Inspiron 1545 display problems

[RJM]

I am repairing a Dell Inspiron 1545 for a friend of mine's 17 year old son who dropped it, breaking the screen. He replaced the screen but now it has these problems with some pink backgrounds and some pix elated dots. See pictures attached. Laptup are from the laptop screen, monitor are from an external monitor plugged into the laptop.

  The problem also appears on the BIOS setup screen so it does not appear to be a driver problem.

 

  The LCD internal tests run fine, all screen colors are pure and correct.

 

Internal self test gives the error code 2000-0413 No LCD cable detected.

 

Do you think this is only a cable problem or something more serious because the laptop was dropped?

 

Laptop left pics --- Ext. Monitor RT. pics

Edited June 2, 2015 by RJM

[Tripredacus]

It might be possible that the cable is not seated properly.

[jaclaz]

Which video card has it?

By any chance a Nvidia GeForce GO (possibly a 5200 or 5700)?

 

Some of these cards (of course proprietary) have a known issue that through a clever combination of manufacturing issues, poor cooling or both tend to overheat, to the point that the BGA contacts become defective.

 

BUT usually this affects (with not so much different symptoms) both the internal display and the external connection, so while it is possible that the issue is the same it is hard to definitely say it is.

 

IF the issue is the BGA, nothing but a reflow of the GPU will solve it (and of course replacements for the proprietary cards are either not available or sold at "crazy" prices).  

 

A DIY/poor man's reflow of the chip is possible:

http://www.laptoprepair101.com/fix-laptop-motherboard-with-failed-nvidia-graphics-chip/

http://www.addictivetips.com/hardware/fix-your-graphics-card-by-baking-in-oven/

though of course risky and without any guarantee it will work, whilst a professional one is likely to go into the hundreds of bucks

 

jaclaz

[RJM]

Thank you for your replies. I taped and reseated the cable on both ends and it still has the problem. I'll probably just give it back to her as both the battery and keyboard are bad. It was built in 2008.

Edited June 4, 2015 by RJM

[puntoMX]

Replaced with a bad screen or cable indeed, hard to tell. Good the "newer" LCD screens with LED backlight have a more standard plug these days but the older, CCFL, ones can be a pain to test on another laptop. Clean the contacts on the cable connector, that might help.