Planar PE191M external LCD monitor paired with a Dell Inspiron laptop. Systems are about 7 years old. Upon boot or returning from sleep mode the monitor displays briefly, then goes black. Seems to still be getting video signal because it does not display "No Video Signal" box. Pressing the "fn-F8" combination to switch between the laptop video and the external PE191M monitor several times finally restores the display to the monitor. Once restored, it works fine until the next time I reboot. I've never experienced this before. Coincidentally this occurred after doing a large number of Windows XP Updates.

You can switch to anexternal monitor by two methods.1. Connect the externalmonitor to the laptop's video port, power up the external monitor first and thelaptop. The video information will automatically switch to the externalmonitor.2. If you power up thelaptop first then you can switch the video output to the external monitor bypressing the Fn key and one of the Function keys, depending upon your make andmodel laptop. You can also toggle between the external monitor or both LCDscreen plus the external monitor or back to LCD screen only by pressing the Fnkey plus one of the function key. Here is a list of keycombinations for some of the laptops :-IBM ThinkPad = Fn + F7HP and Compaq = Fn + F4Toshiba = Fn + F5Dell = Fn + F8

Fn + F8 should toggle between LCD, External and both, wait about 15 seconds between Fn+ F8 attempts

Hi

How do you know that the laptop is booting into windows did you connect to an external monitor
and if it did work on external monitor you could then uninstall the display driver in device manager or do a system restore and then when windows restarts it may load the correct driver ( if that is/was the problem )

If you are sure that it is booting into windows but cannot see anything you could try restarting pressing F8 while booting to get you into safe mode and see if that will show on monitor if it does you could uninstall the display driver reboot and hopefully windows will reload the correct driver

good luck hope this works for you

You appear to be cloning your internal LCD and as long as it is active, the resolution setting for the LCD is also controlling the resolution of the external monitor. When the LCD is closed, then the default resolution of the external monitor is being used by Windows 7 (It apparently has autodetected the size of the monitor and knows the Highest optimal resolution it will display.) The higher the resolution, then smaller the icons.
To resolve, go to display properties and check the resolution of the internal LCD and then set the External display to the lower resolution.
You should be able to wake the system with an external keyboard, by pressing the spacebar, if the system is sleeping

Use the 'FN' key (blue coloured?) and one of the other blue-coloured keys to "toggle" the video:

1. LCD only
2. external monitor only
3. both LCD & external

After boot-up, Windows defaults to "LCD only", and so the external monitor goes to "sleep".

Do you see anything on screen? Dell logo? I will assume you see nothing. Not even a Dell logo.

First test your power supply with a meter to be sure it is putting out 18-19 volts. If good, remove the laptop battery and try again. The next tests should be done with the battery not connected to the laptop.

Remove the hard drive and see if it boots. If not, next remove the dvd drive from the laptop and try to boot. If no good, remove the ram, clean the contacts on the ram and the slot with a pink pencil eraser....gently, just make them shiny. Try to boot with no ram/hdd/dvd. Put the ram back in and try again. Try connecting the laptop to an external monitor.

If after all this you still cannot get a Dell logo at boot time, the mainboard is likely dead. A refurbished one (with only 90 day warranty) will probably cost you at least $250 from Dell. Please let this one go and look at a new laptop.....sorry.

Hope this helps :)

Okay.... If you can. install your drive. It may work. If not then your Hardware in your monitor is screwed. Or maybe something else but not to my knowledge.
good luck!

iv come across this before sometimes people can see that the monitor is actually working but the light has gone out id say bad capacitors that are breaking down. if you want to DIY it take it apart and find the light pcb usually built on the power supply pcb and look for bulging or swolen capacitors this happens alot in my opinion. if you can DIY it get the same caps or same value but better ones. I might be wrong but worth a look

At first glance, I'd say "bad video/motherboard" ...however, when you hook up an external monitor, you also need to first switch into "external LCD" mode. On the Dell laptop, hit FN and F8 I believe to switch between LCD and external. It will go through several modes...LCD only, external only, neither, and both. Keep switching until you see something on the external.

If you never see output on the external, you've got a video/motherboard problem. If under warranty, contact Dell and place a support call.

If not under warranty, you're looking at anywhere from $200-$400 for a new motherboard, plus labor for someone to install it.

Hope this helps - remember to rate :)

Experience:
- A+ certified technician
- 8 years as IT/manager of a 100% Dell-supplied company, with over 1,500 Dell volume annually
- Dell Level II certified technician

http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/ins6000/en/sm/video0.htm#wp1006368

Above is the directions of how to get to the video board:
I would check the LCD connector first.

Here is the service manual for it.
http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/ins6000/en/sm/index.htm

It will show you how to take it apart.

Please let me know how you make out.