Computer Repair in Northern Virginia

Computer repair across Northern Virginia

I'm Sammy Lackey, the person behind SammIT. I'm CompTIA A+ certified and based in Arlington (22202, near Crystal City), and I fix desktops and laptops for households and small businesses all over Northern Virginia — Arlington, Alexandria, Falls Church, McLean, Vienna, Annandale, Springfield, and Fairfax County.

When your machine won't boot, runs hot, or has slowed to a crawl, you don't need a sales pitch — you need someone to look at it and tell you what's actually wrong. That's the whole job. The diagnostic is free, and if the honest answer is "this is fine, don't spend a dime," that's the answer you'll get.

What I fix

• Hardware diagnostics — I track down the real cause: a failing drive throwing SMART errors, bad RAM, a dying power supply, a swollen battery, or a board-level fault.
• Screen, power, and overheating fixes — cracked laptop screens, machines that won't power on, fans roaring at full tilt, or shutdowns when a CPU cooks itself because it's packed with dust.
• Slowdowns and startup problems — Windows or Mac freezing, crawling, or taking five minutes to reach the desktop. I find out why instead of nuking everything with a reinstall.
• Drive and storage upgrades — swapping a tired spinning hard drive for an SSD is the single best dollar-for-dollar fix there is; it makes a six-year-old laptop feel new for a fraction of replacement cost.
• The honest call on repair vs. replace — including when the repair costs more than the machine is worth and a new one makes more sense.

How it works

Call or text me at 571-680-5334, tell me what the computer's doing, and I'll give you a read over the phone for free. From there I either fix it remotely — great for slowdowns, software, email, and setup, at $65/hr — or come to you on-site anywhere in Northern Virginia at $95/hr for anything that needs hands on the hardware. I quote you before I start, so the price you hear is the price you pay. No trip to a store, no leaving your machine on a counter for a week.

Common questions

Do you charge for the diagnostic? No. Figuring out what's wrong is free. You only pay if you want me to fix it, and I'll quote the job before I touch a thing.

On-site or remote — which do I need? Remote covers most software trouble: slowdowns, email and account setup, "it's acting weird" problems. On-site is for the physical stuff — a cracked screen, a machine that won't power on, overheating, or a drive swap. Not sure? Tell me the symptoms and I'll pick the right one.

Can you fix both desktops and laptops? Yes — Windows and Mac, towers and laptops. Common laptop jobs: screen replacements, batteries, and SSD upgrades. Common desktop jobs: power supplies, storage, and clearing out the heat and dust behind random shutdowns.

My computer is old. Is it even worth fixing? Sometimes yes, sometimes no — and I'll tell you straight. An SSD upgrade can buy a slow machine a couple more good years cheaply. But if the repair runs more than the computer's worth, I'll say so and help you pick a replacement instead of selling you a fix you don't need.

Is it a virus, or just slow? Often it's both, and they get tangled together. If the slowdown turns out to be malware, that's its own job — see virus and malware removal. If a drive is failing and you've got files you can't lose, say so up front, because data recovery comes first, before any repair that could overwrite it.

What areas do you cover? All of Northern Virginia. I keep neighborhood pages for the spots I work most — computer repair in Arlington, Alexandria, Falls Church, and McLean — but if you're nearby and not listed, just ask.

Let's get it sorted

If your desktop or laptop is acting up, call or text 571-680-5334 for a free read on what's wrong, or book a visit and I'll come to you. Honest answer, fair rate, and I'll tell you when you don't need me.