My laptops screen went haywire last night? v.suggestions

[nicklk]

So my Dell Inspiron 8600 went bizurco last night out of the blue, I was uploading pics from my vacation to the hard drive and then the display went all fucked up....like this:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v154/nicklk/1187800288.jpg

Is this the video card? Are they intergrated or are they easily replaceable on a laptop?

Thanks in advance, I suck at the computers

[STIBungy]

Do you have an external monitor? You can try to hook that up to assist in troubleshooting. What you see on the screen looks like either a screen gone bad or bad connection in the ribbon cable. Is it under warranty?

[Kwando]

i suspect a ribbon cable also. my friend has fixed a lot of laptops, if you want his info, i can send it to you.

[nicklk]

Do you have an external monitor? You can try to hook that up to assist in troubleshooting. What you see on the screen looks like either a screen gone bad or bad connection in the ribbon cable. Is it under warranty?

I've gotta monitor I can mess with tonight.

Its outta warranty, its close to 3-4 years old so ya.

[Bedlam]

I've gotta monitor I can mess with tonight.

Its outta warranty, its close to 3-4 years old so ya.

Its a real easy fix, try an external monitor real quick first, if thats ok I'd bet money that the cable just needs to be re-seated. I did like 1000 of those fixes and pc club..its pretty painless on most dells. (IE a decent tech should be able to do it in like 20 mins..max) I could even do it for you sometime if you want for a beer or something..or perhaps give you instructions on what you are looking for if you want to try it yourself (its really not very hard)

[Weston-work]

The video card is almost certainly integrated into the motherboard, but I'd suspect the ribbon cable too... it's a moving part and a bad one can produce these symptoms. As others have said, try an external monitor to verify that the system is otherwise functioning properly.

[nicklk]

Thanks everyone on yoru suggestions! I will look at it tonight and let ya know!

[Terry]

Don't forget to shake it.

[Aracheon]

Don't forget to shake it.


A few cuss words also help.

[nicklk]

Ya, looks like my video card......I shaked, cussed, and checked with another monitor and nothing happened. Its giving a bunch of weird pictures on the screen and nothing is happening, I checked the connections on the computer....nothing. Fuckin A

[Bedlam]

Ya, looks like my video card......I shaked, cussed, and checked with another monitor and nothing happened. Its giving a bunch of weird pictures on the screen and nothing is happening, I checked the connections on the computer....nothing. Fuckin A

There arent really stand alone video card devices in laptops. I've been kinda busy with work but I'd certainly tear into it and see if I could see anything obvious with it if you want? Normally its either all or nothing with a notebook, are you getting a post beep or anything on startup? Fans and hard drives spinning up?

Also, at the VERY least I have a 2.5" hdd portable case so we could yank out the hdd and get your data off there. Not sure what part of town you live in, but if you want to do something with it..let me know. Otherwise, you can normally buy a new motherboard off e-bay or any of the dell refurb places online pretty cheap. Depends on how much time/money you want to put into it I guess.

[nicklk]

Thanks man! My brother works for a computer company and we took it apart tonight....its got a seperate video card from the mother board which I am stoked about! I'm pretty positive its just the video card because the fans were still operating and everything, just the graphcis on the screen were fucked up.

He can get a new graphics card for about $80 so we shall see if it resolves it, so currently I have this

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v154/nicklk/1187929125.jpg

[guessinthe2000]

Wanna buy a new one? my bro is selling his for 700... LMK by PM

[nicklk]

Na, its cool. Thanks for the offer though!