Vertical Lines- Pavillion DV9000

My friend brought his laptop over and I'm trying to help him sort everything out. I think the problem might be due do a dying graphics card or bad memory.

Basically on the load up screen for Windows, there are groups of white dotted vertical lines spread evenly across the screen. This also happens when in CMOS. Everything seems fine on the desktop in safe mode, so I'm not sure whats wrong. I'd gladly appreciate any help.

Here's an example... I used MS paint to make a picture to emulate the problem.

*note the lines go through the windows logo..



Thanks NBR!

 

Plug in an external monitor, if the lines show up on th external screen then your gpu is dying.

If it doesnt then its either your LCD panel/cable or you need new drivers.

 

If it's not showing up in Safe Mode, then it's probably not the GPU failing. If it were it would show in all modes. You should check your internal temps with HWMonitor as high GPU temps will cause that kind of display too.

Do a reinstall of your GPU drivers first - if that doesn't clear it, do an uninstall on the GPU itself from the Device Manager, and then restart the system so it'll reinstall it.

After that - unplug all peripheral devices, including those in your ExpressCard slot. Peripherals can cause anything from Monitor problems to outright BSOD's.

It's also possible that a recently installed program is affecting the display when it starts up. That would explain why you see it in normal but not safe mode. Think back to when it first started and see if you can equate it with ani installation of a program, hardware or peripheral addition, etc. Something else to consider is a recent change or addition of a screen saver or desktop background, Gadget, etc.

Your Event logs will tell you if you've got a hardware failure, and you can also run a system diagnostic that will tell you if your GPU is at fault.

1. Control Panel, Performance Info, Advanced Tools.
2. System Health Check - click and run the test. It outputs the report to the Performance Log.
3. Event Log - click on the Event Log at the top of the Advanced Tools window. Note: any hardware or process causing a problem will be noted with a yellow exclamation next to it on the Performance & Information window. Check the Admin Events, log in Custom Views, System and Application logs in Windows Logs, and and the Hardware Event logs in the Application and Services folder.
4. Reliability and Performance Monitor - open this from the Advanced Tools window. Click on Reliability Montior and it will show you a graph which will show you hardware and application failures, the date of occurrence, and what caused it.

The Health Check Report will be at the bottom on the left side, under Reports. The folder report name is the date of the report.

Though you haven't listed your Product # here, the Dv9000 is one of models listed on the HP Limited Warranty Service Enhancement program. Though your system doesn't have the symptoms yet, you should be aware of what they are and check your PN against the listed affected systems. Essentially, if you have an AMD Turion processor, your system is likely on the list.

 

Since the problem doesn't show up in safe mode, my bet would be that the GPU is going bad. You're only using a very limited subset of the GPU in safe mode. If it were the LCD panel it'd be bad all the time. It would be good to test with an external monitor, just to be thorough, but given how common NVIDIA chip failures are that's almost certainly it. Call the number listed on HP's enhanced warranty page for these notebooks.

 

Thanks for all the advice.

Flipfire:
I am going to test out the external monitor in just a sec.

Cybervisions:
-I can't boot up normally, so I must run in safe mode to test.
-I uninstalled the GPU drivers, and no change.
-There are no peripherals attached, so I doubt its that.
-In safe mode, I can't "Performance Info" in the control panel. The display of the windows is like XP, and doesn't have the Vista sidebar on the left. I did however manage to open up the Reliability and Performance Monitor, and took some random pictures.
-According to the list of HP's, the laptop isn't listed, but I might call them just to see what they can do. My friend had a warranty through Circuit City, but we all know what happened there.

Brainstretch:
- My gut tells me the GPU might be going bad, but we'll see. It has a Nvidia Geforce 7600.

Additional problems with the laptop:
-Vertical lines show up on Windows loading screen and in CMOS.
-BSOD on normal start up. So I have to run in Safe Mode.
-I'm assuming something over heats quickly because after a few minutes of using it on a flat surface it'll shut down. We have to keep the laptop hanging off the side of the desk to keep the vents wide open.
-Battery life lasts a good 2-5 minutes fully charged.

 

Its GPU problem. I had this problem before.

 

Thanks. I just connected the laptop through my CRT monitor via VGA cable, and sure enough the lines show up on the external monitor as well.

I think the fair thing to assume is the GPU is going bad. Can there be any other causes to this?

I've also tried system restore, and that came to no avail.