laptop issues resolved: lesson learned
 

my laptop is bugging out on me right now. for the past month or so the screen has been some shade of pink when i open the lid (and the screen comes on) which has gradually shifted to normal colors the longer i leave it on. it usually takes about a minute for it to revert to normal colors, but because of the odd pink-ness when i open the screen, ive been anticipating something wrong with either the screen or the video card.

last night it decided to take it a step further. now when i open the screen it looks like the refresh rate is way slower than it hsould be. the entire screen is shifted about the width of the taskbar down, and blinks very quickly. and it doesnt stay that way, its kind of like the VHS tapes with bad tracking.

i hope this is something fixable. my friend who pretends to know more about computers than i do claims its not fixable, as neither the screen or the video card can be replaced, but i have no reason to believe he knows anything about my laptop other than its a hp that i bought in 2002.

anyone have any thoughts?

I've torn apart a couple more laptops than necessary, and you might have a bad connector. The output is in the bottom, but the screen just has a tiny cable running to it. What model is that?

Attach an external monitor (LCD preferred to duplicate video mode) to see if it's your video card or your laptop display.

what he said

We get this all the time at work and the picture will look great on the attached monitor, but messed up on the laptop.
It is most likely the screen. Check the connector like mentioned above. Tear it apart,.....

thanks to everyone whos replied thus far. hooked up an old crt i had laying around and it works fine. oh, and its toshiba, sorry for the misinformation.

but a crt isnt feasible for the living room, so ill be buying a new LCD monitor (system is still good with 3/4 a gig of ram and a 3ghz processor. its getting outdated, but im not ready to spend $600 on a new laptop, which after looking around is the cheapest i can get one that meets my criteria). so a new monitor for about $200 seems to be the way to go. bc its an "old" laptop [2002], the places i contacted to replace the screen said the screen was ~$450 to replace.

i found three possibles so far, if anyone has any input thatd be appreciated:

NewEgg 19" delivered for $175 [new]
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16824254005

Amazon 19" delivered for $176.49 [used]
http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-Widesc...6640845&sr=1-3

im leaning to the first one, bc its new. and quick delivery. of course, theres one at circuit city thats a 19" as well, for about $200 with tax. i dunno if the extra $25 is worth the convenience of having it "today".

what model laptop is it? how large is the screen....lcd screens should be around $50-$150 for most older laptops like that.

I imagine you could find an LCD screen for that laptop for very cheap on ebay. They're actually VERY easy to replace, and theres lots of instructions online. Unless you WANT an external monitor. I've done several myself. It's a matter of opening the bezel, removing the screws and connector/ballast, and putting the new one in.

Some connectors are very easy, some aren't. I'd just double check online, i'm sure you can find some sort of walkthrough or pictures of what you're dealing with.

bloody hell. i just learned a $65 lesson.

knowing nothing about laptops, i took my laptop to a local computer place and had them look at it. i told them that i thought it was either the video card or the screen. they said "$65 to look at it, and if you end up having to buy a new laptop, that $65 will be applied to it'.

so i said okay, heres $65.

showed up again and they said "definitely the screen. but because of what kind of laptop it is, itll be $500 for the screen itself then 2 hours labor -- itd be cheaper just to buy a new system."

so i said "okay. if i buy a new screen, will the $65 be applied to that?" and got a flat out no.

so i took my laptop home and fully planned on buying a new screen. hence the prior posts. saw that it was possible to replace it myself via this thread. so i started looking on EBAY to a new screen and found one, but realized it does me no good to buy a new screen if i dont know how to replace it.

so i took my laptop screen apart. had to pretty much figure it out myself, as i didnt find a "how-to" online. but i figure, if i break it, im buying a new monitor anyway. got the screen taken apart and looked at the cables and such. decided on a hunch to go ahead and boot it up and see if it was indeed the connector (as itd be stupid for me to have taken it apart and not tried that, even if the computer repair place had said it was definitely NOT the connexion). and

*gasp* moved the connexions around a bit and viola: problem solved.


so i consider this my $65 lesson. i learned it with cars awhile ago, but i thought the computer place had more integrity than to scam me -- they didnt. im contemplating calling them and complaining, as theres no way they actually looked at it then told me $500 to fix it plus labor. the screen is $150 on ebay. and i could switch it out easily in an hour. thats $215 plus tax to fix. a far cry shy of what they said.


lesson learned.


thank you everyone. you saved me $200 and would have saved me $65 more if i hadnt been a wimp.

Whoo! Good job!