Let’s say you’ve got an aging laptop. It doesn’t exactly run like new any more. Maybe the battery is a bit weak even on a full charge, or perhaps the fan makes a lot of noise even after you cleaned it out.

Traditionally, you’d have to pay a pretty penny for new laptop parts.

You’d also have a hard time finding instructions or guides on how to remove and replace any parts in your lappy.

Well, nowadays, things are a bit different.

You can get all kinds of laptop parts on the cheap, and all the how-to guides you’ll need are already out there just waiting for you on YouTube!

Cheap parts

Let’s say you have an Acer Aspire V3-771G, like so:

You’d like to replace your battery, because even on a full charge, it only lasts an hour or two. So, you hop on Amazon and search for your battery number.

Well, it’s entirely possible that you’ll find a nice variety of batteries available at a decent price. For this particular make and model of laptop, there are plenty of Aspire V3-771G batteries on Amazon.

But that’s not always the case, and the prices aren’t always the greatest.

Enter ebay!

Hop on over to ebay and search for “aspire v3-771G battery”.

You’ll see something like this:

While the Amazon links were for aftermarket batteries, ebay has both aftermarket and original Acer batteries – and the original battery is up to 50% cheaper than the Amazon aftermarket versions. Score!

You may note that these wonderful offers are “From China” or “From Hong Kong”. That’s the secret.

Newsflash: Everything is Made in China. When you buy an original battery from your lappy’s manufacturer, you’re getting the same battery. Only trouble is that you pay a lot more because there are added costs: shipping from China/Hong Kong to your country, and then overhead costs associated with customs fees, import duties, stocking the battery, name brand markups for no good reason, domestic reshipping to you, and so on.

So, some intrepid folks in Hong Kong and China decided they’d just cut out the middlemen and sell direct to you via ebay. The end result is that you can usually find whatever you need for half price – and sometimes much, much less.

The only catch is that your goodies will usually be shipped to you by “Economy Post” from Asia. This means you will rarely pay customs fees, but it does mean you’ll have to wait 1-2 weeks on average before your component arrives at your doorstep.

Let’s say your laptop fan is noisy. Well, just hop on ebay again and search for “Aspire V3-771G fan”. Here’s a nice fan for $12.93 including shipping.

Note that you aren’t limited to just batteries and fans here… I have purchased from ebay entire laptop motherboards, cases, panels, optical drives,  daughter boards (for USB, ethernet, etc.), bluetooth modules, WiFi cards, LCD screens, LCD frames, touchpads, and just about anything else you can think of. I even once bought all the different parts and assembled an entire laptop for half the price of what it cost me locally!

Remember, YouTube is your friend

YouTube is exactly how you’ll know what steps to follow to replace your part. No more guessing which screws to remove!

For example, search YouTube for “Aspire V3-771G replace fan”, and you’ll usually find complete disassembly videos like this one for your specific model:

A final note on quality

You have to realize that just because you’re buying an Official Acer Battery, for example, doesn’t mean the quality is any higher than a no-name brand. Quite often, the cells and whatever other internal components of your purchase are exactly the same, regardless of the sticker placed on the outside of the part.

I have purchased all kinds of goodies via ebay, and I’ve never received a “dud” or a DOA (dead on arrival) part. What’s more, the customer service is actually pretty awesome. I always get a response if I have any questions or concerns, they know what they’re talking about, and they’re damn friendly.

Plus, I save some bucks. What’s not to like?