Why is my Thinkpad screen flickering so much?

June 3, 2007 3:02 PM

Help me figure out why my laptop screen is flickering (madly).

Here's a YouTube video showing my Thinkpad R40. As you can see, the screen is flickering a lot. Other times, my laptop will boot up just fine, I'll log into my XP account, and then suddenly the screen will flicker for about two seconds, and the screen will just freeze up.

Anyone know what's causing these problems? I believe I have the right video/graphic drivers installed---the machine worked fine for four or five months before the flickering started. Also, for anyone who's certain it's some *X* or *Y* causing the problem, is there a cheap replacement part that I should buy, and would it be easy for me to install?

I went to a Best Buy Geek Squad to get this fixed; they charged me 40 bucks to "re-seat" something; the flicker came back right after I left the Best Buy, though, and to be honest, I was too frustrated to return to the store. If I can, I want to avoid paying hundreds of dollars to fix this thing.

posted by n_s_1 to computers & internet (9 comments total)

That's an interesting failure mode for an LCD, much more common for a CRT.

Functionally, it looks like your display isn't getting the correct timing information. That means that one or more cables that run between the lower keyboard portion of your laptop and the hinged display are broken.

The fault could be at any of three places (per wire/cable):
1. At the terminal on the motherboard/graphics card (some laptops do actually have separate graphics cards).
2. In the middle of the cable, where it bends with the hinge, or passes over sharp components
3. At the terminal in the display.

If you flex the display back and forth, does it fix your issue?
You have three options:

0. Open the laptop, and fiddle with the cable, seeing if you can make things better. You might make things worse, but you might not.
1. Open the laptop, and install a new cable assembly. Obviously the same dangers associated with (0) are present here.
2. Take the machine to a proper IBM service depot. Forget the BS technicans at any electronics shop, you want authorized IBM* dudes (likely a 3rd party service provider, but still IBM's designated agents) fixing your laptop.

*well, Lenovo, now.
posted by b1tr0t at 3:18 PM on June 3, 2007

It's very likely the ribbon cable running from the motherboard to the LCD. I think it's replaceable. You can get the service manual from their site and disassemble it for inspection.

I'm presuming it's not still under warranty. If it is, make it Lenovo's problem. If you can (which I don't think you can if it's now out of warranty) you could buy Lenovo's extended warranty for a fee, but the fix probably wouldn't be that expensive anyway, it's just a couple dollar part in all likelihood.
posted by wierdo at 6:46 PM on June 3, 2007

Oh, wow. I've been a computer guy for a long time and I've never seen that before (on and LCD).

It's very possibly a broken cable -- they get flexed constantly, obviously. But they're also designed for robustness and you rarely see one fail unless there's been some kind of abuse (dropped 'top, etc.).

If you are an experienced computer hardware person (e.g. you've at least replaced a hard drive or installed a CD or multimedia card), opening the laptop up and having a look may be worth it, assuming it's beyond warranty service. The Best Buy trip suggests that's the case. If you've only -- say -- added some RAM before, I wouldn't necessarily attempt this.

Opening laptops is a much trickier process than opening a desktop case, though, and you have to be ready to keep close track of screws (which may be of different lengths or diameters) and make damn sure you don't lose anything or accidentally break a crucial plastic holder-in-placer, and oftentimes getting the keyboard parts back in the correct alignment is a headache. So, fair warning. But you could open it up and find that the ribbon cable just doesn't stay in place anymore or something like that. If you're especially brave you can boot up the laptop while open and directly fiddle with the cable to see if it's the problem.

(If the cable connection inside the screen part of the laptop is bad, this is even more advanced stuff and I don't recommend opening that part up. The screen itself is basically a unitary device worth half the price of the laptop and you probably won't be able to fix the connection there.)

This could tell you whether the cable is something to try replacing, or whether (possibly) it's just the video card that's gone wrong. If it's the card, you're probably not going to be able to replace it -- in most cases it's an integrated component.
posted by dhartung at 8:50 PM on June 3, 2007

To completely eliminate the chance of bad drivers, you should attempt to boot into XP's 'Safe' mode. Your movie doesn't show when the problem starts. When is the earliest you've seen it do that? Has it ever happened before Windows starts booting?

the screen will just freeze up.
Does the software also freeze? If it's just a cable problem, I believe your programs shouldn't be affected.
posted by philomathoholic at 9:05 PM on June 3, 2007

Here's the manual. - I'm a big fan of printing out the relevant pages and taping the (screws/small parts) directly to the instructions (with packing tape) where they're mentioned, but others prefer egg cups or ice cube trays.

I don't see any mention of a video daughter card - Apparently if you pull the keyboard, you can get to where the screen plugs into the motherboard. I'd definitely try reseating that if the safe-mode boot advice above dosn't work. Matter-of-fact, the 'LCD-related-systems' troubleshooting guide (p56) suggests resetting all the LCD related plugs, but it looks like the other two wires in the diagram are to the WiFi and BT antennas.
posted by Orb2069 at 11:08 PM on June 3, 2007 [1 favorite]

Thanks for all the advice! Unfortunately, my computer screen isn't even showing an image anymore...when I turn it on now, the Thinkpad just beeps loudly three times. Nothing shows up on the screen. Fairly sure this is hardware failure. I might bring the machine to an authorized service provider, or might just sell this for parts.

Either way, I'd like to get my data off this laptop, so, last question for any of you still following this thread: I can just hook this up to an external monitor, right?

Thanks again for trying to help.
posted by n_s_1 at 12:11 AM on June 4, 2007

I can just hook this up to an external monitor, right?

At this point, perhaps not. Hopefully it is beeping three times to give you some error message that you can use to diagnose the problem and ignore by pressing F1 or something. You won't know until you try.

You may need to get a 2.5" ATA USB enclosure to put the hard drive in to hook it up to another computer.

Also, Geek Squad sucks. Ask for a refund.
posted by grouse at 1:53 AM on June 4, 2007

Those beeps definitly mean that it's a hardware issue. See this current thread for information on saving your data from your hard drive.
posted by philomathoholic at 7:55 AM on June 4, 2007

Thanks for the help. Think my laptop is toast, but I'm grateful for the lead re saving my data.
posted by n_s_1 at 12:50 AM on June 5, 2007