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Issue: after turning on my laptop, the screen stays completely black, not even a backlight.

What happened: I was carrying a backpack with two laptops:

  • a Lenovo 320 15ABR, 6 years old.
  • a Motile M142 14'', 2 months old

The backpack fell two times, from a chair. So, not véry hard. The six year old laptop is totally fine, the newer laptop is broken.

What I've tried: 1- Opening up the laptop, but not the lid where the screen is. I saw no loose cables or whatever 2- hooking up the laptop via HDMI cable to two TV's and a 24 inch HP screen. All three said "no signal"

My preliminary conclusion is that the motherboard is still good, because I can hear the laptop starting up, running even, and the backlit keyboard turns on normally, but something GPU-ish is broken, a cable, a connector, or the GPU itself.

Question:

  • One Do you agree with that conclusion, or can there be something else which is going on? Did I miss a possible explanation?
  • Two, what are your ideas to fix this? For the moment, I'm thinking the only sure way is replacing the motherboard. If the GPU was not integrated, I would replace just that, but it is integrated.

Motile M142 specs:

The router shows 3 devices via ethernet with the addresses(?) of

  • 000.000.2.1 ; main laptop
  • 000.000.2.2 ; TV
  • 000.000.2.16 ; PC Note how these come back in the arp table below, and how they are all dynamic.

the arp table after arp -a command

 Interface: 192.168.2.3 --- 0x1c
   Internet Address      Physical Address      Type
   000.000.2.1           xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx     dynamic
   000.000.2.2           xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx     dynamic
   000.000.2.16          xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx     dynamic
   000.000.2.254         xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx     dynamic
   000.000.2.255         xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx     static
   200.0.0.0             xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx     static
   200.0.0.00            xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx     static
   200.0.0.000           xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx     static
   200.0.0.000           xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx     static
   200.000.000.000       xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx     static
   200.000.000.000       xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx     static
   200.000.000.000       xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx     static
   200.000.000.000       xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx     static

Interface: 192.168.2.5 --- 0x2 Internet Address Physical Address Type 000.000.2.1 xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx dynamic 000.000.2.16 xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx dynamic 000.000.2.254 xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx dynamic 000.000.2.255 xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx static 200.0.0.0 xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx static 200.0.0.00 xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx static 200.0.0.000 xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx static 200.0.0.000 xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx static 200.000.000.000 xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx static 200.000.000.000 xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx static 200.000.000.000 xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx static

the follow up question is of course if the arp shows a device which the router doesn't show... ?

And the other follow up is: If the laptop doesn't show in the router, is the whole motherboard really broken, despite hearing it and the backlit KB turn on?

1 Answers1

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Based on your description: Since your GPU is integrated, it means that it is actually part of your CPU (in AMD, they call this APU).

It is not likely to break a highly integrated circuit (a.k.a. chip) like it by physical damage and just breaking one small portion of it -- given that your laptop still boots. It could be some external component that is broken, like some circuit/wiring on your motherboard.

I don't know how this laptop is designed. If the APU is soldered on the motherboard then there is basically no fix.

Otherwise, we need to confirm if the broken part is actually the APU itself, or on the motherboard. What I usually do for troubleshooting this sort of issue is by replacement, but that requires you to have a replacement. Say, put this APU on a different compatible laptop or put a different APU on the same laptop, and see which works.


One more thing to check is that if your laptop really still boots: Try to open it on a known Wi-Fi, or connect it directly to your router, see if you can find your laptop from your router and ping it from another device. If it had any server on it, try if you can still connect to it.

charlesz
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