Ants In My Laptop

[alphagrl]

EEuw, gross. Has anyone out there ever had this problem?

Opened cd drawer to find it filled with ants and a ton of larvae. Googled "ants in laptops" to get various ideas. One... leave the laptop on for a few days, another, leave laptop off for a few days. Try putting the laptop in the fridge for a few days (sounds like a bad idea).

Suggestions welcome. No sweets or food have been around the laptop ever.
Tiny little black ants.

Thanks,

Alana

[Larry Robinson]

You might try putting a little honey in dish somewhere nearby to lure them away from your laptop, then put some honey outside the house to lead them away from the house.

[Braggi]

Oh, my! Real bugs in your computer!

Avoid killing them. If you kill them they will be a mess inside your machine. Ants are very neat creatures. They clean all debris out of their nests and when they move on they leave almost nothing behind.

My thought is that you should just turn the computer on and off a few times over the day. Ants like constant temperature and if they can get it, constant humidity. By letting the computer cool off when not using it, then letting it warm up by turning it on you'll make it uncomfortable for them. They should move on without further interventions. Avoid using the CD player until after they go away.

Willie LumpLump is our resident expert on insect behavior. I'm sure he'll chime in.

Good luck,

-Jeff

[glenclem]

Greetings,
If you have larve present there is a queen and it would be difficult to lure the ants out of the lap top. Start by lightly vacuming the ants and then place in an air tight container, plastic bag, tupperware container, and place in your freezer for at least 10 hours (be sure to remove battery so there is no source of heat). Romove as much of the case as you can, vacume, shake out or (useing a soft brissle brush) sweep the dead ants out. Do not use air in a can as it can lodge the ants into the circuit boards, also be careful with the vacume, don't use a high power shop vac, use a household strength vac and hold it a few inches away from the lap top. Good luck.
Glen

[Kunnskaping]

There are suggestions that ants can be attracted to the EMR field and warmth that are produced when laptops are running. Leaving your laptop off for a day or two, if possible, could help.

Vacuuming is a good suggestion, especially if you vacuum up some diatomaceous earth or corn starch first, so the ants suffocate when they end up in the bag or canister. Don't use any fine dust or grit near your computer though, as it could damage it.

Putting electronic devices into the freezer is not a good idea, IMO. It can cause the various materials to contract to differing degrees, causing the circuitry to break. For that reason, most electronic devices come with a range of temperatures between which they can be safely stored. If you check the technical specs for your computer and CD drive, you will probably find that they are not meant to endure to deep chill of a freezer.

The ants are not likely to do any harm if they die in the computer. There is a small risk that their bodies could cause some trouble if they die on or in moving parts, such as spinning drives or the fan. Fortunately, you can get at those moving parts fairly easily to vacuum them up.

Therefore, some simple borax ant bait, which you can make yourself or buy, should do the job if you put it near the computer and give the ants enough time to gorge themselves on it. They will carry it back to the queens and feed them with it, which will make for a very effective population control measure. When the party is over, just vacuum again, wipe the surface of the desk and laptop exterior with an orange oil cleaner to remove the scent trails of the ants, and go back to enjoying your computer.

By the way, if they are only in your CD drive, you can remove it and place bait near it while you clean up your computer and surrounding area and go on using it, sans CD drive, while the ants eat their way to ant heaven. You can stick the end of a paper clip into the little hole in the door of the CD drive to open it and motivate the ants to step outside.

[[email protected]]

Hello, How about laptop cleaning service, which i do , flat fee $25.00 and
i completely clean your entire laptop, i have a ad in wacco for pc/laptop repair
in Santa Rosa , call me Frank, if your interested in having something like this done to your laptop, one hour turn around. Have a great day :wink: