Solved! Is the graphics card dead?

[lazyngrumpy]

I have a friend who has a Samsung NP R700 laptop, that upon start up, all that shows are thin, gray vertical lines. After a minute or so the lines start to show some color. I can hear the windows start up sound, but that's all. Just the vertical colored lines remain. My guess is that the laptop has overheated and since I can hear windows starting up, that the only problem is in the graphics card. Would I be correct in my assumption?

Thanks.

Samsung R700
250GB HD
Intel Core 2 Duo T5450 1.66 GHz
2GB Ram 17in. display
Nvidia Geforce 8400M GS 128MB

 

[frozenlead]

No. It sounds like your LCD is damaged. What happens when you plug in an external monitor?

 

[lazyngrumpy]

Yea, I haven't tried that yet. That will be the very next thing I try. Thank you

 

[lazyngrumpy]

Ok, here goes. Prior to hooking up an external monitor, I turned the laptop on again, this time the vertical bars showed up again, but by the time windows booted up, they went away. The desktop was back. I thought i would put in a dvd just to see what would happen, and just as I thought...as soon as I got through the menu and to the main movie, the screen blacks out. I can still see the desktop in the background, but inside my movie player window...nothing, just audio.
Now, I am back to square one...I think the graphic card is shot.

 

[frozenlead]

The movie being black likely doesn't have anything to do with your GPU if the rest of your desktop was fine. Try using a different player/movie.

The bars are gone though?

 

[ibanezbass]

Nope sounds like the graphics card. Did the image lockup when you started the movie player? Or glitch out?

INFO: Nvidia 8400m/8600m were defective and all tend to burn out over a year to two period. Unfortunately the only way to fix it is to replace your motherboard, or easier, the whole laptop.

 

[frozenlead]

Nope sounds like the graphics card. Did the image lockup when you started the movie player? Or glitch out?

INFO: Nvidia 8400m/8600m were defective and all tend to burn out over a year to two period. Unfortunately the only way to fix it is to replace your motherboard, or easier, the whole laptop.

I don't believe there are nearly enough test results to say that.

Also, you can generally repair the defective G84/86 chips with a solder reflow or the much-less-expensive oven bake.