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Inspiron 2200 screen goes blank on ACpower
Yesterday my girlfriend's laptop display started blanking out immediately after booting! I booted into Safe Mode and did a system restore to a few days ago and I thought that worked 'cause she was able to start using it, but then after about ten minutes it went blank again. I tried hooking up an external monitor but it acted the same way with it. Then I discovered that the display doesn't go blank when the laptop is unplugged and operating on the battery, except that the screen is a little dimmer because of the battery-save power settings.
I ran a virus scan (no infected files found) and I tried a different power supply, still no change.
Awhile back, she was having an apparrent problem with the power supply i.e. her laptop would switch from AC power to battery, but if she jiggled the connector that would usually fix it, but I ordered a new power supply for her and that fixed that problem.
Her laptop is running Windows XP SP3
Any idea what the problem might be?
Thanks
Ray
ejn63
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June 8th, 2010 16:00
It's either a bad inverter or a bad mainboard - the former is under $20, while the latter is about $200, so start with the inverter.
lunaray
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June 8th, 2010 21:00
Thanks! But if it's the inverter, shouldn't it work with an external monitor? The inverter only controls the laptop display, right?
ejn63
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June 9th, 2010 04:00
Yes, it is more likely a faulty mainboard - but it could still be an inverter problem, and given that the inverter is inexpensive, while a mainboard probably means a new system on something this old and low-end, you might want to try the inverter first.