You Can Fix A MacBook By Baking It In An Oven Like A Pie

Nothing feels more counter-intuitive than shoving a broken MacBook Pro that cost thousands of dollars into a preheated oven. But it might be the best last-ditch effort available if your laptop won't start.

We are NOT recommending you try this at home!

Ales Kocjancic, founder of real-time optimization platform Live Systems, was getting Mac's equivalent of the blue screen of death on his laptop. After hunting through dozens of forums and finding no other fixes, he decided to try "cooking his 'Book."

He wrote about the experience on his blog.

The process is relatively simple. If you don't have AppleCare and don't feel like spending hundreds of dollars at the Apple Store until you've tried every trick in the book, or feel that you're only going to get a new laptop anyway, you might as well give it a shot. All you need is a hefty supply of different screwdrivers, the right MacBook re-assembly guide, aluminum foil, your oven, and some bravery.

The basic idea behind it is that your MacBook's system has failed because of broken connections in the logic board. By heating up the whole board, you liquefy the solder joints that broke and they cool back in place once you take it out of the oven.

Although there have been hundreds of successful bakes reported, there's no guarantee that cooking your 'Book will provide a long-term fix.

Still curious? Here's how the process goes down:

Start preheating your oven to a roasty 340 degrees Fahrenheit (that's 170 degrees C). Unscrew the metal outside of your MacBook so you can get to the logic board, which is the only part that's going to bake.

Put your logic board on a tinfoil-covered baking tray, but first create "tinfoil legs" for it to rest on (because you don't want its entire surface area touching the foil). Pop the tray into the oven and wait about seven minutes.

While your precious logic board bakes, Kocjancic recommends you "stare nervously at your expensive piece of machinery slowly roasting, only breaking eye contact every 10-20 seconds to check your watch for the time."

Once time's up, take the logic board out of the oven and let it cool before putting all the pieces of your disassembled laptop back together. Then: Moment of truth.

According to Kocjancic, his MacBook Pro started right back up, and he hasn't had any trouble since: