External monitor flickers when connected to laptop

Hi, I'm now using my laptop (HP dv2530) as a desktop but when I plug in any monitor to the laptop I get a flickering on the monitor screen which I do not experience on the laptop screen. I've tried different cables & different monitors but still the same symptoms. We have 2 laptops exactly the same and the other laptop with the same settings and resolution works just fine. I'm assuming its the VGA cable connection on the laptop's graphics card?

Does that sound right? If so, I'm not too sure what the cheapest and easiest fix is for this, any advice?

My options I thought of were:

- replace the graphics card. Dunno how much or how easy this is on a laptop
- get a port replicator - connect to a different VGA port
- get some other USB to VGA adaptor

Any ideas?

 

Sounds like the RAMDAC is a bit flakey on the laptop. Graphics circuitry on laptops is rarely replaceable. High resolution LCDs run on VGA will always have a slight amount of flickering as the phase lock loops in the ADC's aren't perfect (in the LCDs themselves).

Doubt there are any easy fixes. If this seriously matters to you, and you have no warranty available through HP, time to start shopping for a new laptop, preferrably one with digital output.