D830 Display Problem

Question

I have a Dell Latitude D830 that I normally run from a Dell docking station using the Laptop's display.  Several days ago, the display suddenly went dark for no apparent reason.  I could still see (barely) information on the screen.  The computer appeared to function normally as I could see my mouse cursor and could still get menus to come up when I selected them with the mouse, but the back-lighting appeared to be turned off.  The only way to restore the brightness was to either turn the computer off and reboot, or close the laptop, wait for it to enter standby, and then reopen it.  Once the computer woke up the screen brightness was fine for a while and then poof, it suddenly went dark again as if someone had turned off a light switch.  When I un-docked the computer and ran it from the internal battery, the problem did not occur.  I'm not sure if it's a setting problem, hardware or software.  I am running Windows Vista Ultimate with SP1.  Anybody have any ideas?

RonCau · Answer

I have this same problem.  Need help!

txdoughboy · Answer

I have the same problem BUT IN REVERSE. The display works perfectly well when I am docked. When undocked, the PC MAY display well with the back-light going dim occasionally - a slight movement of the screen (hinge) MAY turn the back-light ON again. There is no regular pattern here.

When I insert the live PC into the docking station when it is ON... the back-light does NOT come on.

When I reboot/restart the PC when IN the docking station - the back-light seems to come on and remain on.

The Ambient Light Sensor is disabled in Windows (in the Bios ??)

Help??

Locked Topics – Laptops General

Was this post helpful?