Vertical Lines, like barcode on lower half of TP701CS LCD

[mirf]

I've trawled around for a bit looking for info on this and I notice someone has in fact had similar errors with upper and lower half of the screen on a different thinkpad model.

The problem is (and this doesn't happen all the time) that the lower half of the screen turns to vertical lines that look like a coloured barcode. The colours always correspond directly to the colours being used at the time. It actually looked quite pretty when the malfunction occured during a game of Commander Keen!

When I went to bed last night the screen was playing up, this morning I switched on again and everything was fine. This leads me to believe that there is more than just a loose connection.

Is it worth me buying a 755 (there is one on ebay ending in 8 hours) and replacing my 701 screen with the one from the 755? Are the 2 screens in fact interchangeable at all? If it not the screen at fault but the video controller (or something?) would I be able to replace the faulty part with parts from the 755?

Any pointers would be useful.

Thanks

[AlphaKilo470]

As far as interchanging parts between the 701CS and the 755, I wouldn't count on it. If I were you, I'd download the hardware maintenence manual and take the computer apart and make sure all the connections are seated properly. I'd unplug all the video connections completly make sure there's no dust in the connection and reseat the connection firmly.

If you are 100% positive that the problem is not a connection issue, then it's most likely to be the cable itself going from the computer to the LCD or the problem coiuld be the LCD inverter.

If you need any parts for your machine, I'd look for an incomplete 701c (not cd) on eBay with an LCD screen. Unlike the cs, the 701c has a much nicer looking longer lasting TFT screen.

[thinkie]

Mirf,

My i1441 once exhibited behavior somewhat similar, in that the upper inch of the display would suddenly show many green vertical lines. This would happen after being left on for hours, and getting quite warm. For that reason, I decided to d/l and install a program called cpuidle (at the time, was running w98se) which purported to idle the cpu part of the time, resulting in cooler operation. Never had the green lines when running cpuidle.

Have subsequently upgraded to w2k pro, which I understand automatically idles the cpu part of the time; have not had the green line thing happen since the upgrade about two months ago.

I've tentatively concluded that the display anomaly in my machine was caused by excessive heat in the gpu and video memory, as the cpu and gpu share the same heat sink. The display seems to be fine now. Your situation may be different. fyi.

Good luck!