The Curse: A Relatable Story of Repair and Triumph

It's The Curse, right? The Curse has screwed me over before and has brought me some really crazy projects, but this time he's gone too far. Like, he struck my daily driver. I mean, I know it's happened before, but I've never had to physically tear the computer open before. Yeah, this time it's personal, Curse. You struck my daily driver on a hardware level. You will pay for that.

All right, now we're done with the 2., I think those are 2.3 millimeter screws, now we're on to the 3 millimeter screws for the remaining eight holes. Not too bad for a cheap Chain or tool, right? Made in Chain or. Oh, (chuckles) think I just scratched the aluminum there. Hopefully, I can buff that out. Frick on a stick. I mean, the bottom's already scratched up a bit anyway. I've used it for five years.

And there we go. Criss-cross applesauce, all the screws in place. Bon appa-tit, we are done. Hopefully this worked. Time to flip it over and then head rotate it, (chuckles) and, uh, boot it up, and, uh, hope it works. And while we're at it, you might as well give the screen a little cleaning. At least, you know, without any solution, like liquid solution. I have glass cleaner, like screen cleaner. I'm just not using it right now. I just thought I'd use the little cloth that came with the tools. Can't really fix the film coming off at the top though because that was an Apple defect. Good job, Apple. But, that's okay, I still kinda love you.

And, yeah, all pretty. Let's boot her up. (computer boot-up chime) All right, so we're at the desktop and I do have a little fan controller, as I showed you earlier. The issue doesn't seem to happen all the time, especially when you just turn the computer on or wake it up from sleep mode. It usually only happens once the fans start speeding up a bit. And this, (laughs) this towel is dusty. I'm gonna have to make sure that really gets washed.

Oh my gosh. It was a bloodbath of dust. I'm gonna invoke a higher fan speed and we're gonna see what happens. Let's just go full speed ahead. Okay, I'm not gonna lie, they sound a little different. I mean, I am also on a towel. That might be muffling the sound a little bit, but they sound a little different. Is that because the dust is off the fans? They now sound, like, better because there's no dust on the fans?

That actually changed the sound. I mean, it makes sense. Yeah, let's skip that for now. Go back to auto. Huh, so far, nothing. I don't wanna jinx it, but so far, nothing. I'm gonna let it sit for a bit. I'm gonna take this towel out from here and we'll give it another test. This time I'm gonna take my phone and just kinda lay the microphone, running voice memos, by the way, right over where the fan is so we can record the sound better and listen for any defects.

All right, so let's bump up the left. Bump up the right, and have a listen. (computer whirring) So far, so good. It's sounding better than it has in a long time, even before the buzzing issue. Like, it just sounds, sounds more like a jet. Like a (whooshing) instead of like a (growling). It sounds more like a (whooshing). You want your computer to (whooshing), not (growling), you know?

(notification bell dinging)(growling) bad, (whooshing) good. (whooshing) There, you learned something today. Yeah, it's sounding good. I also listened to the phone recording, just to get a more amplified sound. I don't hear anything bad. Well, I'll keep an ear on it and if something happens we'll probably replace the fan itself, but I'm calling this a win. I kinda didn't think that would work, just getting the dust out of there.

That was really fun and we made it snow. (laughs) Yeah, man, thanks for tagging along with me. I'm glad we got this fixed together because it was a little annoying and happy birthday to me. Yaaaa-aaaaaay. Hey, that's a good birthday present. Canned air. Thanks, Gino. Catch the crazy and pass it on.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: en- Okay, sorecently, kinda out of nowhere,my MacBook Pro startedmaking these lovely sounds.Have a listen.(computer fan buzzing)Yeah, that's pretty great, ain't it?I mean, I'm no rocket engineer,but I'm pretty sure that's the fan.So, we're gonna have to take a look at,take a look at what'sgoing on inside this thing.All right!(chuckles) I'm so excited.(sighs)(gadget beeps)(gadget beeps)(keyboard clicking)(futuristic techno music)All right, so I was gonna experimentwith smcFanControl quick,an app I have used before,and now I'm thinking, well,maybe that'll help the issue a little bit.I have no idea, so we're gonna try that.And, oh yeah, screw you frickin' MacUpdatewith your fake download buttons.Man, that stuff is just adisgrace to the tech community.I can't believe you would try to do thatand think that's okay.All right so, smcFanControl.So the hope is that I canjust maybe speed the fan upand then slow it down so the noise stops,'cause that is really annoying.And if this doesn't work,well, we're gonna have to take itinto the lair and try to fix it up.The Curse has struck on me again.Ooh, what is this?Alert!smcFanControl has not beentested on this machine yet.But it should run if youfollow the instructions.If you choose tocontinue, please make sureyou have not otherFanControl software running.Otherwise please quit, de-install,de-install, okay,the other software, restart your machine,yadda, yadda, yadda.Okay.We are currently spinning at zero RPM,oh there you go, it changed now.All right, 61 degrees Celsius.I am a dumb American anddon't understand that,so I gotta change that.I don't have the formulamemorized in my head.All righty, let's go to Fahrenheit.Save changes.Oh my gosh!How many times do I haveto type in my password?Okay, 142 degrees Fahrenheit, which,I'm no expert, but I don't thinkthat's actually too out of controlfor a computer with this much power in it,and considering how frickin' thin it is.It's also from 2013.So, yeah, I don't think that's terrible.It doesn't sound like the fans arekicking up any faster, and,like, it doesn't feelany warmer than normal,so even though it'smaking an annoying soundit doesn't feel any warmer than normaland the fans aren't kicking upany more than normal as well.So that's kind of a good sign. (chuckles)Oh boy.All right, so let'ssee, right now left sideis at 2603, right is at 2417.Now, is that, like, houseright, which should be here?Or is it stage right, which would be here?I don't know which one it means.Hopefully this one,'cause when you have itflipped upside down, thedirections are flipped.So I actually don't knowwhat it's referring to.I'll probably figure that out later,or one of you guys can tell me.You're smarter than me, probably. (laughs)Okay, so let's take a look here.So what I could do,I'll say the left side,actually I can control these individually?Really?Oh, well that will helpme actually figure outif it is the left orthe right, or whatever.Anyway, let's just go like,it's not a full pin it.Let's just go, like,halfway so we don't, like,explode anything.Okay, and we hit save.And, of course, gottatype in my password againbecause this is a overly worrisome system.Do you think, Macintosh,within the last five secondssome, like, thief gota hold of my computerand wants to turn my fans up?Ah, there's gotta be away to turn that off!I swear I did not have to do this before.Okay, I can't find a setting to disablethat frickin' authorization panel.Very obnoxious.I swear I never had to do that before.Okay, so this must not beworking because the settinghere is at 37 and we're getting 26.Ah, my gosh, I'm gonna punch you.I'm not doing anythingon purpose right now.But it looks like my theory isnot gonna be correct anyway.(chuckles) Oh boy, ohhhhh.It's just gonna bust off its bearingand burst through the aluminumand sever my neck.Oh yeah, we're getting really fast nowand I don't even have,like, this is set to the minimum.(groans) Gosh, it doesn't sound good.All right, so it looks likeI'm gonna have to remove this.Maybe I'll try a different utility.All right, let's, um,let's restart and thenwe're gonna try a different fan controllerand see what's up.And if this doesn't workI'm just gonna removethat fan controller andthen we're just gonna gointo the lair and rip this thing open.(laughs maniacally)Oh, I'm gonna need apentabular screwdriver.All right, off to Amazon.So here's what I'm gonna test next.Macs Fan Control, which should,that icon actually looks pretty spiffy.CrystalDEA, D-E-A?Like Drug Enforcement Agency?All right, didn't think theymade software, but okay.But see, now listen. (fan whirring)The fans are kicking back upand it's not making that sound.After it shut down and turnedback on it stopped buzzing.So what is the variable here as towhy it would buzz earlier,shut down, and now it's fine?Even though the fans areclearly spinning faster.Listen, right?But no buzz.Interesting. Well, I'm gonnawait for the buzz to come backand then I'm gonna tryout this application.Ah! (laughing)I jinxed it.There it is, right there.Let's see, move to applications.Would you like (mumbling),yeah, sure.Oh, gotta type in a password.Well, this is pretty spectacular.It has all the individualhardware components.Sensor-based value, constant RP, okay.Well, let's just crank it up.Ooh, there we go.(computer buzzing)Yup.Okay, so that is the right fan.All right, now we got that down.So it is house right, okay.Yup, it's still buzzing as you can hear.Let's bring it down to, like, 3800.(computer buzzing)Oh yeah.So adjusting the speedand bringing it back downain't gonna do jackshit.It's fine for, like, maybe 10 minutesand then it comes back.Oh, it's so annoying.I've had this computer for five yearsand I've never had a problem.That's, like, the first problem.Software problem, sure.Like, High Sierra, that was a bitch,but hardware issues, no, never.This is the first hardware anomalyI've ever had with this computer.Five years though, noissues, pretty good, right?Let's, uh, I don't knowwhat it was at before.Oh, just auto.Okay, whatever.Let's just crank this other one up.(computer whirring)That's cool, it's like stereo fans.(beat boxing)Yeah, okay, crank this one up.See, the buzzing is actually less annoyingwhen the white noise of bothfans at full blast are going.That's actually, itkinda, like, covers it up.That's not good enough for me though,so we're gonna have to takethis bad boy apart in the lair.Come and join me.♪ Ken ski-doo, we can too. ♪Okay, it took some doing, but I finallyfound some time to comedown to the laboratoryand take a look at thiscomputer on the inside.And by laboratory I meanthe government-assignedasylum that is 10 stories underground.But we won't get into that much right now.It involves too much lore.So, let's see, we gota little tool kit here,because these are pentabular screws.Yes, I didn't know what those were untilI owned an Apple product either.So we have some beautifulmade in China toolsthat are gonna help usde-pentabulize this computer.Ooh, Chinese plastic. (grunting)Hard to open up.(plastic ripping)Holy frick on a stick, Iam so glad those thingsdidn't go flying at, like,a thousand miles an hour.Too bad I don't have my knife down here.And just a reminder, youknow, this is in the littledisclaimer at the beginningof Krazy Ken episodes, butyou know, this is not adirectly educational series.This is not supposed tobe strictly educationalto teach you how to open this stuff up.These are tech video logs.This is me exploring stuff.I am not a repairman,I just play one on TV.Actually I don't even dothat, so I'm just hereto have some fun, experiment,and maybe fix some things.If you really wanna learnhow to fix computer shit,check this guy out.He's way smarter than me.Okay, so we have a helper stick, which,I am not kidding, that isactually what it's called.I looked it up(laughs) I was always wonderingwhat those things were called.We have the cloth-y cloth.And then some doo-dads with the, probably,pentabular bits on them.Phillips, pentabular.And a little screw case.So let's open this bad boy up.The main area we'regonna be concerned withis this proximity.This is the fan that is being naughty.And, to be honest, I don'treally expect major results.I don't wanna risk breakingstuff, so I don't knowhow much I'm actuallygoing to attempt to fixwith this thing.I'm trying to take a lookon the inside and seeif there's any small things I can do.If there's anything I'mnot comfortable with doing,well, if this was someone else's machineand I had permission,yes, I would experimentand possibly break things on the show.But since this is myown computer, (chuckles)that I paid for with my own moneyand have used to make manyof these tech video logsfor you guys, and, basically,I make my living with it,I am not going to risk breaking it.(chuckles) We're justgonna see what we can do.Actually, now that Irealize it, I probablyshould have done thecriss-cross applesauce methodfor unscrewing this, just like I should dowhen screwing it back in,so I will do that nextwhen I put it back together. (chuckles)I know there's some of these rules thatthey're really just rules.Like, oh, you should putthe screws in this wayand that way, but, to behonest, I don't know if,in the long run, it's goingto make a huge difference.I mean, this stuff is pretty solid.I don't think screwingthings in a different orderis really gonna screwstuff up, no pun intended.But, yeah, I mean, it's good to be safe.Just don't strip your screws, you know?So, yeah, I've neveropened this up before.This will be the first time ever.I've had this computer for five years,and this is the firsttime I had to open it up.The only time I've seen the, oh (bleep),the only time I've seenthe inside of it is whenit was going through a TSA x-ray thing.The x-ray showed, like, thebattery cells and stuff,which was really cool.That was awesome.Okay, so, again, this is thearea we're concerned with.Let's peek on the inside.Three, two, one.Let's try that again.Three, two, one.Maybe this is where I'm supposedto use the helper stick.Is there still a screw in here?No, they're all unscrewed.I have no idea if that helperstick is supposed to be used.Okay, it still feelslike there's resistance.No, there's no screws.Well, I may need to lookup something on iFixitbecause I don't wanna break this shit.And look at that right there.A repair guide for the right fan.Well that's pretty cool.I'm gonna be definitely reading this.You go play Fortnite or something.I'm just kidding, don't play Fortnite.Well, I don't know why I said that.Drink coffee and read a book.There, there, that'syour education for today.Okay, so, apparently, thisis actually called a spudger.Okay, well, it was called,like, a helping stickon the Amazon listing,but that was probablya Chinese thing.Also, yes, as I figured, thereare different size screws.I believe I separated themin my little box over there,unintentionally, but, yes, if I'm lookingat this diagram correct, theseare 2.3 millimeter screws,the rest are 3.0 millimeter screws.Huzzah. But, yeah, I'mlooking at their thing andI was doing it right.You're supposed to liftby the hinge first,but it's being very stubborn.You bastards.Ah, shit.Finally, goodness gracious!(coughs)Like, a swarm of dust just attacked me.Okay, well, ooh, oh.Oh my gosh!Yeah, that clearly has never been dusted.Well, I mean, obviously, I've never openedthis thing up before.Oh, hey, wait a minute.Do they always, do allthe covers have numberswritten in them like that?That's cool.It's like a, it's like anautograph, except it isn't.Yeah, this is five years of dust.But this is pretty (bleep) cool, actually.Oh, wow, this is actuallyreally fascinating.(chuckles) I always liked how it lookslike an angry face, likethe battery cells are the,and is this technically considered a cell?I honestly don't know.Again, I'm not an engineer.Yeah, it looks like a frownyface, an angry frowny face.Here's the fans.This is the one that's being bitchy.It looks like we got speakers right there.That looks like the RAM.That's uh, (mumbling) oh man.But the CPU's probably,like, under this thermalthingy somewhere.Again, not an expert.Uh, that's the M.2 SSD.Uh, this is obviously the battery.All six of these things are the battery.Pretty cool.Okay, it doesn't feel loose or anything.It looks really dusty though.Yeah, I'm gonna have to,I'm gonna dust the shit out.Oh my gosh, it's horrible. (laughs)I'm gonna take a look at the iFixit stuffa little bit more though.Well, the further I readdown the iFixit instructions,I just don't necessarily seethe point in going throughwith them all the way becauseI don't have a piece to replace this with.So we're gonna have to do, like,a two-pronged approach here.I would say let's trydusting this stuff outand then boot the computer back up and seeif we have the issue again.If the issue doespersist, then maybe I needto get a replacementfan, which it looks likeiFixit will sell me one for $64.99.I'm gonna track down somecompressed air and just(blowing) blow the shit out.I'm a little weary touse that stuff thoughbecause, like, I don't wanna, you know,angle it wrong and endup squirting frickin'liquid air, or liquid whatever in here,'cause when it's compressed it gets coldand it turns into aliquid and I don't wannaliquefy my computer.So, yeah, I'm usually a littlecautious with that stuff,but I think it should be doable.In the meantime, let's set this asideand dust this bad boy out.That's fascinating.There's, like, a dust ringfrom the fan on this side,but it's severely thicker on that side.That's where the problematic fan is'cause this is the right fan.Huh.I don't know, maybe, I honestlythink the fan is, like,off its bearing orsomething, and it's, like,maybe brushing up against the case?Maybe that's what's causing it to buzz?It's just, like, hitting the aluminumwith the fins of the fan?Maybe that's it, 'cause,yeah, it looks likeit's been touching.Or at least the dust has been, like,more accumulated on this sidebecause this is way more,like, present than on this side.Interesting.Well, let's give it agood cleaning anyway.You know, now that I think about it,that may not be five years worth of dustbecause this thing was actuallyat an Apple repair facility,or, what do they call it?A repair center?Whatever they call it.Yeah, it was there for alogic board replacement,which actually wasn't even needed,and if you want to knowwhat I'm talking aboutyou can actually watch the five-part sagaof early Krazy Ken episodeswhere I dealt with that issue,where I thought it wasa hardware issue, but,spoiler alert, three, two, one,it was a software issue this whole time,but since I had the warranteeI had Apple look at it anyway.So they did a logic board replacementand nothing got better, so I was like,okay, it's definitely a software issue,but I figured since Ihad the repair for freeI might as well do it.Yeah, that was several years ago already,so that actually might onlybe, like, two and a half yearsof dust as opposed to five years of dust.(chuckles)All right, so time to trackdown some compressed air.Let's set that to the side over there.I'm gonna see if we canjust give this a quickblow job, I guess.That's what Adiblasi calls it.No upgrade would be complete unlessyou have a proper blow job.What were you all thinking?Disgusting.Well I searched all around the houseand could not find any compressed air, soI'm gonna have to give my friend,jubilant Gino, a little call.Hey, Gino, how's it going?Great, yeah, thank you.Um, hey, if you're out and aboutcan you please pick upsome compressed air for me.Oh, hey man, I know.Just this one time, and I'll owe you.Okay, thank you, appreciate it.Bye.Well, I called him at the perfect time.What a coincidence.He was actually just near an Office Depot,so he's gonna pick some up for me.And, bon appetit, herewe go, cleaning duster.You know, I see somepeople using this stuff,like, kinda wrong.Like, I see people angle it and shit,like I just did there, actually,now that I think about it.(laughs)Yeah, you shouldn't do that 'cause,you know, compressed air iscold and it turns to liquid,so we don't wanna sprayliquid into our computer.So I will not do that again, even thoughI just did it there.Right, so we'll take the little straw offso we can drink it.Ah, just, actually...I don't know if that wassupposed to come off.(laughing)That came off, like, really easily.I don't know if that wassupposed to come off or not.Oh, good.Oh, okay, um...(air hissing)There we go.All right, we are up and running.So, also, because I am10 stories undergroundwith very inadequate ventilation,I have an ionizer right over there,there, that is going tobasically help purify the airand, like, collect all the dust particles.'Cause once I spray thisbitch into that bitch,I'm sorry, computer, Ijust called you a bitch,it's gonna get messy.It's gonna get dusty, sowe need some kinda ionizerto help clean the air.So let's do that.I'm gonna head over here,boot this sucker up.And if that doesn't work I'll just use agood old-fashioned vacuumcleaner to suck up the dust.Not from the computer, just from the air.Using the vacuum cleaner on the computerwould be kinda silly.I just have to positionthe computer in a waywhere I can spray this stuff verticallybecause you shouldalways keep the canisterperpendicular to the ground.You don't wanna hold it horizontal,and you don't wanna shake it because thenyou might spray liquid outof the frickin' nozzle,and you don't wanna spray liquidinto the motherboard, trust me.All right, ladies andgentlemen, this is our target.Let's take 'em out with extreme pork chop.(air hissing)It's like Christmas, it's snowing!(air hissing)(yelping)All right, I'm glad I hadmy shirt over my nose.Should probably wear some goggles.(laughs) It's, like, snowing in here.All right.(air hissing)All right.(air hissing)Okay, well that was fun.Let's nip this in the buda little bit. (air hissing)That looks pretty good.(air hissing)I think that's about it forthat side. Let's flip her over.All right, round two, fight!(air hissing)That dust right there isreally not wanting to move.(air hissing)That's looking much better than it did,you know, 10 minutes ago.(air hissing)Looking shiny, boys.Well the ionizer must be working,'cause there's not a lot ofdust floating in the air.Uh, cool.So it looks like we stillhave some on the fan here.(air hissing)It is not wanting to comeout though. (air hissing)Let's go like that.(air hissing)There we go, come on, get outof there, boy. (air hissing)Some of that dust is just stubborn.(air hissing)That's looking a bit better.(air hissing)Good enough for government work.I don't work for thegovernment, by the way.Actually I kinda do, I'm a secret agent.Ah, shoot, more lore.Dang it.I'm just getting a stool sample.Ow, nope, there we go.Stool.Okay.Ah, hoo, hoo, hoo, it's on wheels.That's some dangerous shit.Man, I'm so glad OSHA doesn'texist ten stories underground.They don't have anyjurisdiction down here.(fake laughs)Okay, so let's get thisbad boy reassembled here.It looks 10,000 times better.There's, like, a thread there, okay.Cool. Oh, there's,like, a thread here too.I don't know if that's normal or not.Shoo.Very nice.And these shorter screws,these shorter pentabular screwsgo in the back.Okay, they are so freakin' tiny.Oh my gosh.Wonder if the screwdriver's magnetic.I don't think it is.Oh, it is magnetic!Whoo, we're living in the future!Or the present, really.Small victories.I guess I'm just extra happytoday because it's my birthday.It actually is.It's my birthday and I'mdown here, underground,just like most other days.♪ Happy birthday to me. ♪It's The Curse, right?The Curse, you know, The Cursehas screwed me over beforeand has brought me somereally crazy projects,but this time he's gone too far.Like, he struck my daily driver.I mean, I know it's happened before,but I've never had to physicallytear the computer open before.Yeah, this time it's personal, Curse.You struck my daily driveron a hardware level.You will pay for that.All right, now we're done with the 2.,I think those are 2.3 millimeter screws,now we're on to the 3 millimeter screwsfor the remaining eight holes.Not too bad for a cheapChainor tool, right?Made in Chainor.Oh, (chuckles) think I justscratched the aluminum there.Hopefully I can buff that out.Frick on a stick.I mean, the bottom's alreadyscratched up a bit anyway.I've used it for five years.And there we go.Criss-cross applesauce,all the screws in place.Bon appa-tit, we are done.Hopefully this worked.Time to flip it overand then head rotate it,(chuckles) and, uh, boot itup, and, uh, hope it works.And while we're at it, you might as wellgive the screen a little cleaning.At least, you know, without any solution,like, liquid solution.I have glass cleaner, like screen cleaner.I'm just not using it right now.I just thought I'd use the little cloththat came with the tools.Can't really fix the film coming offat the top though becausethat was an Apple defect.Good job, Apple.But, that's okay, I still kinda love you.And, yeah, all pretty.Let's boot her up.(computer boot-up chime)All right, so we're at the desktopand I do have a little fan controller,as I showed you earlier.The issue doesn't seemto happen all the time,especially when you justturn the computer onor wake it up from sleep mode.It usually only happensonce the fans startspeeding up a bit.And this, (laughs) this towel is dusty.I'm gonna have to make surethat really gets washed.Oh my gosh.It was a bloodbath of dust.I'm gonna invoke a higher fan speedand we're gonna see what happens.Let's just go full speed ahead.Okay, I'm not gonna lie, theysound a little different.I mean, I am also on a towel.That might be mufflingthe sound a little bit,but they sound a little different.Is that because the dust is off the fans?They now sound, like, betterbecause there's no dust on the fans?That actually changed the sound.I mean, it makes sense.Yeah, let's skip that for now.Go back to auto.Huh, so far, nothing.I don't wanna jinx it,but so far, nothing.I'm gonna let it sit for a bit.I'm gonna take this towel out from hereand we'll give it another test.This time I'm gonna take my phoneand just kinda lay the microphone,running voice memos, by the way,right over where the fan is so we canrecord the sound betterand listen for any defects.All right, so let's bump up the left.Bump up the right, and have a listen.(computer whirring)So far, so good.It's sounding better thanit has in a long time,even before the buzzing issue.Like, it just sounds,sounds more like a jet.Like a (whooshing) insteadof like a (growling).It sounds more like a (whooshing).You want your computer to (whooshing),not (growling), you know?(notification bell dinging)(growling) bad, (whooshing) good.(whooshing) There, youlearned something today.Yeah, it's sounding good.Let's slow 'em down.Yeah, they sound great.I also listened to the phone recording,just to get a more amplified sound.I don't hear anything bad.Well, I'll keep an ear on itand if something happens we'll probablyreplace the fan itself, butI'm calling this a win.I kinda didn't think that would work,just getting the dust out of there.That was really fun and we made it snow.(laughs)Yeah, man, thanks fortagging along with me.I'm glad we got this fixed togetherbecause it was a little annoyingand happy birthday to me.Yaaaa-aaaaaay.Hey, that's a good birthday present.Canned air.Thanks, Gino.Catch the crazy and pass it on.(futuristic techno music)\n"