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Hard drive or video card

12 years ago

Last night I was working on 'old laptop' (HP Pavilion dv9408, Windows 7, password protected) and the monitor started to fade from lower right to upper left then went blank. The computer shut off and came right back on and kept doing this. I took my stethoscope and was listening to the computer. Did not hear any 'clicking'. I then shut off computer by holding the power on button down, which it did.

This morning I took the 'old hard drive' and put it in the 'new laptop' (HP Pavilion dv9910, Vista, no password protected) in the second drive bay. I wanted to see if the 'old hard drive' was still working. The 'new laptop' sees the hard drive (name and model), I'm able to open folders (user, program files, Preflogs, Windows). When I open the User folder, I can see and open always-beezee folder and the sub folders. So my conclusion is that the 'old hard drive' is working.

Is it worth while to change bios boot order and "really check to make sure drive is working"? I'm a little bit worried about doing that.

How do you check to see if the video card is working? I suppose I could swap them to see if it is working.

Thank You, Bernie.

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Comments (6)

owbist
12 years ago
Bernie you can indeed change the boot order in the BIOS, remember to press F10 when you exit to save the settings. After you can return to the BIOS and reset it to the original drive if you wish.

Your video card is likely built into the motherboard, very few mass produced computers have separate video cards now. If you have access to a monitor there should be a spot to connect it to the computer to verify that the video card is working or not. You might Google 'video card stability test' and select a program to download and test the card, there are plenty of them out there.

You mention that the problem computer is old. Perhaps the vents and fan are bunged up with dust bunnies creating a heat issue? Have you tried clearing this out?

If you made note of the hard drive you could visit the manufacturers site and run some tests on it perhaps.
genes
12 years ago
See if it does that on an external monitor if you have access to one to determine if it is your video card or your LCD screen
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always_beezee
Original Author
12 years ago
Your video card is likely built into the motherboard

Yes owbist, you are right about that. I've been doing some checking and it seems that HP has problems with the laptop getting too hot and de-soldering the connection. After they re-solder, everything works again.

You mention that the problem computer is old. Perhaps the vents and fan are bunged up with dust bunnies creating a heat issue? Have you tried clearing this out?

I take care of that every month. I also have 1 inch spacers underneath the laptop for more heat dispersion.

I think I will go into the BIOS and change boot order. You make it sound so simple which it probably is.

Hi genes.

See if it does that on an external monitor if you have access to one to determine if it is your video card or your LCD screen

I'll have to look into that also.

Thanks to yo both.

Bernie
always_beezee
Original Author
12 years ago
I forgot something. The new hard drive has Avast on it and the old hard drive has Microsoft Security Essentials on it. Will I have a problem when I switch Bios?

Bernie
owbist
12 years ago
Safety programs should have no effect on the running of the computer. However you may well have no security but that can soon be remedied by installing an anti virus and anti malware program.

I would remove the old safety program and start fresh so no bits from the wrong machine remain.

A conflict of drivers will be more the issue but even that should cause no hardship, just note any screens that pop up during the starting process.
always_beezee
Original Author
12 years ago
Just an update.

The old hard drive does work so that leaves me with a video card problem. I tried a different monitor but the computer just kept going on and off and I never did see anything on the monitor.

Thank You owbist and genes for your replies.

Bernie

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