HP pavilion 17-e049wm laptop with black screen

Hi Guys,

Im having some trouble with my HP pavilion 17-e049wm laptop (with self installed 7) where I push the power button but the primary screen does not come on. It used to happen intermittently in between reboots. Then it got to the point were I would have to push the power button on and off about 5 times to get the monitor to come up. Now it just doesn't come up. What is funny is if I can get the monitor to work during boot, it will never stop working and I can use the computer. A temporary solution was to never shut down the computer. Obviously my computer shut down as it would be still working if I hadn't.

A major note is that external monitors work absolutely fine. Using an external monitor, device manager cant even detect that the laptop monitor is there as if it were unplugged. Thus there is no monitor tricks such as (fn+F4 or win+P).

Some have said to try tricks such as taking out the battery and power plug and removing any possible power from the system by holding down the power button for 30s 1m or 2m.

Some said to swap around memory sticks in an event that a ram went dead.

First I must diagnose the part that has failed. I am inclined to believe that both the monitor and the vid card are ok as a secondary monitor works and that the primary works....sometimes.

Where do you guys think I should start to begin the diagnosing process. The cable between the monitor and video card? If so, how do I get to it? Laptops are not always easy to dissemble.

Thanks

Where I would look would be the backlight of your laptop. Shine a flashlight on the screen once the laptop has booted, and see if you see anything. If it's the backlight, you'll see the familiar Windows screens, although very faintly. If it's not the backlight, you won't see anything reflected.

A backlight problem is usually caused by a bad fluorescent tube on older lappies, or an inverter problem. Newer laptops with LED backlights have different issues, usually in the LED drivers.

It could be something as simple as the screen's ribbon connector to the motherboard has become damaged or has come unplugged from repeatedly opening and closing the laptop.

Try the flashlight trick and report back, please.

Its not the backlight. I shined the brightest light I had and nothing. Additionally, device manger doesn't see the monitor. The computer is indicating that its like the monitor doesn't exist.
Thanks

That's unfortunate.

I guess your next step in the troubleshooting process is to see if the ribbon cable between the motherboard and the screen is damaged or loose. Hopefully it's just loose.

The other possibility is that the on board graphics circuitry has become damaged in such a way that the laptop's screen won't work, but it still allows an external monitor. I think that's a remote possibility and I wouldn't bet on it myself.

I don't envy you the job of taking it apart. It's not something I enjoy doing. There might be a disassembly video on youtube though. That would help.

EDIT: Ha! There is!

Thanks for the video! This will be a great help.

I probably wont reply back for a few days as the rest of the disassembly will need to be juggled between school and work.

Thanks

Well, good luck with it. :)