VGN-FJ180P Screen Brightness Not Changeable

Greetings,

I am glad to have found this forum, and I am hoping that someone here will be able to help me with my issue. I have recently purchased a used Vaio laptop, model number VGN-FJ180P.

When I first got it, the battery was dead. So I assumed that my problem with the screen brightness was due to needing a new battery. Basically, when I use the screen brightness keys, I see the meter change on-screen, but none of the settings have any effect on the actual brightness of the LCD screen itself.

I spent a lot of time cleaning out the junk, unnecessary programs, etc. Then I proceeded to install all necessary Windows updates, as well as all the necessary Vaio updates. I have run extensive maintenance on this laptop, and have made sure that it is malware free. I then proceeded to read up on possible Fn key problems, and made sure I had all of the right software installed to ensure proper functionality of Fn keys. To be clear, all my Fn keys work fine, and all onscreen meters/graphics that pertain to them show up. It's just that the screen brightness can't be changed.

Power options have been checked, disabled, re-enabled without effect. I contacted Sony support, and was directed to this LCD screen troubleshooting page... http://www.kb.sony.com/se...k.do?externalId=C1001450 ...followed all the instructions to no avail. According to this page I need the laptop serviced. Seems silly to me though, because there doesn't seem to be any actual damage to the screen. It exhibits no other negative symptoms.


Two possibilities that I can think of which may affect this issue:

1. Device Manager lists under "Monitor" three different Plug 'n Play Monitors. Uninstalling these has no effect after reboot. They just come back again (all three). Nowhere online have I been able to locate an actual LCD driver. Is this normal?

2. Since I purchased this laptop used, I did not get any Recovery CDs. The Recovery Partition is also gone. Doing a factory restore is the only thing that I haven't tried yet, and would need to buy the CDs to make it happen.


Anyway, I hope my post wasn't too long. If anyone can shed some light on this I would greatly appreciate it! Thank you in advance.

Michal

 

...Anybody?

 

You have to install the Graphics card driver.

 

Did that ^_^... still no go.

 

Anyone got a lead on the lcd drivers perhaps? I'm pretty much out of tricks at this point...

 

There are nothing like LCD drivers. Windows will install the appropriate monitor driver by itself. But you will have only one monitor in device manager.

 

That's too bad. Apparently there are three "monitors" installed because of the ports on the laptop.

I've been searching for some clue as to a resolution to this problem all over the internet, and nobody seems to have any idea... not encouraging .

 

same, but my series is NR (NR160E). My only complaint is the damn FN key for brightness not working. I have the latest graphic driver.

 

Tj... does your brightness meter show up on screen when you try to use the keys?

 

nope. The volume does though.

 

Hmmm... on mine I do get the meter, but the brightness doesn't change regardless of what setting I have it at.

There is a whole bunch of software on the Vaio support site that you need to reinstall to make the function keys work properly. If you need it, I can try to look it up again...

 

if you want, sure.