Yesterday took apart and repaired my notebook LCD screen with water damage. The screen itself was working just fine but it had two different problems.
- previous owner spilled water on the laptop. Somehow the water got inside the LCD screen and left stains inside the screen. The water marks were very noticeable on a white background and it was very irritating.
- the screen also had dust and lint inside also very noticeable on a white background. I have no idea how it got in there but I decided to clean it up too.
To fix both problems I had to open up the LCD screen. This was my first experience on opening a notebook screen. I was pretty confident because I didn’t really care if I break the screen, I just wanted to know if it’s possible to fix it.
Warning: the LCD screen can be easily damaged if you open it up. If you do something wrong the screen might become completely unusable and you’ll have to buy a new screen. It’s very expensive. Think twice before you decide opening the screen. Continue at your own risk.
Here’s my Dell Latitude D610 notebook with water damaged screen I’m going to take apart.
First of all remove the battery from the notebook.
Lift up rubber screw seals and remove all screws.
Carefully separate the screen bezel from the LCD cover and remove the bezel.
Remove two screws from the front and two screws from both sides.
Carefully remove the LCD screen from the cover and place it on the notebook base. Disconnect the video cable and the inverter board cable.
On this model the inverter board is attached to the screen with two screws. Remove both screws, disconnect the screen cable and remove the inverter board.
Carefully peel off sticky tape and foil and put it aside. You’ll have to put it back in place during the screen reassembly.
Remove two screws from both sides of the screen.
Carefully place the screen upside down on a flat surface. Carefully unglue the film that covers the circuit board and remove two screws from the board (top circles). I wasn’t really sure if I have to remove screws on the bottom, so I removed them just in case. Do not touch the circuit board with fingers.
After both screws are removed you should be able to lift up the circuit board. Be careful, it’s still attached to the LCD.
Start unsnapping the metal frame from the screen. There are a lot of latches on all sides of the screen. You can unlock them with nails or a small flat head screwdriver.
After all latches are opened you should be able to separate the screen into three pieces: metal frame, LCD and background (not sure about correct technical name).
If you have lint or dust inside the screen, probably you’ll find it between the LCD and the background. Do not touch LCD or background with your fingers. I was able to remove dust and lint up with a very soft cloth, barely touching the LCD and background surfaces.
After I split the screen I found that the background has a few some kind of optical layers (three transparent sheets) and in my case they were damaged by water. The water dried out and left stains between these optical layers.
In my case removing dust and lint wasn’t enough and I had to go further.
Very carefully separate the LCD with attached circuit board from the background.
To remove damaged optical layers it’s necessary to remove metal locks on both sides of the screen. It’s like a small clip that keeps layers in place.
After I removed both clips, I was able to look between the layers. At first I tried to clean up the dried water marks with a soft cloth but it didn’t help. The stains were still visible and didn’t want to go away.
Fortunately I had another similar screen laying around, it had a cracked LCD. I decided to borrow the optical layers from the cracked screen and transfer them to my screen. I wasn’t sure if it’s going to work, but as I mentioned before I didn’t really care if I break the screen. It was just an experiment.
So I disassembled the cracked screen and carefully transferred the white background and all transparent layers to my screen.
After that I assembled my screen back removing dust and lint with a very soft cloth. Breathlessly connected my new screen to the notebook. Turned it on and…
That’s a miracle, it works!
No dust, no lint, no water mars inside the screen! It’s clear and the background is absolutely clean!
My donor screen had a cracked LCD but it had a good working backlight tube. The backlght tube is very fragile and it’s located inside a metal casing. I didn’t remove the backlight tube, I just broke off the entire metal casing from the plastic frame. I’m going to use this backlight tube for testing purposes.
If you fixing a Dell laptop yourself, probably you’ll need a service manual. Some Dell service manuals provide step-by-step laptop disassembly instructions.
Are you looking for a new screen? You can find very inexpensive brand new LCD screens here, just search for your laptop model.
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August 27th, 2007 at 10:33 pm
How I will replace the LCD backlight of my laptop DELL inspiron 510
Thank you.
August 26th, 2007 at 9:19 am
Joe Clatch,
On witch laptop? Take a look here – laptop service manuals.
August 26th, 2007 at 9:15 am
Jeff Trost,
At this point it’s hard to tell which one is causing the problem. Your laptop worked fine for 2 days after you replaced the inverter board, so I would try replacing the inverter board again. It’s possible you purchased a defective inverter board.
Make sure the lid close switch (button witch turns off the backlight when the display is closed) is clean and it works when you press on it with your fingers. A dirty lid close switch might get stuck inside and the backlight will not turn on even after the display is open. Clean the switch.
August 26th, 2007 at 9:09 am
Melissa,
First of all, clean the heatsink/cooling fans with compressed air. Spray air inside the air intakes on the bottom until the cooling module is clean. It’s possible that your cooling module is completely clogged with dust and the laptop overheats because of that.
You said the screen doesn’t look right. Does it happen only when the laptop is hot? How about video on the external monitor, it looks bad too?
August 26th, 2007 at 8:37 am
How do you access the motherboard to install a CPU? Any ideas?
August 25th, 2007 at 4:39 pm
My DV1000 screen went dark (with faint images of the screen) 2 weeks ago – I ordered a new inverter (from invertercentral.com) that was supposedly compatible with my DV. Replaced the inverter and found out that the old one didn’t have the exact same number as the new one.
The screen powered up, worked fine for about 2 days – now back to dark/faint.
Is this an inverter problem (still)? or is this a backlight problem? or neither? What should I do?
August 22nd, 2007 at 3:26 pm
hi,
a few weeks ago a family member left my laptop in a postion where no air could come out of the ventilators. when i discovered this my laptop was really hot. Now my laptop will begin to heat up and won’t cool down unless i shut it off. Also, my computer screen doesn’t look right. It’s hard to see, especially on darker backgrounds. how can i fix this?
August 20th, 2007 at 6:51 am
>i turn on the power, the Caps-Lock and Scroll-Lock lights turn on, >and so do the power and HDD lights. about 5 or so seconds later, >the thing powers off
dear Wajih ur Rahman
im my case (inspiron 8100, same symptoms) it was short circuit on the mainboard, precisely there was very tiny coppaer braid wire which was stuck in the memory module socket and had probabyl also contact to the main board. after removing this everything was just fine again,
greeting, altaa
August 19th, 2007 at 9:57 pm
Hello,
I’ve cleaned my laptop (an HP nx9105), like I do as usual, with a special product for screen and pc (a foam).
Some product have entered under the screen and I have now a white light transparent stain at the bottom left corner.
Do you think I can dismount the screen to clean it ?
Regards
August 18th, 2007 at 9:53 pm
MikeD,
I assume it’s not a software/settings relate problem.
Could be a connection issue between the motherboard and the screen. First, I would try reseating the video cable connector on the motherboard, it’s easier to access this one. Second, I would check the connection between the video cable and the LCD screen. To access this one, you’ll have to open up the display assembly and take a look on the back side of the screen. Make sure the video cable is plugged in correctly, all the way inside the socket.
If reseating the cable doesn’t help, I would try replacing it.