Broken Graphics card?

[Pierce Ward]

Hi everyone,

I turned on my laptop to find it had become broken somehow. The screen
during boot up (and in console) has unusual intermittent lines that appeared
around some text. And when I tried to start X, it kernel panics. I was able
to get the following output from dmesg before it died:
http://pastebin.ca/544532

Although that looks like a driver issue, I can only assume my graphics card
is borked. So since I am out of warranty I'm wondering if anyone has any
idea how I can proceed to get it fixed? I'm sure if I sent it to HP I would
be paying through the nose for them to replace the parts (not to mention
customer service is €0.95c per minute!). Is it possible to buy the graphics
card and replace it myself? Some people have said they think the cards are
built in to the motherboard and it is most likely a problem with both. Can
anyone give me any advice on how to go forward? I found this online so it
seems possible I can replace the card:
http://www.impactcomputers.com/5j149.html

Any information anyone can give me would be very much appreciated.

Cheers,

[Jonathan Berry]

Post by Pierce Ward
Hi everyone,
I turned on my laptop to find it had become broken somehow. The screen
during boot up (and in console) has unusual intermittent lines that appeared
around some text. And when I tried to start X, it kernel panics. I was able
http://pastebin.ca/544532

Does it do that every time? What is it doing now? Are you
dual-booting with Windows to where you could see what it does? If
not, maybe try a Live CD or something.

Here is what my screen looked like when my laptop died. Does yours
look anything like either of these:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/plasmoidia/401150652/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/plasmoidia/401152126/

Post by Pierce Ward
Although that looks like a driver issue, I can only assume my graphics card
is borked. So since I am out of warranty I'm wondering if anyone has any

You do not want to assume, you want to know what is wrong :-). If the
hardware is okay, you do not want to go to the trouble of replacing
it. What have you done to troubleshoot this?

Post by Pierce Ward
idea how I can proceed to get it fixed? I'm sure if I sent it to HP I would
be paying through the nose for them to replace the parts (not to mention
customer service is €0.95c per minute!). Is it possible to buy the graphics
card and replace it myself? Some people have said they think the cards are
built in to the motherboard and it is most likely a problem with both. Can
anyone give me any advice on how to go forward? I found this online so it
http://www.impactcomputers.com/5j149.html

The graphics card is integrated on the motherboard; it is not a
separate card that you can replace. You would have to replace the
entire motherboard if your card is broken.
Motherboard: http://www.flickr.com/photos/plasmoidia/230575657/
Graphics chip: http://www.flickr.com/photos/plasmoidia/230577735/

My advise, if the hardware is broken, would be to buy another
computer, if at all possible. The R3000z is getting to be quite an
old laptop. If you wanted to revive it, I think the best you could do
now is buy another motherboard off eBay or someplace similar and
replace it yourself. But that likely won't be cheap and there is
still a chance something might not work or you could break something
else in the process. If you go with a new computer, you can even sell
off some of the components from the old laptop and recoup some cost
that way.

Jonathan

[Prarit Bhargava]

Hi Pierce,

Post by Pierce Ward
Hi everyone,
I turned on my laptop to find it had become broken somehow. The screen
during boot up (and in console) has unusual intermittent lines that
appeared around some text. And when I tried to start X, it kernel
panics. I was able to get the following output from dmesg before it
died: http://pastebin.ca/544532

That is not a panic AFAICT. It's a softlockup warning -- the kernel is
probably still alive.

Try booting with the NMI on, and see if you do actually get a panic.

What OS are you using, and what kernel version?

Post by Pierce Ward
Although that looks like a driver issue, I can only assume my graphics
card is borked.

Don't assume that the card is hosed -- it could very well be a driver issue.

P.

[D. Hugh Redelmeier]

| From: Prarit Bhargava <***@redhat.com>

| Try booting with the NMI on, and see if you do actually get a panic.

To expand on this: have a look at the file
Documentation/nmi_watchdog.txt
within the Linux kernel source. It might be on your system even if
you don't have the kernel source loaded (use locate(1) to find it).

Here's a link to a copy:
http://kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/people/landley/kdocs/Documentation/nmi_watchdog.txt

[D. Hugh Redelmeier]

| From: "Pierce Ward" <***@gmail.com>


| Date: Wed, 6 Jun 2007 15:18:06 +0100

Sorry for the late reply.

Best not to send HTML mail to a list.

Best not to send mail encoded in WINDOWS-1252 characterset to a Linux
list.

| Although that looks like a driver issue, I can only assume my graphics card
| is borked.

It looks as if you are using the proprietary nVidia driver. You
should consider trying the open-source nv driver.

(1) most kernel folk don't want to deal with a problem when the kernel
is tainted with closed source. There are good political and
technical reasons for this.

(2) this would be a good test to see if the problem is a driver
problem.

This has the added advantage of being free (as in beer).

I hope that this suggestion is not too late to be useful.

[Pierce Ward]

Crap.

I could of sworn I replied to this mail, but it turns out it was saved
as a draft. Not quite sure why that happened.

Anyway, yep I have tried the nv and nvidia driver, both stall when I
start X (black screen). The problem is the lines I see on the monitor
(which distort the text) happen before I even boot grub.

As I was previously shown in this thread, the graphics card is onboard
so I've decided to give up on the laptop. Maybe use it as a router :)

Thanks for the information however,

Regards,

ps. (sorry about the mail format and encoding, its the gmail default).
I'm not even using windows.

Post by D. Hugh Redelmeier
| Date: Wed, 6 Jun 2007 15:18:06 +0100
Sorry for the late reply.
Best not to send HTML mail to a list.
Best not to send mail encoded in WINDOWS-1252 characterset to a Linux
list.
| Although that looks like a driver issue, I can only assume my graphics card
| is borked.
It looks as if you are using the proprietary nVidia driver. You
should consider trying the open-source nv driver.
(1) most kernel folk don't want to deal with a problem when the kernel
is tainted with closed source. There are good political and
technical reasons for this.
(2) this would be a good test to see if the problem is a driver
problem.
This has the added advantage of being free (as in beer).
I hope that this suggestion is not too late to be useful.
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