Probably Stolen Laptop Hack
I picked up a dinky laptop for a song off of eBay with the knowledge that it was "broken" and wouldn't boot. It seemed that the BIOS was locked out and there was a system password (which was strange, but I didn't know it) so some swift Google-Fu demonstrated that you would need to short circuit 2 legs of an EEPROM chip on the motherboard in order to reset the ID of the system, and then you could enter a new one sans unknown password.

So, disassembling the beast I propped the bare motherboard up with the monitor panel sticking off of it and fired it up. It took some time, but I found a chip with the right lettering on it which was about 4mm x 2mm. At the right spot I shorted the pins and.... nothing. I'm nothing if not tenacious. I shorted different pins, made sure I was getting it right. Made sure the paper-clip could conduct electricity (discovered it could when I dropped the clip on the motherboard creating a few sparks and angry noises) and was stumped. I tracked down the chip manufacturer's papers and learnt all about the damn thing. I knew what voltages went were and what pins were dead pins with nothing going through it. Four days of study and frustration I sat looking at the board and realised. I was looking at the wrong fucking chip. The right one was under some black plastic. Ole! Shorted the correct pins on the first try - Unlocked laptop! Woo!

Put it together (with some screws to spare - buggered if I knew where they went). Upon boot it became apparent that the laptop was from some company which I imagine the machine was stolen from, but that's another story...
(MrSnoobs, Sat 22 Aug 2009, 2:24, 2 replies)

screws
Those spare screws are known in the trade as "Pocket screws", because you bung em in your pocket after and nver use them for anything.
(Captain Spacker I lick windows, Sat 22 Aug 2009, 9:37, closed)

And when the pocket is full
You can trade them all in for a new soldering iron!
(Pope Jamiroquai III, Mon 24 Aug 2009, 1:12, closed)