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.
If you find this article useful, please consider making a donation to the author. Thank you!
July 21st, 2007 at 12:13 pm
Jocelyn,
Yes, it’s still safe to operate but the crack will not go away by itself.
July 21st, 2007 at 7:29 am
So, I disassembled the screen, and found that there are blotches on the two layers nearest to the screen.
I would say it is mould: roundish, separate a.s.o.
Could someone advice on how to clean these transparent layers, please.
Another problem I have is that one of the sreens just does not work, that is to say the backlight is fine, but no image. I am sure that the inverter and the cable to the screen is OK, as they work properly with another screen.
Can I try to repair this. If yes, where to start with the diagnosis?
July 19th, 2007 at 12:12 pm
My dughters Inspiron 6000 has the black screen problem with (very) faint image. How can I tell if it’s the backlight or inverter which is bad and can the backlight be changed on this model without the horror story above ? Thanks for any help you can give, a local repair shop is quoting £180 for a fix !
July 18th, 2007 at 3:25 pm
Is a laptop with a crack lcd(accident) still safe to operate?? The computer still starts and operates as normal.
July 12th, 2007 at 11:42 am
Every body know, how I can convert my notebook LCD screen in a pc LCD ?
July 10th, 2007 at 9:15 pm
I’m not sure if it would even show up in a photo but I would be willing to try. Is there anyway to post the pics on here or link to them once I upload them to my laptop so you can see the spots and possibly identify the problem?
July 8th, 2007 at 5:45 pm
Cindy,
I don’t know. There is no way I can tell what is wrong without looking at the screen.
July 6th, 2007 at 3:33 pm
I ony Vaio FRV37 with possible moisture damage around the outer edge. I never had to clean the screen so I’m not sure if it is moisture. The damage- some spots with dark uneven middles that fade out then go dark at the outer edges – some are at least 1/2 inch in diameter. The extensive damage from right side across the top to left side and are darker at inside edge and lighter closer to bezel. All spots are very noticable on white background. I cannot find any examples of screen damage to compare. I need to know is this indeed water spots or LCD damage so I can fix it or replace it. I do have another undamage screen as replace but only as a last resort. Thanks for writing such an informative article.
July 6th, 2007 at 3:24 am
Hi! I have successfully transferred LCD screen from Inspiron 6000 to Inspiron 6400 but I had to take along inverter and video cable. I really like this particular screen and I wonder if it likely to be compatible with other brand laptops? I plan to upgrade to a santa rosa laptop and don’t want to limit my choices to Inspiron 1520. Thanks!
July 1st, 2007 at 11:01 pm
Kelly,
Probably the cheapest one you’ll find here. I just searched for “Latitude C640 screen” and found two LCDs, one for $85 and another one for $65. I think this cheap enough.