Hello please reply by e-mail I hope you can help me. I have been in the computer tech business for about 10 years. I have just recived my first complaint. The customers computer has a system battery that is verry old. It has leaked onto the motherboard causing many errors. On the outside of the barrell battery their is now a white fuzz building up. This indicates to me that the battery has sufferd from old age. The customer says that we did the dammage to his motherboard not the system battery or old age. What I need is documentation about system battery problems and the causes. Can you point me in the right direction? Please help send e-mail to Mike Oltedal Southern Vermont Computer Services navigate@sover.net

Its the battery, Tell him to sur you! He has to prove it was you, Not you that is was not!

Mike, How much damage is the customer claiming has occurred? If its just the motherboard that was damaged it's cheaper for your business to just replace it. The possible negative word of mouth from that dissappointed customer can cost many times more than the price of the motherboard. Just a thought. +Michael

Michael is right. Remind the customer what ANY battery will do over time. Then offer to replace his motherboard with another older motherboard that I'm sure you have laying around somewhere. Changing out a motherboard doesn't take long and keeping the customer's goodwill is more important than quibling over old motherboards. Find some old Packard Bell motherboard from that pile of junk in your back room and fix him up proper.

That doesn't happen often. I ran a 386DX-40 on which I had to put in the time at each boot for over a year. I'll bet the customer tried to recharge his dead battery. Also, if he has a sentimental attachment to that particular motherboard, you could probably clean the motherboard with alcohol. The problem is the electrolyte shorts components together, and if it is removed to the naked eye it is probably off electrically.

Put him a good used motherboard in. That is the best thing to do. The customer is always right, (of course they are not) but to keep yourself in good standing with the customer, put him another motherboard in. Like Preston said, I'm sure you have some old Junk motherboards around somewhere. I remember a while back buying a used PC with a month warranty on it. I had problems from day one with it booting up with a blinking cursor or not booting at all. Took it back the second day, & the people kept it all night & said it worked fine for them. Brought it back home, the same thing. After a series of telephone calls to the person who sold it to me, I took it to another Computer store who told me it was the motherboard. I had been a customer for over a year & was always satisified. Even though, the store I bought it from was bought out by another owner, thats when my problems occured. I was a good sport though, & did not talk ugly about them, but I never went into the store again. I wish they would have done right by me & just replaced the board instead of telling me nothing was wrong with it when clearly it was. Never the less yours is a different situation, but by replacing the board you would make the customer happy & keep his business.

The last time I had a battery do that I cleaned it with coke. The acid in coke did a nice job of cleaning the battery residue....... Crack kills but Coke cleans.