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Fucking weirdass laptop/monitor issue

ThanatosThanatos Registered User regular
edited March 2010 in Help / Advice Forum
So, I have a laptop with a busted monitor that I'm attempting to get working with an external monitor. Whenever I boot it up in regular mode, the hard drive stops working and the monitor goes dark. If I boot it into safe mode, it will work up until the login screen, and I don't think I've been able to manage to login yet. If I have an external monitor hooked up to it when I turn it on, it won't boot at all. If I try to switch it to an external monitor after it boots, it seems to shut off (no hard drive activity), and won't let me switch back.

I think it's probably borked, but I figured I'd ask, see if anyone had any ideas. It's a four-year-old Toshiba laptop running Windows XP SP2. I've tried it with multiple monitors and cables.

Thanatos on

Posts

  • ApogeeApogee Lancks In Every Game Ever Registered User regular
    edited March 2010
    Are you intending to keep using it as a computer, or do you just want access to get your stuff of it? If the altter, just yank the HD out and mount it on another computer.

    Apogee on
  • ThanatosThanatos Registered User regular
    edited March 2010
    Apogee wrote: »
    Are you intending to keep using it as a computer, or do you just want access to get your stuff of it? If the altter, just yank the HD out and mount it on another computer.
    Intending to keep using it as a computer. The stuff is already off of it.

    Thanatos on
  • ZyrillusZyrillus Registered User regular
    edited March 2010
    I guess a good place to start is was the laptop working before the busted monitor?

    could be another symptom of whatever happened that broke the monitor. (not sure if it was damage or just failure)

    Zyrillus on
    I have a Dream, and in it something eats you...
  • ThanatosThanatos Registered User regular
    edited March 2010
    Definitely damage that busted the monitor. It was, in fact, working before the busted monitor.

    Hell, I had it working after the busted monitor (with an external monitor) without a problem.

    Thanatos on
  • ZyrillusZyrillus Registered User regular
    edited March 2010
    Ah ha...so you dropped it on it's head huh? :lol:

    It could have damaged something else, especially if it was a short amount of time since the damage happened.


    I would probably start with reseating hardware like the RAM and HD just to be sure.


    EDIT: if it's been some time you've been using it on the external monitor, you could be right and it's just burned out something and it's fubar.

    Zyrillus on
    I have a Dream, and in it something eats you...
  • HoothHooth Registered User regular
    edited March 2010
    Try booting up with the ultimate boot CD for windows to see if its some sort of hardware issue with the hard drive/software glitch with windows. If you can use the monitor with that, you might be able to just re-install windows or go buy a used hard drive.

    Hooth on
  • blakfeldblakfeld Registered User regular
    edited March 2010
    Hooth wrote: »
    Try booting up with the ultimate boot CD for windows to see if its some sort of hardware issue with the hard drive/software glitch with windows. If you can use the monitor with that, you might be able to just re-install windows or go buy a used hard drive.

    http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/

    I happen to have a link handy in case you don't have it.

    blakfeld on
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