Here I’m going to post some laptop screen photos showing bad video output. I’ll explain what was wrong with the screen and how I fixed it. I plan to ad more examples as soon as I get new pictures. If you have your own example (and know how to fix it) please let me know and I’ll post it too.
Here’s some help for finding a correct part for your laptop.
Other post related to troubleshooting laptop video problems:
How to troubleshoot and fix laptop video problems
Taking apart notebook LCD screen
Replacing LCD screen inverter
The newly installed screen is not working
Example 1.
Here’s a picture of Satellite M55 LCD screen I made this morning. I got this video output as soon as I started the laptop. There were a lot of vertical lines, and they were changing color without any pattern. To me it looked like Northern Lights (never seen in real life) 
. The external monitor worked fine.
As soon as I applied some tension to the screen it changed the pattern. Some horizontal lines appeared in the middle of the LCD.
Here’s the difference. When I torque the screen, the image appears but it’s distorted with some horizontal lines running across the screen.
Reseating the video cable didn’t make any change and the problem was fixed after I replaced the LCD screen.
Example 2.
I took this picture from Toshiba Satellite M65. I think that this example is very typical. One day you wake up, turn on the laptop and see one or a few hair-like vertical lines in different colors.
When you move the LCD screen some lines might disappear or more lines appear on the screen. A video output on an external screen would be perfect, without any lines. Unfortunately, these lines indicate a screen problem. I’ve never seen this kind of video output caused by a bad video cable or bad FL inverter board. My laptop was fixed after I replaced the LCD screen.
Example 3.
The photo below comes from Toshiba Satellite 5205. The laptop displays identical vertical lines all over the LCD screen as soon as I turn it on. Sometimes these lines are red, sometimes they are blue, sometimes they become wider and change color to white.
The same pattern appears on the external monitor. It displays same vertical lines. When the same video defect appears on both monitors – internal LCD screen and external screen, then most likely it happens because of a bad video card. On some laptops the video card is integrated into the system board, on other models it’s a separate module.
In this example, the vertical lines were caused by a failed video memory on the system board. I’ve tested the video memory with Microscope utility and it failed the test. In Toshiba Satellite 5205 the video memory is integrated into the system board. To fix the problem, I’ll have to replace the board. (We do not have equipment to replace the memory module itself).
Example 4.
Here’s another example of a bad LCD screen. My bad! It wasn’t the LCD screen problem.
As soon as I turned on the laptop, I was getting these reddish marks on the LCD screen but not on the external monitor. Reseating and replacing the video cable didn’t help. The problem disappeared when I installed my test LCD screen. Yes, for some reason I wasn’t able to reproduce the problem on my test LCD screen. But the reddish video appeared again as soon as I replaced the screen. I guess it happened because the system board had some kind of intermittent problem with onboard video or video connector. Long story short, I had to replace the system board and it fixed the problem. Yep, I misdiagnosed this laptop.
Example 5.
Here’s one more example of a faulty LCD screen. The left half of the screen works just fine but the right side is completely white.
Example 6.
Here’s another laptop with a bad LCD screen. This time it’s a tablet PC.
Example 7.
This screen looks like the screen on the example 1. I hooked up an external monitor and the external video works perfectly fine.
Here’s the difference. When I torque the screen, the image appears but it’s distorted with some horizontal lines running across the screen.
After a few seconds the image washes away.
I had to replace the LCD screen.
Example 8.
This laptop displays inverted colors right from the startup. As you see, the Toshiba logo is light green instead of red. The background is light gray instead of black. The Intel logo should be blue on a white background but it is red on a black background.
When your laptop displays inverted colors as on the picture above, this is an indication of a bad screen. You’ll have to replace the screen.
Example 9.
Here are two more screens. In both cases this problem is related to the LCD screen, witch means the screen has to be replaced.
On the image below you see a white band running from the top of the screen to the bottom. This band appears right from the laptop startup and runs through the logo too.
On the following image only the left side of the screen is working properly. This problem is caused by faulty LCD screen.
Are you looking for a new LCD screen for your laptop? Try here.
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February 20th, 2007 at 7:36 am
cj2600,
I took the plunge over the weekend, and hadn’t been back to give you an update, but your analysis is spot-on, it was the video cable to LCD connection. When I finally got the bezel and display apart, the connection looked good, and was covered with tape that appeared to be holding it securely. When I powered up the notebook, with the display in my hands, I found that the screen was blank, just the backlight was on. I thought maybe the LCD had actually died, but then I put a little upward pressure on the cable to connector connection, and the “bad color” display came back. I applied more pressure, and wow! the original crisp clear display with great colors was back. I hadn’t removed the tape over the connection, just applied upward pressure to “tighten” the connection. I didn’t see or feel any movement within the connection, but the display had come back to life. Since there doesn’t seem to be a way to make this connection more secure, I left it alone and used it for a day while it was disassembled. Since it continued to work well, I reassembled the display, and it continued, and still does work well. I guess I’ll just have to wait and see if it holds together another 5 years, but at least I now know how to get it working again if these symptoms reappear. (Now I just need to decide on whether I should put the original video card back in and sell the new one, or leave good enough alone, as my wife has her laptop working again.)
So folks, listen to this guy, he knows his stuff! Thanks!
February 20th, 2007 at 6:02 am
well, I got the new LCD inverter installed, put everything back together, and other than the obvious signs of me opening up the display, everything is right as rain now. I have a beautiful display on my zv6000 and I can finally remove it from my PC’s monitor. It makes me so happy to be able to carry it away from my desk once again. I cannot even imagine how I managed these last 7 months without the display functioning.
Again, my problem was a very dim display, and only lighting from a single side. After setting my desktop top pure white I was able to see it when I shined a flashlight at it in the dark, or by having direct/bright sunlight shining directly at the screen.
February 19th, 2007 at 9:49 pm
joel,
and just removing screws is not enough. Here’s how I usually separate the LCD mask from the screen. I insert a piece of soft plastic between the mask and screen and slowly move it along the screen. I use a guitar pick, sometimes a small library card because it’s made of soft plastic and cannot damage the screen (if you are careful of course). One side of the card slides along the bottom side of the LCD mask and another side along the metal frame of the screen (not the screen itself). After the mask is separated from the screen, work with your fingers to release plastic latches and lift up the mask.
I know exactly what you are talking about, I agree it’s a pain. Sometimes the LCD mask is glued to the LCD screen (to the metal frame) with a sticky tape, really sticky tape
February 19th, 2007 at 8:50 pm
Stacy French,
Where are a lot of free websites for sharing your photos. You can use any of them (flickr.com for example) and post a link to the photo here.
February 19th, 2007 at 8:29 pm
Ken,
I don’t think this is a motherboard related problem. Have you tried reconnecting the video cable on the back of the LCD screen? I would try this first because it might be just a loose connection between the cable and LCD screen.
If reconnecting the cable will not help then it’s either a bad video cable or faulty LCD. Witch one is bad? It’s hard to guess.
It’s possible a you have a defective wire/connection inside the video harness or the LCD itself is going bad. If you have no LCD available for testing the laptop, you’ll have to guess. I would probably go with the video cable first because it’s much cheaper and you have a chance fixing the laptop without an expensive LCD replacement.
February 17th, 2007 at 8:09 am
I have the same problem, have been recommended to replace the “inverter” it is inside the display near the hinges, and a pain in the rear to get to, the display cover is attached by 4 screws (HP zv6000 15.4 WXGA screen) and some super duper sticky tape, I cannopt get the tape off to get to the inverter which has 2 screws in it. I bought a new inverted off ebay (new, not pulled) last week for $23 including shipping. if I can get to it without breaking anything, I’ll repost to let you know.
February 15th, 2007 at 3:36 pm
I am having a problem with my lsptop LCD..Let me send a pic to you and maybe you can tel me how to fix.
February 15th, 2007 at 12:06 pm
Great site! Hope you can help me. I used my wife’s Dell Inspiron 8100 (with 15″ UXGA LCD) for a long period over one night, and it was working fine when I shut it down. A few hours later, when she got up and powered it up, the screen colors were very odd, and there appeared to be alot of video noise. I thought the video card (nVidia 32MB GeForce2) was shot, so I bought a new card on eBay (nVidia 64MB GeForce4), and installed it, along with the new drivers for that card (Inspiron 8200). Powered it up, and the colors still looked bad, no change. I then tried the external monitor test, and everything looked great on the external monitor (wish I’d tried that before replacing the video card). I found the Dell diagnostic disk and ran the video tests. I discovered a test that lets you play with the individual red, green, and blue colors, by using sliders to increase or decrease each individually, showing the individual color intensity in separate boxes, and the combined color in another box. This test showed that red and blue ramped up cleanly from no color to intense color for each. However, the green color did not have a smooth transition. By moving the green slider the green color would make jumps from low to high intensity, and back again, and at many points along the path it would display video noise over the color. This affected not only the individual green box, but also the box containing the combined colors. Since I just replaced the video card, with no change, I’d rule out the video card cable connection. Could this possibly be a cable problem, or connection problem on the LCD? I’m trying to decide what part to replace next, the cable or the screen, and those screens aren’t cheap. Or, could this be a motherboard problem? Any suggestions? Thanks!
February 11th, 2007 at 10:10 am
Rhys,
Looks like a bad screen. You’ll have to replace the screen.
February 11th, 2007 at 9:23 am
Eduardo,
I think it could be a video memory related problem. Do you know if this laptop has shared memory – part of the main memory is used for the video card? Try this. Reseat the memory module. If you have two RAM modules installed remove them one by one and test the laptop with each one. Find a known good memory stick (maybe you can borrow it from a friend) and test the laptop. If new memory doesn’t help then probably your guess is right. Something is wrong with the video card.