Trying to repair a laptop

[KittKatV]

The fan in my laptop has stopped working, so I ordered a replacement. I dont really want to HAVE to send this laptop in to HP for repairs as they want $250 to replace the fan, so I've been working on it myself. So i've nearly dismantled the laptop to the point I can access the fan, but I've run into a bit of a proverbial brick wall I've unscrewed everything in the laptop and pretty much taken out the ram, the disk drive, network card, keyboard, etc. I'm at the point where I need to remove the palm rest to access the motherboard but whenever I try to lift it off, it feels as though the motherboard is being pulled up with it as well (I've unscrewed the little metal plate that covers the motherboard as well) as the top left corner of the palm rest lifting up on its own when I move the monitor. I dont want to risk damaging it so I haven't tried to pull the palm rest off. Any advice on how to remove it?

The laptop is an HP Pavillion dv-7 4087cl
Intel Core Mobile i5 430M
ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5470
Windows 7 Home Premium x64

 

[jkhoward]

Generally if all of the screws are out, the palm rest should pop off. I'd get a flat head screw driver, start from one side, slowly turn it vertical, slide it further down, repeat, if you get a hard spot flip over the system and double check that there isn't a screw still intact.

 

[tman1]

Make sure you didn't miss any screws on the bottom. And the keyboard is already off, correct?

 

[KittKatV]

Yes the keyboard is already disconnected, and I did check and it turned out I did have some screws in there that I thought I'd gotten already! Thank you both!