Question about magnets and computers.?

Question

Ok, my brother has these 2 little magnets he plays with. He accidently dropped one on his laptop, and now it doesnt work. My questions are:
1) What do you think happened? Is the whole comp de-magnetized?

2)Is there any way to solve it?

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

Computers store information on the Hard-drive, which stores the information magnetically.

It is unlikely that the magnets wiped the whole hard-drive, however it could have changed some critical information on the drives need to be repaired.

You will know it is a hard-drive problem because the computer will start-up will not load up Windows.

Answer 2

He wiped out the entire hard drive.