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The following tutorial explains how you can replace the CCFL backlight bulb in a laptop LCD screen. As an example the author takes apart a HP Pavilion zt1000 laptop.
Listed below is a typical laptop disassembly. This is most likely not the exact model you will be servicing, however it is indicative of what you will find in most models. They are all relatively the same and we hope this tutorial will give you a basic idea on the scope of backlight replacement.
Step-by-step CCFL backlight replacement tutorial. Are you looking for a new CCFL bulb? You can find it here.
The disassembly and LCD screen removal steps will be the same for many different laptop models.
Before you attempt replacing the CCFL bulb, I would recommend testing your laptop with another working inverter board. It’s possible that your laptop backlight is not working because of failed inverter board.
UPDATE: Here’s another backlight lamp replacement guide that could be useful for all DIY-ers.
March 13th, 2010 at 9:58 pm
I have a question my friends laptop is a toshiba thats all i know but we will turn it on and around 20 minutes or so the screen will go black and we cant do anything and then half the time it turns off any ideas?
February 19th, 2010 at 11:28 am
Hi there thanks for your reply. Do you think it could be something on the motherboard?
I have now tried a new inverter and that never worked and i have also tried a different laptop screen which never worked!
Could it be the graphics controller?
The problem didn’t come and go the light went off and has never been back on!
January 20th, 2010 at 3:43 pm
mick,
Sounds like a bad inverter board or backlight. I don’t know if the internal diagnostic test is good for testing these parts.
The only way to find out which one is causing the problem is testing the laptop with another backlight or inverter, take a look at this post: http://www.laptoprepair101.com/laptop/2009/05/04/how-test-lcd-screen-inverter-in-laptop/
January 18th, 2010 at 11:30 pm
Hi there Laptop Tech i hope your still around.
My backlight is out completely on my laptop doesn’t come on at all but under a bright light i can see mostly it’s just faint it isn’t the inverter or backlight. I come across a diagnostic test by accident i went to start in safe mode but clicked f12 instead and got a choice to do a diagnostics test so did it and it tested everything on the laptop including an heading for the LCD and the tests for it were inverter it passed, backlight passed and graphics passed. In fact nothig failed at all. The light went out without warning never did it before just went out and hasn’t come back on! It happened after connecting a mouse to a back usb and after taking the keyboard out of the laptop the usb slot is directly behind the lcd connector that connects monitor to keyborad i’ve checked and it isn’t loose. Could something have shorted or would the monitor not work at all in that case?
Cheers for any help
December 21st, 2009 at 1:27 pm
BDP,
Most likely you have a faulty LCD screen and it has to be replaced.
December 21st, 2009 at 7:41 am
@ laptop tech 18/12 thanks for your reply
OK got an external monitor hooked up and working just fine. What does this tell me LT Tech? Does it mean my laptop screens duff or is it something else? Will search about again for the answers to the above but would be really thankful for an answer to this conundrum!!! as it’s doing my swede in.
Thanks in advance for anyone who knows what the hell is going on here,
Al
December 18th, 2009 at 9:24 am
BDP,
Sounds like a problem with the LCD screen. You’ll have to test video output on the external monitor. If external monitor works fine, I would say you have a problem with the LCD screen.
This problem is not related to the inverter board or backlight lamp, that’s for sure. If the screen is still bright, inverter and backlight work properly.
Test your laptop with the external monitor first.
December 18th, 2009 at 3:13 am
Hi
Im having the same thing on my tosh satellite l350. Im on it now with the brightness screwed up full and can see images. The black and white are reversed (paper black, text white for eg.) and colors are not as they should be…reds are blue for eg (may not be correct but you see what I mean) have changed the invertor board to no avail but the screen now goes into hibernation every 20 mins or so. Gonna try the backlight if I can track a supplier in the UK, seems they are all in the US. Any body got a definative answer to this cause it looks like me going thru the whole array of solutions to get to the bottom of it.
al
November 21st, 2009 at 10:20 am
I have this laptop and the screen went dark so I plugged in an external LCD and it worked just fine, so maybe not the video card, I got a new lcd and Inverter and then it worked! After 5 minutes i hear a high pitched “whine” and then the screen went dark again. Any ideas?
November 2nd, 2009 at 3:42 pm
manny,
Are you sure that the screen is totally blank? Maybe the image is still on the screen. Take a closer look.