My dad has an old Acer Aspire 4732z, nothing special of a laptop but still works and is good for what he requires. A couple of months ago he told me if I could check it because it started blinking and he was unable to see the screen.
I checked it and at first I thought about doing some extra stuff to give it a few more years of useful life, so I've basically done the following:
- Bought new bottom casing (where all the hardware stuff goes) old one was pretty spent, discolored and brittle
- Bought a new LCD, thought the problem was there
- Bought a 1TB SSD as an upgrade, used to have a regular 1TB HDD
- Bought a new battery, old one was dead
One day I started cleaning it up and readjusting everything, and after assembling everything, the exact same issue persisted.
So, my next thought was to change the flex cable, ordered one (at the moment not sure if new or refurbished), but that didn't solve the issue either. I tried installing it carefully and without forcing it.
I was out of my level of expertise at that point, so I took it with a guy that I thought could fix it. At first he told me that the flex cable was the issue and that something was not right with the flex cable positioning or installation. Just in case I took my time in going back for the laptop and when I got there, the issue was exactly the same, he basically wasn't able to fix it.
He told me apparently the bezel/case/hinge assembly was in some way doubled and that's what causing the issue, but since the top closes perfectly in line with the rest of the laptop I am not sure this is the problem.
Since I've already invested quite more than the current laptop's value I don't want to surrender now, but I don't want to buy another flex cable and that not being the solution.
I am also looking for a new bezel/case/hinge assembly, but so far I've only found the bezel and the hinges (very expensive on their own), but I am not convinced this is the issue.
The other reason why I'm a little stubborn about this is that I wanted to surprise my dad with the renewal of the laptop and the main thing is that the computer works fine except for the blinking screen. I installed Windows 10 and it works fine with the SSD... but that bliking makes it unusable.
Sometimes it can stay okay for a couple of minutes, then it starts blinking and goes back to normal and then it would be blinking for a few minutes, then it can stay completely white for a couple of minutes. Cooling/temperature doesn't seem to be related since I leave it off for a few hours and turn it on again and sometimes it even boots with white screen.
I think I can run it with an external display, haven't been able to check because I no longer have VGA screens and I don't want to buy an adapter just for that.
I know the computer could be used stationary with an external screen, but that defeats the purpose of the entire fix.
Should I look for another flex cable or is the issue elsewhere?
UPDATE
I got a VGA-to-HDMI adapter and the external screen works. It has some noise issues but I think that's either from the adapter or the VGA interface, otherwise no blinking.
So from here on, should I look for another flex cable? Or what's the issue?
UPDATE 2023 June
So I know it's been a long time, but I had it catching dust and recently decided to try at it again.
I changed the flex cable with a new one, and the result was the same.
My last resort is to change the motherboard, I found the same model on AliExpress, but I am not sure that would work.
My theory is that maybe the processor is having age-related heating issues because if the laptop has been idle for a while the screen works fine for some time and then it starts blinking again and goes white in the end. From what I see the new motherboard comes with no processor.
So after checking the CPU of the laptop is this one ...which is actually a decent price... so in theory if I buy the mobo and CPU it would be an entirely new PC except for some casing and the keyboard.
Do you consider this would solve the blinking? I honestly don't know what else could be the case.
