Messed Up LCD on Presario 700, Please Help Me Diagnose.

[Pantha37]

http://www.geocities.com/pantha_37/computer/presario700.html <--Pictures and Video.
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?docname=c00009633&dlc=en&lc=en&product=95525&lang=en&cc=us&printable=yes& <-- Product Specs.
I'll try and tell the story as best I can. First this is my friend Steve's laptop. How now has no internet and I'm trying to help him out. He spilled a glass of water from the left side of the keyboard to the right. He said the water only got on the keyboard. Right after he turned off the computer, turned it upside down and took out the battery, RAM and had disk. Then he turned it sideways and blew a fan on it. He would flip the laptop from one side to the next every few min. He removed the keyboard and inspected for moisture. The laptop is now dry but the LCD is degrading. At first, it was barely noticeable, but now the laptop is unuseable. He plugged an external monitor up to the the laptop. The BIOS came up fine, but windows requires that he turns on an external monitor on his system so he couldn't check windows. During the degradation process the computer itself acted normal. Is the LCD busted or is it some other device? Thanks in advance!

[SkyDog]

I don't think it's the LCD itself. Normally, when the LCD itself is damaged, either you have a picture or you don't, or a whole part of the screen stays screwed up. (Unless the backlight is dying, but that wouldn't look like what you're seeing.)

I'd suspect that one of the small ribbon cables that connect the video output and/or inverter to the LCD isn't making good contact. Maybe the spill isn't entirely dry in every little crack & crevice, or some impurity got into a connector because of the spill. Depending on how the laptop's circuit boards are connected, it's possible the same might apply to a board-to-board pin connection instead of a ribbon cable.

I'd probably start by disassembling and reassembling the laptop, making sure everything is dry and clean in the process.

[Pantha37]

My friend used his laptop with an external monitor. He left town for 2 weeks and left his laptop on by accident. He came back and the LCD was working again. Did the laptop just melt off what ever crap was on there?

[kent1146]

From your story, I suspect that SkyDog is right. Water probably got into a little crevicice, or a conenctor port for the LCD ribbon cable. Over two weeks, that little bit of water probably just dried up. Since it cleared itself up, I doubt that there was any sort of impurity that cuased the problem.

Just be glad that the problem fixed itself, pray that there is no permanent damage, and tell your friend to be more careful next time!

[Johnmcl7]

That was certainly an interesting way of sorting the problem...

How long did you leave it for initially when the LCD didn't work?

John

[Pantha37]

Just be glad that the problem fixed itself, pray that there is no permanent damage, and tell your friend to be more careful next time!Well It was my cat that knocked the glass of water over.
That was certainly an interesting way of sorting the problem...
How long did you leave it for initially when the LCD didn't work?
JohnDunno, it happened in Feb and got fixed in April-May.

[Johnmcl7]

Ah right, didn't notice the large gaps in the posting dates!

John

[kent1146]

Well It was my cat that knocked the glass of water over.
Dunno, it happened in Feb and got fixed in April-May.


Hmmm... your first post makes it sound like it was his laptop, and he knocked a glass of water over. Now, it's your cat that knocked it over... hmmm.... ;)

Don't worry, champ. It happens to the best of us.

[Johnmcl7]

Judging by other forums, spilling liquids on keyboards is a fairly common occurrence!

John