
UPDATE:
well, this past monday the laptop was put back together after an attempted repair. remaining after the reassembly was 6 screws and a small unidentifiable metal peice. after a brief test it seems the repair and the hours (literally) of putting it back together were in vain. my laptop is h-i-s-t-o-r-y. the good news is i have ordered an adapter to (hopefully) pull all my files off of my hard drive. the bad news? because of other expenses right now, there will be no new computer -- laptop or desktop -- in my future. :( so goes my life...