Symptom guides · Singapore
Laptop water damage: what to do in the first ten minutes
The most expensive sentence in this trade is "it dried out and it's fine". Here is the correct sequence, why rice makes things worse, and why the clock matters more than the spill.
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Do this now, in this order
- Hold the power button for ten seconds. Do not shut down through the menu — that takes thirty seconds of powered circuitry you cannot afford.
- Unplug the charger. Do not plug it back in "to test".
- Open the lid to about 120° and stand the machine tent-style, keyboard down, on a towel. Gravity is the only free tool you have.
- Do not press keys to see what still works. Every press pumps liquid deeper.
- Do not use rice. Do not use a hairdryer. Do not put it in the sun.
- Bring it to a workshop the same day. Today, not when it stops working.
Why the clock matters more than the spill
Water on a live circuit can short it, and sometimes does. But the fault that actually destroys laptops is electrochemical corrosion: dissolved ions plus a powered circuit means metal migrates off traces and pads. That process starts within minutes and continues for weeks, whether or not the machine appears to work.
This is why the classic pattern is a laptop that survives the spill, runs fine for five days, and then dies. The owner concludes the two events were unrelated. They were the same event, with a fuse burning in between.
Sugar makes it far worse. Plain water evaporates and leaves relatively little behind. Coffee with milk, soft drinks, juice and beer leave a hygroscopic, mildly acidic residue that pulls moisture out of Singapore's air indefinitely and never stops conducting.
Why rice does nothing useful
Rice is a mediocre desiccant that cannot reach inside a sealed board assembly, cannot remove residue, and cannot reverse corrosion that has already started. What it does reliably is buy time — the one thing you do not have — while starch dust settles into connectors. The same applies to hairdryers, which drive moisture further in and can warp plastics, and to sunlight, which cooks a lithium cell.
Nothing you can do at home removes ionic residue from a circuit board. That requires disassembly, an ultrasonic bath, and an isopropanol rinse.
Not sure what you are looking at? Ask a technician.
Send us the model and a two-line description of the symptom. You will get a probable diagnosis and an honest price band before you leave the house.
What a proper liquid-damage repair involves
Full disassembly. Battery disconnected before anything else. Every board and flex cable inspected under a stereo microscope at 20–40×, where corrosion, flux residue, lifted pads and cracked joints are visible and at arm's length are not.
Boards go through an ultrasonic bath in an appropriate cleaning solution, then isopropanol, then a controlled dry. Corroded pads are cleaned back to copper and re-tinned. Broken traces are jumpered with enamelled wire under the microscope. Shorted components — usually ceramic capacitors on a power rail — are removed and replaced. The board is then powered on a bench supply before it goes back into the chassis, and the assembled machine is soak-tested for at least 24 hours.
Keyboards are replaced at the end of that process, never at the start. A new keyboard fitted over a corroded board is a repair with a three-week shelf life. See liquid damage repair.
The honest odds, and the honest costs
Brought in the same day, a spilled laptop has a strong chance of full recovery. Brought in after a week of intermittent use, the odds drop sharply and the cost rises, because we are now repairing corrosion damage as well as the original short. After a month, we are frequently talking about data recovery rather than repair. This is not a sales technique. It is chemistry.
- Clean and inspection, no component damage — S$150 – 280, 2–3 days.
- Clean plus board-level component repair — S$250 – 550, 3–7 days.
- Keyboard replacement, after the board is clean — S$130 – 480.
- Data recovery from a corroded board — quoted after assessment.
Two things worth knowing afterwards
First, keep the machine off until it reaches a bench, even if it seems fine. A working liquid-damaged laptop is a laptop corroding under power. Second, on MacBooks with T2 or Apple silicon, and on Surface devices, the storage is soldered to the board and encrypted to it — so a spill that kills the board threatens the data too. On those machines we secure the data before we do anything irreversible, and you should insist that anyone else does the same.
Questions we get every week
Frequently asked questions
My laptop still works after a spill. Do I need to do anything?
Yes, urgently. Corrosion is progressive and it is happening now, under power. Machines that "seem fine" are the ones that arrive here two weeks later with a shorted power rail and a far bigger bill. Power it off and bring it in.
Does rice work for a wet laptop?
No. It cannot reach the board, cannot remove ionic residue, and cannot reverse corrosion. Its only reliable effect is to waste the days during which the damage is easiest and cheapest to undo.
How much does liquid damage repair cost in Singapore?
S$150–280 for a clean and inspection where nothing has failed; S$250–550 where components need board-level replacement. Nobody honest quotes a flat price before the board has been opened and inspected under a microscope.
Is water damage covered by warranty?
Manufacturer warranties almost never cover liquid ingress. Our own warranty covers the work we do and the parts we fit, but we cannot warrant against the continued progression of corrosion that was already underway when the machine reached us — and we say so in writing before we start.
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Get a written quote before a screw turns
Component-level diagnostics, a fixed price in writing, and no repair fee if we cannot fix it. Walk in Mon–Fri, or WhatsApp the workshop.