Help! My laptop screen is doing strange things. Can anyone give advice?

[Armstead]

A couple of days ago, for no apparent reason, my laptop screen (Dell circa 2000) started acting up.

It gets these strange color ghosts, that take the shape of liones of a different color. It seems to come and go. These lines extend out from certain pictures or menu objects horizontally, and are made of little verticle lines (kind of like a siound meter might look).

For example, an object on a black background will produce a blue ghost. Pictures also look a little off color as a result.

They're unpredictable as to when they appear, and how noticable they are. It's most notable in the menus, when a sickly yellow extends off the menu words.

It just appeared spontaneously, and i can't recall doing anything that might have caused it.

Any suggestions as to how to diagnose and fix it? All advice would be most welcome and appreciated.

[AirmensMom]

1. My 2003 Dell laptop did some strange things, too.

But it was a little different. The pixels sort of danced around until the whole screen was almost white. I spent countless hours on the phone with Dell. They were useless. It got to the point where all I got was a light grey screen. Finally, a friend of mine took it all apart and replaced the fan on the video card. It seems to be working now, but I got a little craziness the first time I booted it up when the cat bumped the top corner. That might be from dirty connections, so we're going to take it apart and clean up all the connections.

I don't know if yours could be something similar or not. But it's worth a shot to make sure both fans are running and all the connections are clean and tight. I sure hope you can get it fixed.

Edit: BTW, I haven't given it a good workout yet. I ran it for about 2 hours and it was fine, but its wireless card is painfully slow compared to my MacBook's. So I got impatient and went back to the MacBook. I'll try the Dell out again soon, when I'm not in such a hurry.

[Armstead]

2. Thanks..I'll check that out

[seemunkee]

3. Call an exorcist, the things possessed

[Armstead]

4. Tried it already

But it's technical, not satanic.

[seemunkee]

7. Damn, that would be so much easier to deal with

Now you'll have to call the real Spawns of Hell, tech support.

[Armstead]

10. kick for the nighttime crowd

Any techno Wizards able to help?

[Phillycat]

5. Just a guess....

In laptops, the first thing to go is the electrical connections from the unit to the screen that reside in the hinges. From opening and closing it, those connections get loose. I would see if opening it to different places fixes the problem, and then I would have the connections looked at.

[Armstead]

9. Thanks

I'll check that out too.

It seems internal rather than physical though. When it first boots up, it's clear, but degrades as I use it.

[Burma Jones]

6. Wait until the LSD wears off

this Shit used to happen to me all the time

[Armstead]

11. It wore off 30 years ago but my monitor is still tripping

[Armstead]

8. Okay when I just rebooted it, was fine -- but then...

The screen was clear and no ghosties.

But after a few minutes, I passed the mouse over a menu button (for color selections for an application). I didn't press anything, but the bars jumped out, and they also reappreared elsewhere.

For example, that red PriceZilla ad at the top of the DU page gets yellow extensions coming out of it after this happens.

[Armstead]

12. Taking one more shot at this

kick