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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September 27th, 2008 at 8:48 am
The screen on my Toshiba M105-S3084 suddenly goes slightly dim and grayish in color and sometimes goes almost totally black, with slight splashes of color. At first it would do this off and on and would correct itself at random times, but now it is dim from start-up and doesn’t fix itself anymore. If I push on the top right corner of the screen casing and pull on the left top corner it goes back to normal, but only as long as I am pushing/pulling. It works fine with an external monitor. I had a person open the screen and check the connections, but the problem persists.
My wife has a M105-S3041, so I’m wondering if it would be worth swapping the screens to verify if my screen needs replacement; do you recommend this as a first step or do you think it is something else?
September 26th, 2008 at 8:11 pm
hi, ive got a compaq presario v6000 , the bottom quarter of the screen is like all mixes up and u cant see the colors, just a mix of the color that should be there, top bit of screen works perfectly do u think this can be fixes if so whats wrong?
September 23rd, 2008 at 5:16 pm
My screen broke, it fell it broke. It is a Tecra A3 S611. I have been trying to find the screen to replace it and I know it has to be somewhere for less than 159.00 where can I find it?
Please help!!
September 21st, 2008 at 10:22 pm
Maurice,
Could be related to the video cable, possibly loose connection between the cable and screen. You can try reconnecting the video cable on the back of the LCD screen.
If reseating the cable will not help, apparently it’s bad LCD. From my experience,video cable failures are not very common.
September 20th, 2008 at 9:57 pm
I have a compaq laptop that suddenly started showing thick white vertical lines down the screen. You can connect the laptop to an external monitor and see a perfectly fine display however on the second monitor. The laptop monitor now looks like this.
Just wondering it you think its just the screen. Thanks for any help you can provide.
September 20th, 2008 at 11:45 am
Kieran,
You’ll have to test the laptop with an external monitor. If you have the same problem on both internal LCD screen AND external monitor, most likely there is a problem with the video card. Most laptops have integrated video, in other words the video card is a part of the system board.
If external video works fine and your problem appears only on the laptop LCD, most likely it’s related to the LCD screen.
September 20th, 2008 at 11:39 am
Trev,
I’ve seen this kind of failure a few times before and from my experience it’s related to the LCD screen.
It’s not related to the inverter board. The screen lights up, so backlight lamp and inverter work properly. Bad video cable? I guess it’s possible but I don think so. In my case I tested the old screen with a new video cable and it didn’t fix the problem.
Nope, I swapped just the LCD screen, not the assembly. The new screen worked fine with old cable and inverter.
September 18th, 2008 at 9:55 pm
[...] Related post: Laptop has bad video on the LCD screen. What is wrong? [...]
September 17th, 2008 at 8:12 pm
Was looking at your info RE: bad video on Laptop LCD screens. I think, based on what you wrote above, that I have an issue with my system board, but would like your take on my problem before getting a new one. When I power up my Toshiba Laptop everything comes up fine. After a few minutes however, the icons on the desktop start getting fuzzy, and eventually the screen goes blank. If I try to start the Laptop up I get a distroirted image on the initial windows login screen. If I wait an hour or 2, I can start the laptop, and get to the desktop before teh screen goes fuzzy again. Any ideas what may be the issue. Any help greatly appreciated..
September 17th, 2008 at 3:36 am
I have same problem, theres like some cables or somehting thats not correctly cnected, in the middle upper of the screen put ur fingers and press alitle hard it might work; it worked for me xD