Inspiron 9400 Display Problem - Help Please

ncjok

ncjok

ncjok

Associate
Joined
17 Jan 2004
Posts
483
Hi,
I'm having trouble diagnosing a display issue with an Inspiron 9400 laptop, a couple of pics are given below. Apologies for poor quality, they were captured by phone.

Symptoms are:
- Corrupted characters at the POST screen and thereafter while booting Windows.
- Windows XP will seemingly boot, and continuing hard drive activity leads me to think reasonably successfully, however following the "Loading Windows" screen the display goes completely dark - not just black, but as if there is zero signal to the screen.
- Safe Mode will boot successfully (in 800x600 res).
- Multicoloured corrupted pixels in Safe Mode.

Diagnosis so far:
- Memtest86+ (bootable CD) runs without any errors.
- Prime95 v25.9 'Blend' mode runs without any errors.
- FurMark won't run in Safe Mode.
- Replacement GFX card fitted: same issues (see post #4 for details).
- Display outputted to full size monitor. Graphical issues remain exactly the same (post #7).

Suggestions please to the cause of the problem and/or further tests to try.

Thanks!

F8 boot options screen
288a2i1.jpg


Windows XP Safe Mode @ 800x600
15ywt4m.jpg
 
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The fact you're getting this at the POST screen points squarely at hardware.
The fact that Windows fails to boot normally, but succeeds in Safe mode, makes me think that a graphics card failure (ties in with the corruption) has occurred, since the avoidance of loading drivers seems to work.

To be honest it's guesswork without swapping some things around, but the POST screen alone tells you that it's hardware. Your one option might be to try a BIOS flash off a boot disc, but I think that's optimistic to be honest.

Sorry I don't have better news!
 
"Chip reflow" sounded interesting.

Because I thought I was reasonably sure from the checks I had made I neglected to initially mention that I have already fitted a new GeForce 7800 card into the laptop tonight. I guess I was trying to save face :(

With the new card installed, the system displayed the same corruption at POST but did load Windows XP. However, because some sort of config change had been effected, Windows was running in 800x600. Images were pretty much identical to the photo captures above. Upon raising the resolution to my normal default the screen went blank. Back to square 1.

I've just put the old GFX card back in and am wondering if anyone has suggestions for further diagnosis.
 
Thanks for the replies.

Just tried outputting via the VGA connector to my main monitor. All graphical glitches are represented exactly the same.

MagicBoy said:
It's not the inverter or screen. Graphics chip or graphics RAM problem.
Click to expand...

I've tried a new GeForce 7800 (yes, £200+). Do you think I've got two dead cards?
 
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"Brand new", from Malaysia. As I'm guessing there's no retail ones about then the only assurance I have that it is actually new is the fact is it VERY clean - it looks unused to me.
 
Thought I'd dig this thread up to direct some thanks to beermonster; the diagnosis was spot on. In my ignorance I didn't concentrate too much on the graphics card once I had tried the replacement, but, as suggested, that one was probably faulty too!

Step 1 - Prepare
Tied the heat pipe down as it is only soldered to the heat plate.

Step 2 - Cook
10 minutes at 200°C.

Result
Dual boot, Win7-64 & Ubuntu Lucid.

I think we all felt the GFX card was at fault. It was just a matter of tackling it the right way :)
 
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