Arch Linux

jlacroix

Member

Registered: 2009-08-16

Posts: 576

Possibly a Bad Inverter?

Hello again everyone. My problem is probably just hardware, but I am posting it here because Arch is my primary OS, but I don't think this is an Arch problem.

Anyway, I've had my Dell Latitude E6410 for about two months. I really like it a lot. However, twice in the two months I've had it, the back light on the monitor didn't come on. I could see the image if I looked close but there was no back light. Both times that happened, I restarted the laptop and the next time it booted it up the back light came on no problem.

At first I thought it was an Arch kernel problem, but the second time this happened I was using my Windows 7 hard drive, so I know that it's not an OS or driver issue. It happened once with Arch and once with Windows 7. I'm pretty sure that when it happened under Arch it had a kernel panic, but I don't remember.

I suppose the problem is just the inverter going bad? In my career so far, I've always known inverters to either always work or always not, never intermittent. Since it this only happened twice in two months, perhaps I'm over-reacting and it was just a fluke both times?

I do have complete care coverage with next day on-site repair, so if it is the inverter I can get it replaced, though I don't want to call tech support unless I'm more educated about what the culprit is.

Have any of you experienced something like this?

PS. I have the latest BIOS already, so if it is a BIOS issue it must be one that hasn't been discovered yet.

Allan

Pacman

From: Brisbane, AU

Registered: 2007-06-09

Posts: 11,385

Website

Re: Possibly a Bad Inverter?

I have seen inverters work and fail in cycles repeated until they finally die altogether.  It definitely sounds like that might be the issue.

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kgas

Member

From: Qatar

Registered: 2008-11-08

Posts: 718

Re: Possibly a Bad Inverter?

I had a similar issue (No display at all) with Acer aspire one. First time a bios update fixed the problem second time I got the lcd replaced from the service center.