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    Display /HW problems: Vertical lines

    Discussion in 'Acer' started by garrapeta, Sep 19, 2006.

  1. garrapeta

    garrapeta Newbie

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    Hi all.

    First of all, excuse me for my poor English.

    I’m having troubles with my laptop. It’s an Acer Aspire 1524. It comes with an integrated NVIDIA GeForce FX Go.

    The problem raised when I was browsing the net. The screen / mouse got freezed and I had to power it off by pressing the power button.
    Next, when it booted up, just when the laptop is begging to boot (before loading the operating system), the screen displayed several vertical lines as showed in this pics I took: http://www.geocities.com/garrapeta/borrame/1.JPG, http://www.geocities.com/garrapeta/borrame/2.JPG.
    Also some garbage (coulored pixels) are displayed at the top of the screen.

    I have to say that I’ve connected the output of the laptop to an external monitor, and exactly the same happens.

    I’ve tried to do quite a lot of things, like booting from boot CDs. I tell you what happens in each of my tests:

    -Trying to start up Windows XP PRO in normal mode.
    If I let the laptop to continue the boot up from the Windows installed in HD, I get the screen that tells me that a problem happened and propose me to start in safe mode or normal mode: http://www.geocities.com/garrapeta/borrame/2.JPG .
    In that screen, the lines are still showed (this time in blue).

    If I choose “normal mode”, it tries to boot Windows. The Win logo is shown (with no lines). But when it try to enter in the “welcome screen”, it shows a blue window with white letters telling that a critical error happened and blah blah (it’s just a flash and I could not read what it says). Then, it resets.

    -Trying to start up Windows XP PRO in safe mode.

    In safe mode, it enters Windows successfully (in 16 colour mode, of course). When in Windows desktop, all the screen is crossed by the vertical lines, this time grey lines.

    -Trying to boot from Knoppix CD.
    With Knoppix boot CD I’ve tried, it show a green screen and orange vertical lines. It says with orange letters) “Invalid or corrupt kernel image” .
    It does’nt boot.

    -Trying to boot from Linux install CD (Ubuntu install CD).

    I get again weird background colour and vertical lines. This time it says:
    “isolinux: Disk error 80, AX = 42F0, drive 9F”
    I’ve searched this error in the net, and everything points to badly burnt CDs or errors with the CD drive. I’m sure it’s not my case, because the CD is OK, and I’m quite sure the CD drive is OK because I managed to install Windows again from CD.

    -Trying to boot Hiren’s boot CD.

    Hiren’s boot CD is an emergency boot CD with a bunch of utilities such as partition utilities, antivirus apps etc.
    If I tried to boot up from this, all I get is a lot of pc-speakers beep and ASCI garbage on the screen.
    Does not boot…

    -Trying to boot up from Windows XP install CD.
    It boots ok, always showing vertical lines in the 16 colours screens of the installation procedure (sample: http://www.geocities.com/garrapeta/borrame/2.JPG).

    I managed to install it and run from it. However, when I try to install the NVIDIA drivers, during the installation procedure, I get the blue screen with apocalyptic messages and it resets.

    So, this is what I think:
    -It’s not an LCD problem, since I connected the video output to an external monitor and it also shows the lines in the external monitor. I’ve also tried to open the laptop and disconnect the LCD plug to the main board to avoid a possibly spoiled LCD interact in my tests . Nothing new happens…

    -It’s a problem that only occurs when running video in 256 colours / 16 bits mode. (It enters windows in safe mode, but it fails when I try to install NVIDIA drivers).

    So, I’m afraid it’s the motherboard… what do you think about that?
    If you do think it’s the mainboard, where in the mainboard? Can I repair that? How should I proceed??

    The laptop is 1 month out of warranty… (Acer is quite accurate in that…)

    Thanks for your time and excuse the log post. I wanted to provide as much hints as possible.