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Thanks—it’s all sorted now. Turns out the issue was on AT&T's end. They were running some kind of system update that caused a massive bottleneck across the whole network, so they ended up dispatching technicians first thing the next morning.
Since about 10:00 PM last night, I’ve been stuck in this weird limbo where my laptop just won't connect to the router—the Wi-Fi signal is essentially non-existent for that device, even though all the status lights on the hardware look perfectly normal. To make matters even more frustrating, two of the smartphones in the house can't get online either, yet my own phone and my Xbox are cruising along without a single hiccup. It feels like a targeted blackout for specific devices. We’re running on an AT&T connection, and honestly, we’ve never run into anything even remotely like this before. Everything just dropped out around that time last night, then flickered back to life for maybe ninety minutes before vanishing again, leaving those specific devices completely stranded. We gave AT&T a call, but they were pretty useless; they basically just admitted there was a service outage without being able to explain why certain devices are acting up while others aren't. Apparently, they saw a spike in outage reports coming out of Indiana and the surrounding areas near Washington, D.C., but they wouldn't give us any specifics. Has anyone else dealt with this kind of selective connectivity issue? I've spent way too much time digging through YouTube tutorials, but nothing helps when the problem is that my network isn't even showing up as an option in the list—I'm just staring at that dreaded red "X" in the bottom right corner of my screen.
wearymason4 said:Just to be safe, unplug the charger and pull the battery out of the laptop—leave the screen detached if you have to—then check back tomorrow afternoon to see if everything’s still running smooth.
I already did that, and everything seems to be functioning perfectly fine. I didn't even bother pulling the battery because mine is essentially a paperweight; it doesn't hold a charge at all, so I've just been running it strictly off the power cord since the day I got it.
Do you guys really think there isn't any damage, or that nothing's going to happen down the road? At least regarding this specific incident?
I stepped out of my room for maybe five minutes, and in that tiny window of time, a massive rainstorm broke out. Of course, nature decided to take it out on my gear—water managed to spray right through the window, hit my laptop, and just soak it. To give you an idea of the damage: about ten percent of the back of the screen casing was damp, along with the bezel near the keyboard, a few individual keys, and a section of the charging cable (not right at the port, but a bit further down). It wasn't like a flood, but more like someone had wiped it down aggressively with a soaking wet rag or sprayed it with a water gun; I don't really know how else to describe that level of moisture. Naturally, I went into full panic mode. I scrambled to grab some paper towels and dabbed everything dry as fast as I could. My biggest fear is whether any of that moisture actually seeped past the surface and reached the internal circuitry. Since I didn't have power available at the moment, I couldn't even try to use a hairdryer to chase away any lingering dampness. I eventually turned it back on, and it seems to be running perfectly fine for now. But here’s what’s keeping me up: is there a chance this thing could just suddenly die on me later? I’ve heard horror stories about how moisture instantly fries electronics the second it touches a component, and now I'm terrified that there might still be droplets hiding inside, just waiting to cause a short circuit somewhere deep in the hardware. I'm worried the laptop might just quit on me mid-task because of this. I know it probably sounds paranoid, but I rely on this machine for everything and I'm genuinely spooked. Please don't suggest taking it apart to inspect it; I have absolutely no clue how to do that without making things worse.
Thanks!