Is My Laptop Screen Kaput

danjo-xx

I have a monitor connected to my laptop and tonight I was switching from the monitor to laptop and got two wide white bands across the screen.

Even after reboot still the same.

yoyo

danjo-xx wrote: »

I have a monitor connected to my laptop and tonight I was switching from the monitor to laptop and got two wide white bands across the screen.

Even after reboot still the same.

Does the bands appear on the monitor aswell? Looks like the video card has gone in it, is it a Nvidia 8xxx series card? If bands appear on external display it is the video card, if not the LCD screen

Nick

danjo-xx

The monitor is perfect, just the laptop screen.... so its a black bin job

yoyo

danjo-xx wrote: »

The monitor is perfect, just the laptop screen.... so its a black bin job

LCD problem so, I've seen something similar happen a faulty LCD a while back, the line was totally white . Look for a replacement screen on ebay for it, usually around the €80-90 euro mark, sometimes less. If you opened a computer up before and installed stuff you should be able replace the screen, plenty of guides out there, youtube etc.
Also look for a service manual for your particular model, it will give step by step instructions how to take the screen appart usually

Nick

danjo-xx

yoyo wrote: »

LCD problem so, I've seen something similar happen a faulty LCD a while back, the line was totally white . Look for a replacement screen on ebay for it, usually around the €80-90 euro mark, sometimes less. If you opened a computer up before and installed stuff you should be able replace the screen, plenty of guides out there, youtube etc.
Also look for a service manual for your particular model, it will give step by step instructions how to take the screen appart usually

Nick

thanks very much for your help, this laptop must be nearly 9/10 yrs old now so owes me nothing, and opening it up is a bridge too far for me anyway.

Its funny though last Friday a girl from the IT dept was in our office and I was asking her how long should a laptop last and she said about 3yrs and then this happens ~ its all her fault, put a curse on me:D

yoyo

danjo-xx wrote: »

thanks very much for your help, this laptop must be nearly 9/10 yrs old now so owes me nothing, and opening it up is a bridge too far for me anyway.

Its funny though last Friday a girl from the IT dept was in our office and I was asking her how long should a laptop last and she said about 3yrs and then this happens ~ its all her fault, put a curse on me:D

Yeah wouldnt bother trying to fix it at that age, thought it looked quite old design wise alrite, laptops arn't built like the used to, 3 years is probably "the norm" these days

Nick

danjo-xx

Right clicking on the desktop and choosing graphic output to monitor or laptop is the normal way but if I go back into my kaput laptop and the screen has got worse and I can't use this method to get back to monitor is there any other way of switching like maybe control panel or keyboard shortcut keys.

Skerries

usually there is a little picture of a screen on one of the function keys or it may say lcd/crt
so hold down the Fn key and the key with the screen symbol

danjo-xx

Skerries wrote: »

usually there is a little picture of a screen on one of the function keys or it may say lcd/crt
so hold down the Fn key and the key with the screen symbol

F4 has a |Sq Box| ( a square box with vertical line outside on either side, would that be it!


A workmate who is more techie than me, I know that wouldn't be hard:D
thinks if I got the latest graphic driver that it would solve the problem.

Thing is this is an old HP Compax Presario C300 and after doing a search on their website nothing comes up for that model, guess its not supported anymore.

Is there not an archive of the last driver that was available.

ressem

The drivers are listed. Googling hp presario c300 brings up the laptop as the first link.

http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/SoftwareIndex.jsp?lang=en&cc=us&prodNameId=3263162&prodTypeId=321957&prodSeriesId=3213865&swLang=13&taskId=135&swEnvOID=228

I think that your friend is wrong on this though (He'd be right if the patterns were appearing when playing games). I'd guess that in your case the bars appear even before windows has started.

You could read through the service manual, and just disconnect and reconnect the connector cable attaching the motherboard to the screen on the off chance that it's a bad connection, but it's much more likely to be the screen failing.

http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/DocumentIndex.jsp?contentType=SupportManual&lang=en&cc=us&docIndexId=64179&taskId=135&prodTypeId=321957&prodSeriesId=3213865

danjo-xx

ressem thanks for those links, I installed the new driver and re-booted and it was looking good for a minute, got thin thread like lines accross the screen but when it settled down back to the two white banner lines on screen cleared a lot now with just a few short thread size black lines here and there.

When I go into bookmarks menu a lot of broken lines thru folder names wouldn't like to trust it anymore. Think I'll give up the ghost this time

owes me nowt anyway.

danjo-xx

Its after coming clear now ~ perfect ~ wonder if it will last. Will do a reboot in a minute and see if it holds up.

update: just re-booted and its still perfect. Berger your lookin good:-

yoyo

danjo-xx wrote: »

Its after coming clear now ~ perfect ~ wonder if it will last. Will do a reboot in a minute and see if it holds up.

update: just re-booted and its still perfect. Berger your lookin good:-

Fingers crossed

danjo-xx

Its very iffy.......one day I still get the white lines and next its fine. hmmmmm

yoyo

danjo-xx wrote: »

Its very iffy.......one day I still get the white lines and next its fine. hmmmmm

Is possible theres more too it than display drivers, if you see those lines outside the bios then that doesn't sound good, as its old You could try take ourt the screen and make sure the video cable is connected firmly, use a bit of duct tape to tape it into the connector!

Nick

danjo-xx

yoyo wrote: »

Is possible theres more too it than display drivers, if you see those lines outside the bios then that doesn't sound good, as its old You could try take ourt the screen and make sure the video cable is connected firmly, use a bit of duct tape to tape it into the connector!

Nick

stop...... your tempting me now:D might try that at a later stage.

That video cable is a flat wide type of lead?

Does it connect to the laptop through one or both of the hinges.

Is it possible oooooh and easy..... to connect this cable to an external monitor! or is it just not worth the hassle and would look terrible messy I guess.:(

yoyo

danjo-xx wrote: »

stop...... your tempting me now:D might try that at a later stage.

That video cable is a flat wide type of lead?

Does it connect to the laptop through one or both of the hinges.

Is it possible oooooh and easy..... to connect this cable to an external monitor! or is it just not worth the hassle and would look terrible messy I guess.:(

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wRlfC8jr63I

Heres a youtube video, I know not for your laptop model but it is generally a similar procedure for most machines, no guarantees it will do anything for you but worth a shot anyways! Btw I think I posted that previous post while intoxicated, outside the bios does not make much sense. do you see similar kinds of distortion when the machine is POSTing, Ie at the HP/Compaq logo on startup?

Nick

danjo-xx

yoyo wrote: »

Btw I think I posted that previous post while intoxicated, outside the bios does not make much sense. do you see similar kinds of distortion when the machine is POSTing, Ie at the HP/Compaq logo on startup?

Nick

no worries I googled around about bios....No I don't get any lines or bars at startup stage its only after I have logged into my account and lately just thin thread lines on internet and thick bars on desktop.

It's perfect tonight though!

yoyo

danjo-xx wrote: »

no worries I googled around about bios....No I don't get any lines or bars at startup stage its only after I have logged into my account and lately just thin thread lines on internet and thick bars on desktop.

It's perfect tonight though!

Hmm in that case it may be a software problem, one thing which may be happening is windows Update is automatically installing a buddy graphics card driver, the on/off sympthoms of it are weird though :S

Nick

danjo-xx

yoyo wrote: »

Hmm in that case it may be a software problem, one thing which may be happening is windows Update is automatically installing a buddy graphics card driver, the on/off sympthoms of it are weird though :S

Nick

I'll carry on and see how she goes but might get a desktop anyway as one way or another this laptop is on borrowed time.

thanks for all your help ~ much appreciated.

danjo-xx

thanks yo yo for all your help both here and elsewhere much appreciated.

I'm still sucking diesel and no problems since... is it safe to relax now in the belief that its really sorted or am I still on probation:)