Notes made while repairing a Dell Inspiron XPS
Took apart a Dell Inspiron XPS (or Inspiron 9100), Model PP09L to replace a failed video card. Here are some things I found while doing it.
Never believe youself when you think the warranty has expired – check with the vendor. We were sure this one had gone, but Dell thinks not. Upshot? Free video card replacement and a tour of the internals for me!
The Dell Service Manual for this unit is quite good.
There are two removable fans and the small heat sinks through which they blow air clog thoroughly and easily. Probably they should be blown out and cleaned a few times a year.
Memory, wireless card, harddrive and fans are easy to remove, more or less. The F2 fan (the screw holes are labeled) has a third screw inside – heads up. Also, the F2 fan has the audio output jacks built into it – odd design.
The wireless (WLAN) card in this model is labeled “Broadcom BCM94306MPSG” and the Broadcom chip is labeled “Broadcom, BCM4306KFB, HT0415 30, 717973 M”. The large silver (shielding is silver) rectangle on the front is labeled “TW-0M4479-68240-465-7324” and also “Made in Taiwan, DW1350, REV A00”
If you have trouble with the hinge covers, try placing a dull flat screw driver in the vent like you would a chisel and lightly tapping it to jar the cover towards the back of the machine and it should easily pop open. BE GENTLE.
Getting the center hinge cover off is a bit tricky. When you have the lid closed, you want only to disengage the tabs in the back, not lift the cover. Then when you have the lid open all the way, Work the back edge of the cover off first and the front edge, nearest the keyboard, will lift free easily. Again, BE CARFUL, there’s a ribbon cable connecting the cover an main board.
The right keyboard screw was very difficult to remove for me. It appears to seat into a metal post rather than a plastic one as does the left screw.
The screws labeled “D” in the pictures in the section about removing the display assembly aren’t labeled “D” on this unit – but they’re pretty easy to find from the picture.
I like the pull tabs and cable connectors in this unit. They are strong, well placed and easily grasped.
Interesting, these units use heat pipes to draw the heat off the chips and move it the periphery of the case for discharge through heat sinks and fans.
The forth screw on the video card, in the back left corner, is very easy to miss. There’s a Torx screw in that position also that I mistook for the forth removal screw. That’s not it. Look down between the smaller, rear heatsink and the video card itself.
OK, here’s a good tip: don’t screw down the video card until you are sure the heat pipe and heat sink are laying well in their places – the pipe bends easily if you need to move it or the sink, but you’ll want to be able to pull the card out to do that bending and reshaping.
Putting the system back together was easy. All in all, I enjoyed working on this computer – it’s well designed and roomy, and Dell wrote a good service manual for it.
Thanks for the awesome notes Mike. I had been searching (in vane) for anything that would help me figure out the problem with the display in my XPS pp09l. I followed the steps to disassemble the XPS and was able to easily remove the video card (I agree, very well designed). I love my XPS but the video display went on it (best way to describe it is “pixelated”, lines and blocks in the rendered display). So I am assuming that I have to replace it. Could you tell me where you were able to acquire a replacement part Mike?
Thank you so much!