Inverted laptop screen colors

[mrwaffles829]

ok, so i started up mah acer aspire 5100 laptop one morning and low and behold: all the colors on the screen are inverted. like open up mspaint and invert the colors and it looks like that.

its not acessability options high contrast, i changed my inverter, and my ati card is functional (plug it into a monitor and its perfectly fine.)

Im not sure what is causing this. I use powerstrip, and it inverts the colors to normal, but its still not the best quality.

the card is an ati radeon xpress 1100.
please help

[Rik_]

Reinstalling the driver for your graphics card may help.

[mrwaffles829]

thank you very much for the reply, but sadly the display driver was not the problem.

I forgot to mention that from the moment the bios starts up to the moment i turn on powerstrip (a lifesaver for my warhammer online raids) the screen colors are inverted

[Rik_]

That sheds a whole different light on the matter. It is most likely to be the connector to the screen has come loose then. If you have a monitor to hand, boot it up with it plugged in and see if the colours are correct on that.
If they are correct then it must be the connector. It there is no difference then it means your graphics card has had it.

[mrwaffles829]

it is def the connecter. where can i find the connecter or how can i fix it?

[Rik_]

You will need to almost completely dismantle the laptop to get at it and that is a big job indeed.

[mrwaffles829]

easy. ive dismantled my laptop many times for inverter changes, ram upgrades, fan repairs, etc.
id just need to know the location and what i have to do

[jbennet]

Well, if it is somehow the connector, it would be a solder job. Definately not for beginners.

Can you send it off for repair? How old is it?

[mrwaffles829]

luckily my father is an electrician. he can do solder jobs.
warranty expired 6 months ago. its 1.5 years old.

[jbennet]

I dont think it is that though. Cant see how a faulty connector could do that.

In my opinion, the card (and therefore the motherboard) is just broken in some way (possibly due to overheating, a common issue in laptops).

[Rik_]

The original poster says it works fine through an external monitor which shows that the built in graphics card is working fine.

I do not know off hand where the connector is located as I have not dismantled a laptop of that make, I have only dismantled Dell's and a few Compaq's.
Just follow all cables / connectors that go between chassis and screen and go from there.

[mrwaffles829]

i soldered the plugs. didnt work.
i use powerstrip to invert the gamma (bad quality tho).
when i watch a movie with powerstrip on (winamp), the movie's colors stay inverted.

what could this indicate?

[Rik_]

It most likely means the screen itself is faulty and needs to be replaced.

[mrwaffles829]

kk thanx :)