Here are some tips and tricks for troubleshooting and fixing laptop video problems. Video issues are very common within portable computers and with the following tips you should be able to detect and eliminate basic laptop video problems.
Laptop LCD screen has a faint image.
Look at the LCD screen very closely and check if you can see a faint image on the screen. It’s possible that the LCD lid close switch stuck in the “closed” position and the backlight stays off even when you open the LCD screen or turn on the laptop. The switch turns off the backlight when you close the LCD display to save the laptop battery power. Check the LCD lid close switch. Usually it is a small plastic pin located close to the LCD hinges. Try to tap on the switch a few times to turn on the backlight. If after tapping on the LCD lid close switch the backlight stays on, you fixed the problem.
It is also possible that after tapping on the LCD lid close switch the backlight works fine, you see a normal video on the screen for some time and then the backlight turns itself off again. In this case I would blame the FL inverter board. Try to reseat cables on both end of the FL inverter to make a better contact between the cables and the FL inverter board. If it doesn’t help I would try to replace the FL inverter board.
Laptop LCD screen is solid white color.
Most likely it is just a bad connection between the LCD display and the system board. I would try reseating the video cable connector on the back of the LCD screen first and check if it fixes the problem. After that I would try reseating the video cable connector on the system board. I would also try reseating cables if there is no video on the LCD screen at all.
The video on the LCD screen is garbled.
Try to connect the LCD screen to an external monitor. If the external video is fine, you have a problem with the LCD screen or the LCD video cable. You can try to fix the problem by reseating the video cable on the back of the LCD and on the system board.
If you see the same garbled video output on the external monitor most likely it is not the LCD screen problem. In this case the system board (with onboard video) is bad or the video card is bad.
I understand that these tips will not cover all video problems with portable computers. If you have a different problem, you are welcome to leave a comment and I will try to help you if I can. 
Are you looking for a new LCD screen for you laptop? Try searching here.
Here’s a notebook display assembly diagram and tips for finding spare notebook parts.
Related articles:
How I took apart and repaired my notebook LCD screen with water damage
Screen inverter replacement. Fixing laptop backlight problem
Laptop has bad video on the LCD screen. What is wrong?
If you find this article useful, please consider making a donation to the author. Thank you!
August 23rd, 2007 at 3:32 am
Hi,
I also posted this on http://www.asklaptopfreak.com which was a site referenced in one of the posts on this site. I wanted to post it here too in case the two sites are handled by different folks. Please excuse any duplication.
First, thanks for your site and suggestions. I like your simple yet informative explanations.
I have a Fujitsu A6020 just purchased new about a month or two ago. Occasionally, when I power up the laptop, the screen appears off for a few seconds, and then I see a slightly lighter blank screen. This is the point where I’d normally see the BIOS copyright and boot screen. Nothing happens after this point.
If I turn the system OFF and then ON several times in a row, it seems to eventually start up with a blank dark screen but then the expected lighted screen with the BIOS copyright text. However, it seems to be getting to the point of taking more and more OFF/ON attempts before it boots correctly. I have to turn it OFF and ON many many times and eventually it seems to work.
I haven’t broken it down to something specific that I do to get things working. I’ve tried unplugging the power, the battery, and while those things sometimes seem to coincide with things working, there’s nothing concrete and repeatable. I’ve also done those willy nilly things and still the screen is black and then a lighted black (without text) while I try turning it OFF and ON over and over. Eventually, though, if I keep trying, it boots and shows the BIOS boot screen.
I think related to this problem is this: When the operating system is fully booted, and I close the lid, or the system goes to sleep, it never ever seems to show the screen again. As before, the screen is not pitch black. It goes from pitch black to a lighted black but it remains blank, no bios copyright appears.
The problem with sleep seems to always happen. Once again, if I power on, it goes from pitch black (off) to a lighted black and the system does not resume. If I want to try doing the power ON and OFF thing, I end up shutting down the sleeping OS which is lame as you can guess. Because of this, I don’t consider “sleep” to be an option which is further lame. I tend to either always turn off the unit or I go to hibernation. When I resume from power off or hibernation, I get the same results of a blank screen without light for a few seconds, then a lighted-black screen that is basically blank. (When I say lighted blank, I do not mean white, but I mean the difference between a completely OFF screen and one that appears to be ON but black. I’m calling that “lighted-black.” It appears to be more ON than when it was just black/off but there is no graphics or text. As usual, if I turn the unit OFF and ON over and over, the system eventually goes to a normal resume where I can see things. For hiberation, it resume from hiberation just fine.
With all of the above, the problems seems to have gotten worse. It seems to take more and more OFF and ON steps. Each OFF and ON step always goes from black/off, to a lighted black/blank, and eventually when I’m lucky, I get a BIOS boot, or resume or whatever is normal.
One other note: I have PGP Whole Disk Encryption (WDE) installed. That modifies the MBR and boot so that the WDE password screen is displayed first. This allows WDE to know how to decrypt drive contents so that it can resume with the Windows boot. Since the BIOS gets first shot upon boot, and since that’s what I should always see (the copyright), I don’t see how WDE could be affecting the display in this fashion. But until I investigate, I don’t want to assume, so I mention it for whatever it’s worth.
On final item relating to PGP WDE: Since the first screen displayed after the BIOS is the WDE password screen, when I do my OFF and ON attempts to get the display to work, I think it’s booting and going to either that screen or something. If WDE isn’t related to the cause, I guess WDE’s presence is a sort of a blessing in disguise because it means the system will not start doing a full boot while I cannot see the screen – when the screen is a lighted/black but neither the BIOS copyright nor the WDE password screen is visible.
Please excuse that I mention its lighted blank, but I see the other suggestions you offer, and when I see the screen go from black without light, to a lighted black, it makes me think the backlight is working but that some other thing is messed up. There’s nothing glitchy and when it works, and the OS is running, it doesn’t go blank or anything like that. It is a odd problem to me.
Do you have any thoughts on this?
Regards,
Tom
August 19th, 2007 at 6:43 pm
my laptop as a bunch of colored line in i how can i fix this
August 16th, 2007 at 5:48 pm
cj2600 thanks for the answer. Fortunatly the video card is not onboard (ATI X700 128mb). So I will to buy a new one. Any idea where I can find a cheap one ? Meanwhile, I will stil to underclock the core and the memory you think that might helps, the default on the card is 351/330 ?
Thanks
August 15th, 2007 at 8:13 pm
Daniel Laverdiere,
If lines appear on both internal and external screens then most likely you are right, the problem is related to the video card. The only way to test it is replacing the video card. If the video card is integrated into the motherboard, you’ll have to replace the whole motherboard.
August 15th, 2007 at 1:06 pm
I have three LCD monitors these are having same problem , first i bought one it worked good but afterthree month it came problem that no brightness in display on time coming the light after sometime it is comimg bklack if try to re on it will come the brightness one time again go off then I bught another LCD monitor, after 4 month came to this same problem again bought 3rd one also same I gave these to repairing shope the tecnician tried to repair this but he could not do, now I am trying to repair this I thoght the problem in FL inverter section and I changed the transistose with new but no progress coming same problem can u help me to solve this problem.
August 14th, 2007 at 8:54 pm
*** On S-Video I also get the lines – sorry for the mistake.
August 14th, 2007 at 8:39 pm
Hello, I have a Gateway M680. My screen display vertical line usually during the startup and a couple of minutes after. Sometime when it is cool I also experince some random crashes (?). On the S-Video everything is fine so I guess this is the motherboard or the video card (Ati X700). How can I test this ? Also I have never experienced any crashes or weird display was I was under battety. Any idea ? Thanks.
August 6th, 2007 at 11:49 pm
Hello ! I`m the girl with that Fujitsu Siemens which were making white screen. I understand from where were the problem – my RAM memory wasn`t same frequency like it should be for this model. Because I increase it and instead of to put DDR 330, I put DDR 400.
So if someone have same problem and just before that he change his RAM memory , please check is it same frequency
August 3rd, 2007 at 6:32 am
Thanks CJ.
I reseated the memory modules and now the beeps are gone but there is no display on the LCD (not even the faint image that was before when only the inverter was bad) nor on the external monitor.
August 2nd, 2007 at 10:22 pm
Bogdan,
No, it couldn’t.
Check the memory first, make sure it’s seated properly. Reconnect the memory module and check if the contacts on the memory are clean. Test your laptop with a known good memory.