T61p - Display died, warranty ended in FEB. $575 to fix. HELP. I'm ticked.

[g_e_young]

Using my T61p last night and the monitor went black.  Hooked it up to an external monitor and it worked file.  Tried rebooting, cycling displays, everything.  I fear it's almost surely a hardware problem.

Called Lenovo tech support and they said the warranty ended Feb 13.  That's one month ago.  They said my only solution is to send it to them and it will be either $475 or $575 depending on what needs to be replaced.

This is UNACCEPTABLE on a $2000 high end laptop.

Any ideas would be appreciated.

Thanks!!!!

grant-

[zachareth]

All laptops last on average 3 to 4 years regardless of whether high end or not. If ur warranty ended I'm guessing ur laptop is just past 3 yrs of age. The service centre always overcharges. You can get it fixed for much less at a computer repair shop. If not you can sell it for parts at the shop and use the money to get a new machine.

[g_e_young]

It's 13 months old and has been babied.  Warranty expired at 12 months.  Bad luck, no doubt, but Lenovo should fix this problem given that it's just out of warranty.  g-

[ortegaluis]

I don't know much about repairing LCD displays on laptops but it seems that the backlight and/or inverter board seems to cause this problem.

Please correct me if I'm wrong.

You can source the components online or through Lenovo. The hardware maintenance manual [HMM] is available in case you are willing to tackle this on yourself.

15.4" T61p             14.1" T61p

[zachareth]

Lenovo has warranty extension programs. Maybe u want to try extending, and then after that claim warranty repair. IBM made a mistake selling to Lenovo. ThinkPad quality and service has been declining ever since.

[LinYu]

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g_e_young wrote:

It's 13 months old and has been babied.  Warranty expired at 12 months.  Bad luck, no doubt, but Lenovo should fix this problem given that it's just out of warranty.  g-

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Couldn't agree more with you on that one...

But I would still suggest you send a PM to Mark_Lenovo. Clearly, I cannot speak for him and I'm not even suggesting he will be able to do anything to resolve your issue. What I am trying to relay is that, in my view, from all I have read and experienced in this forum, Mark is a very fair minded person.

Someone mentioned that laptops have an average life of 3 to 4 years. I must belong to the lucky ones, because from my three ThinkPads, two are quite older that that, and they're still kicking... 

Besides, your computer is only 13 months old! And your warranty is even less than 30 days off the official expiration date! Would it be fair to guess that, in these circumstances, a 30-day miss isn't that much time? 

Clearly, Lenovo would most likely not be legally obligated to do anything under that expired warranty. But, hey, why don't you try it? You might be surprised...

Good luck.

[g_e_young]

Thanks LinYu, I will contact him.  Events like this leave bad tastes in the mouths of customers.  I've been very happy with my T61p and have told many people about how great it is...but I'm starting to wonder just how good this machine is..

Thanks,  g-

[g_e_young]

I replaced the inverter board; found one on eBay for $15 shipped.  It fixed the display (after much research, I discovered that it also could have been a bad backlight on the LCD which would required an LCD replacement ($150 on eBay)!  That beats a $575 Lenovo repair any day.  Thanks for you help.  g-

[ortegaluis]

Note: A CCFL backlight is also replaceable. You don't have to replace the entire LCD. Not sure about LED backlight.

[mreigle]

I have the same problem and have seen other people with the same problem. 

I started adding to his post here: 

http://forums.lenovo.com/lnv/board/message?board.id=T_Series_Thinkpads&message.id=37599&jump=true