T430, no signal to LCD after hinge replacement

[neps]

I replaced my left hinge the other day, Everything was working fine afterwards, but I discovered that the lcd cable was jammed between the hinge and chassi. So i took it apart again and got the cable placed right. After this the lcd stopped working. It only lightens up the backlight.

VGA output works fine, and I can use the computer.

I ordered a new lcd cable, and replaced it, but same result. Now the [censored] hits the fan.

Could I have burnt something on the mainboard when the lcd cable got squeezed? Or is it just the LCD panel.

The panel is a easy replacment, but the mainboard is not.

What would you guys have done?

[Brad]

Welcome to the forum!

Sorry to hear you are having trouble.

You are asking what came first the chicken or the egg. Did the cable cause the LCD to stop working or the motherboard to stop working.

I am afraid I have no good answers for you. I had a similar problem. I threw parts at it. LCD's, motherboards and LCD cables.

Each replacement seemed to cause one of the other parts to fail.

I had a successful repair when I replaced all three parts at the same time

In my case I think a faulty LCD cable was the cause.

Of course your mileage may vary.

Your T430 should still be under warranty since they were released less than one year ago.

I recommend a call for service.

Brad

[neps]

Thanks for your reply!

Its still under warranty. I got the hinge for free. They estimated 2-3 weeks for the hinge job. So I decided to do it myself. I work as a IT tech/consultant so i thought this would be no problem.
However, now that its "my fault" that the LCD wont work, this is not covered by any warranty anymore.

do you know te FRU for the mainboard? I have the one with the Nvida 5400 card. I could check the price for it and see if its worth it. If not this will serve as a stationary computer at the office with vga.

[systemBuilder]

I am guessing that (1) You successfully replaced the hinge, but in the process of reassembly you pinched a wire inside of the LCD cable. As long as the wire was pinched, there was connectivity, and the laptop worked. (2) You disassembled the laptop to un-pinch the wire (maybe it was a screen data wire). This un-pinching disconnected the wire, so now the backlight is working but nothing is showing up on the screen. If this theory is correct, replacing the LCD cable should fix the problem. Make SURE to remove all batteries before starting this replacement as it's quite common to blow a fuse on the mainboard when connecting and disconnecting the LCD cable with power:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6174o ... lJTjQ/edit

Can you tell us how you eventually fixed the problem?