Warning to laptop owners - be careful how you transport them! (1 Viewer)

[Minxy]

Just a heads up to be careful how you transport and store your laptops!

FIL came round the other day with his laptop to show us a tent he was thinking of buying but in his rush he forgot to turn it off and just closed the lid which should have been fine however when he got here and looked at the laptop he had a weird screen ... there was a pink 'shadow' image showing about 2 inches lower than the true image ... going into the settings etc didn't help and even updating the graphics driver didn't resolve it ... I connected it to our TV to determine if it was the graphics or the screen that was the problem ... it showed perfectly on the TV so it was down to the screen being damaged internally (no visible damage externally).

I found out that he's put the laptop to the side of the passenger footwell where he was sitting (his wife was driving) and whilst it should have been okay unfortunately he'd put the mains lead in the outside pocket of the 'soft' laptop bag and I think that when he put the laptop in the car he was either a bit rough with it, or 'kicked' it as he got in, and the power supply bashed into the top of the screen and damaged it - I don't think having it turned on will have made much difference though ... fortunately I found a much cheaper tent for him with a big discount but the saving is likely to be lost as he now needs to get a new screen!

 

[Spidey]

My daughter has damaged her laptop screen twice ! She tried closed it with something on the keyboard! I think she had to pay about £100 for a new screen.

 

[LesW]

I was 'told' that you should turn them off, something to do with the fan still running and causing damage.

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[Minxy]

I was 'told' that you should turn them off, something to do with the fan still running and causing damage.

Ideally yes but for the short 5 minute journey to our place it wouldn't have caused any problems ... its just annoying that had he taken more care of it, it wouldn't have happened at all.

 

[Wagoneer]

I had a similar strange occurrence. Put laptop in passenger well (switched off). Started car (VW Polo) and vehicle electrics started going bananas. Relocated laptop and everything OK. Laptop still worked OK.
Put it down to strange magnetic forces

 

[jockaneezer]

Try gently flexing the screen from corner to corner, if this affects the picture, it may be that the ribbon cable supplying the screen has moved slightly in it's terminal block. This happened to my tablet after some rough handling.

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[Gellyneck]

You've also got to be very careful moving a laptop if it's got a mechanical (not SSD) hard drive.
Not the first time I've heard the hdd grinding away after the laptop had been "plonked" down on a table!

 

[Minxy]

Try gently flexing the screen from corner to corner, if this affects the picture, it may be that the ribbon cable supplying the screen has moved slightly in it's terminal block. This happened to my tablet after some rough handling.

They've had it in to the shop and the chap did a 'push' test on the screen and has been able to confirm that the problem is a bust screen and nothing else ...an expensive lesson! Whilst at the car boot sale this morning I saw a nice padded laptop case, a bit larger than his laptop, I bought it for him and he's been given strict instructions NOT to store his blooming power supply etc in the pocket but inside the case NEXT TO the laptop which is what I do with mine along with the mouse etc.