Boot Problems Toshiba Satellite M45-S351

[mapex]

Hi I've got a Toshiba Satellite M45-S351 that I bought back in 2005. It's been a great laptop until just recently. The laptop has a widescreen display but sometimes on boot it will boot as if the widescreen portion isn't there and only use a standard ratio leaving a black bar on the right hand side. This shows begining at the Toshiba splash screen and stays like that all the way until it actually boots into windows xp. Other times it will just become stuck at the Toshiba Splash screen. I can usually get a successful boot with a normal looking screen after a couple failed attempts and waiting about 15-20 seconds after powerdown. Fearing it was a symptom of a dying hard-drive or corrupt operating system I've already backed up all my data onto a external hard drive. I then updated the motherboard bios to the newest off of toshiba's website. Used the system recovery discs to reinstall the OS to fix any potential OS issues and updated all the drivers with newest from Toshiba. Is this a sign of the motherboard or screen going out? I'm really at a loss as to where to go from here. For the most part the laptop has been sitting on my desk for the past couple months so it hasn't been dropped or spilled on or anything else out of the usual. Thanks in advance for all your help!

 

[lostandwandering]

It sounds like a graphics card driver issue. What card is the laptop using? Go to the manufacturer's website and download the latest drivers for the card.

 

[mapex]

it's an integrated "Intel® Graphics Media Accelerator 900, 64-128MB Internal
(UMA) shared video memory" The graphics driver was among those that I installed from toshiba's website after the system recovery and the problem remained the same before and after the driver update. The last time they were updated was on 1/18/05.

 

[lostandwandering]

well that's interesting. Best thing I can suggest now is to contact Toshiba's support and let them deal with the problem.

 

[dougbx11]

Hi, I have the identical computer with the identical problem. I was wondering what you have done about it. If you wouldn't mind, plesae call me or email me directly and I have info that may help you and would like to compare notes with you to get this resolved. My phone is 425-451-0300 and my email is dbird2@qwest.net.

I was also told that it must be the video chipset on the motherboard and I think that it will cost $400-500 to get it replaced, ouch! I called MS TS and paid $60 for them to look into it and have talked to laptop experts too. I looked in eBay and found some MBs under $100 but the models do not match perfectly.

Have you check to see what the motherboard part number is?
Thanks, Doug.