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?
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February 10th, 2009 at 10:41 am
hi, having issue with my toshiba satellite M115, there are crazy lines all my screen. SOmetimes vertical sometimes horizontal,they seem to roll too.If I position my screen a certain way, it stops.
If the screen is moved, it starts up again and I can’t see the screen clear. It seems like it is harder to find the spot(place where screen is clear)each time it happens.please help!!!!!
February 10th, 2009 at 5:57 am
NEC i-select M5210 (re-badged Packard-Bell Easynote L)
I have pretty much the same problem as the post a few above this one, I have tested the screen works perfect, I have changed the inverter 3 times, I have changed the cable twice, I have 2 of these laptops with the exact same problem, I have checked and removed the stand by switch, think we may be at a loss with these, hope you can help.
February 9th, 2009 at 4:49 pm
My laptop (Pavilion dv2625la) goes to a black screen sometimes while watching pictures on internet and then turns off. I turned on by pressing the power button, but it comes back as if it were just hibernating. Do you think that’s a problem with the video card? thanks!
February 8th, 2009 at 6:32 am
well thanks allot for your site.I have this problem with my Dell Pentium iii laptop. When it it runs for about 10 minutes, the display starts to shake and some points are like a lens.The fan dose not turn! Bur at times,the problem begins at boot up even with a cold processor. Please help.
Terence
February 7th, 2009 at 4:36 pm
I have a problem that doesn’t quite match anything I was able to find on this site.
I have a Compaq 3000z laptop. A few years ago, the LCD died … I could just barely make out the faint image of the graphic output on the screen. If I connected the laptop to an external monitor , the external monitor worked fine. [By the way, to my knowledge no physical damage caused this problem, it just stopped working one day.]
I put the laptop away because I assumed it was a backlight problem, and that I would eventually get around to it. Well, I did some more research recently and it looked like it might not be the backlight but perhaps just the inverter. So, I ordered an inverter (only $20, much cheaper than a backlight), and it came today. I swapped it out … and it looked like it was going to fix it. However, it isn’t a complete fix.
After replacing the inverter, I have working ‘text mode’ on the laptop, but no graphics modes. That is, I can boot linux on the computer and if I boot into text mode, everything appears to be working fine. I can even adjust brightness on the panel with the function keys. However, if I choose to go into ‘graphical mode’, I just get a blank screen. If I hook up an external monitor I can see the graphic mode image on it, but I can’t seem to get it going on my laptop LCD. Of course, I have this same issue with a blank screen if I boot into Windows.
The panel is a 1680×1050 panel, and the video card is an nvidia GeForce4 440 Go (64M).
Any thoughts on what might be the problem? I haven’t exhaustively examined it yet, perhaps someone has a suggestion?
Thanks in advance …
February 3rd, 2009 at 7:48 pm
I have a HP Dv2171cl laptop. It had a problem with restarting. When I start the computer, half of the time the screen stays black, although the laptop powers on. Sometimes it boots properly and works fine. Now, it has started to garble when the windows starts. I connected it to an external monitor, the external one shows garbled picture too. Any ideas or recommendations are greatly appreciated.
February 3rd, 2009 at 6:07 pm
Hey there! I have an hp pavilion ze4400 and the screen turns on and then fades to white, but never gets any video. It is possible something may have shorted since my dad had it apart to fix something else. Nothing looks burnt on the motherboard as far as i can tell from the top, but would u know if its the video cable that is causing the no video? or should i lift the board and check the bottom for fuses and so on? Thanks much!
February 3rd, 2009 at 2:36 am
I have an NEC i-select M5210 (re-badged Packard-Bell Easynote L) with a dim display. I’ve changed the inverter and it made no difference. On removing the mainboard I found a blown fuse F4 and there is a short circuit across the large capacitor next to it. Anyone know the rating of the fuse (I’m assuming around 500mA) and which components could be causing the short? (the display cable is unplugged)
February 2nd, 2009 at 9:00 pm
Vincent,
A transparent bar like that usually indicates a problem with the LCD screen, apparently it’s failing and has to be replaced soon.
In some cases you can temporarily get rid of this problem if you grab the display by the top left and right corners and slightly torque the screen. Not too much or you’ll crack the screen.
February 2nd, 2009 at 8:53 pm
Joe,
I could be wrong but your description sounds like a problem with the video card, which is most likely integrated into the motherboard.
In cases like that, I usually run MicroScope (micro2000.com) test for the video memory. If the video memory fails and the video card is integrated into the motherboard, it’s necessary to replace the whole motherboard.