Techno Jellies, what do you make of this? [details inside]?
I was given a Toshiba Satellite A45-S250, no, it isn’t brand new. Everything works great that I can see. However, when you 1st boot it up for about 1\250th of a second the screen projects bight and clear like you would expect. Then it dims out for about 3 seconds, then goes dark. If you act as if you will close the screen down and reopen it, the screen tried to light up again. I can use an external monitor, and it works fine. What do you make of it? I am leaning towards a hardware failure of some sort, but not being real familiar with laptops I wonder if it is a software thing?
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LCD screens require a backlight. Quite often, particularly on older screens, this is basically the equivalent of a fluorescent tube. Sounds to me like the tube has failed.
3rding the backlight dieing. The laptop is old enough that replacing it would cost more then buying a better laptop.
I had a old ass iBook that had the same thing happen. I just took off the screen and plugged in a external monitor. It was a great kitchen computer.
@Lightlyseared Off your information, I was able to do some digging on the NET, Oh, you hafta love the Net, you can find ALMOST anything on it, that more than likely it is the LCD inverter. Good thing, you can order on and install it with out too much trouble, well, not for me, I built many computers so I can say I am mechanically handy. Yeah, it is an old laptop by technical standards, but until it get to the point no useful work can be done on it, I try to keep computers in service and away from the landfill. At some point in the future I can pass this one to someone who needs a laptop if just for school, or homework. If they have nothing, something, even an old something, trumps that. ;-)
The back-light is fine, the proof is visible when it goes bright.
I’m Guessing, through experience that your fault is with a leaky capacitor in the inverter circuit (the circuitry that connects directly to the back-light)
If your keen you can dis-assemble the laptop and check for any capacitors that show sings of leakage (usually a slight bulge on top) then replace.
Or you can just continue to get use of the laptop by plugging in an external monitor.
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