Laptop repair: A do it yourself guide to replacing your laptop screen

It is a depressing fact of life, of course, but it is nevertheless true that laptop repair costs very much more than servicing or repairing a desktop computer would. Why this is so is not always clear. It is true, of course that laptop components cost more than desktop components. Another thing that might be influencing price is the fact that laptops still seem to be considered part of the upper income or luxury niche.

When your laptop’s LCD cracks in half (and you’d be surprised that how often that happens), you might hear a technician tell you that it will cost you anything between a few hundred to even a thousand dollars to replace it. If you think this is highway robbery, it probably is. The good news, however, is that you don’t have to give in to it. It’s perfectly possible for you to replace your laptop’s screen on your own, with the help of some handy tips and a little basic guidance.

If you have dropped your laptop the first thing you need to do is not replace your screen, but to ensure that the rest of the laptop is actually working properly. Have a friend lend you his monitor, and connect the monitor to your laptop through the VGA port. Now boot up the laptop and see if it is working properly. If it boots up, all is well, and you only need to change the LCD. However, if your laptop has problems booting up, the chances are that is has been seriously damaged, and you should probably consider getting a qualified technician to look at it.

If you have dropped your laptop, and the screen did not crack, but now simply refuses to work, the chances are that the inverter is spoiled. The inverter is a tiny board that generally powers the lighting of your LCD. If you have even a basic level of technical skill you shouldn’t find this board any problem at all to replace, and since it usually cost less than a hundred dollars, replacing the inverter can save you a lot of the money you would otherwise pay for laptop repair.

Now, carefully remove the back panel of your LCD. Doing this will allow you to ascertain the part number of your LCD screen. Getting a replacement for it shouldn’t be a problem, but make sure you don’t go straight to the manufacturer. It is much better to source spare parts for laptop repair online, such as from ebay, for example.