Broken Video Card on Laptop

[catacon]

I recently purchased a Toshiba Satillite 3005-S403. It was working fairly well until the screen stopped working. The laptop powers on, but when the screen turns on, it is completely white. I noticed if I press very hard or even hit the area where the video card is, the screen will come on briefly and sometimes stay on. My guess is that there is either a loose connection or the card is broken. I tried taking it apart to have a look, but I couldn't get the bottom plate off without forcing anything, and I didn't want to break it any more. Any ideas? What should I do?

[mairving]

Is the unit under warranty?

[glc]

What happens if you plug a monitor into the VGA port?

[catacon]

The laptop is not under warranty. I bought it used.

The display works fine when I plug a monitor into the VGA port.

[mairving]

Sounds like a bad connection. You might have to check with Toshiba on disassembling the case to fix your connection problem. Depending on your skill level, you might have to take it in to a repair shop.

[catacon]

I noticed that if I pull up on the monitor that the screen stays on, but if I move it it goes white again. This probably just confirms the loose connection. I will look around and see if I can find anything about disassembling the case.

Thanks for the help.

[catacon]

I have it open now and I took off the connector to the screen and blew on the connector and reattached it. The screen come on now, but is very finnicky. It seems that if a loosen the connection it works better than if it is too tight. I can't teel if the problem is with the XGA connector and with the circuit board itself. Any ideas?

[flanzig1]

If the connector is to a flat ribbon cable, then there may be a broken trace or a pin connection bad or broken.

[catacon]

Well the screen problem seems to pretty much under control. The white screen still happens a little is much less sensitive now. However, a few other problems have arisen. First off, the five key (which had not been working right since I got it) has almost completely stopped working. I have to apply tons of pressure to it in order for it to work. Second, the switch that turns the screen off when the lid is closed broke off and so the screen no longer shuts off. Third, half of the keyboard periodically seems to stop working. When I had it apart, one of the keyboard ribbon connectors came out very easily, which I thought might be the problem. As you can tell, this laptop is now in very poor shape (some of it my fault). So my question is this: Is there any way that I could get a barebones laptop, one that has only the case (screen, keyboard, etc.), motherboard, processor, and drive caddies and then use the parts from my current laptop with that one? The memory, hard drive, disk drives, etc. all work still.

Thanks.

[glc]

See why I discourage buying used laptops? Was there *any* kind of warranty offered? I'll buy refurbs though as long as there's some kind of warranty.

[catacon]

No, it didn't come with any warranties.