB port(s) not working, laptop not charging due to broken dc jack, laptop overheating, laptop going into bios, laptop not botting, can’t find my wifi or can’t connect to wifi, can’t connect to the internet, battery not holding charger or not charging, the charger is not recognised by the laptop and so on. All of the problems I have mentioned here are generally cost-effective to repair. 

I would say ‘No’ if we cannot open your laptop due to its design and a perfect example of this is certain Microsoft laptops that are glued together. The only way to open them is to break the outer casing and, in return, create even more damage. Also, sometimes we can’t source the required parts as it’s very common with touchscreens, certain Clevo batteries, or even USB-C ports for HP laptops. 

Conclusion

At Manchester PC, we will gather all the information and present it to you to decide if it’s cheaper to repair your laptop or replace it with a new one. But the bottom line is if we email you a laptop repair quote, you can be assured that we have done our research and decided that your laptop is worth repairing. 

However, the final decision has to be made by you.