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Dell Inspiron 1720 - on boot, switches to ext monitor

onthelimit1

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Posted March 14, 2013 at 10:51PM

This laptop was having all sorts of problems. Did a fresh install of Vista SP1 with no problems. On reboot, the screen was black. Plugged in a monitor to check. Worked. Tried to toggle Fn+F8 - no change - wouldn't switch to LCD. Shut down, rebooted - same. Shutdown, removed battery, held pwr button for a few secs, switched on - all normal. Switched off, same problem.

Have made sure all Dell drivers are up to date (no flags in device Manager), but still boots to ext monitor, and the switch from/to LCD is not working. Reset BIOS, no change. Don't even get a lightening of the screen and the Dell logo.

Any bright ideas please!

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Woolwell

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Posted March 14, 2013 at 10:57PM

With the monitor connected try right clicking on the screen and selecting graphics options and try changing back to laptop there. I have use of a Vista Compaq where the F toggle rarely works correctly.

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onthelimit1

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Posted March 15, 2013 at 9:54AM

Thanks Woolwell. Very strange, but when I booted it this morning, all was normal and I was able to switch between LCD and monitor as normal. Will leave it for a while, then try a restart to see what happens!

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Woolwell

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Posted March 15, 2013 at 10:03AM

On that Compaq I tend to avoid the toggle as it seems to give unpredictable results. I have never discovered why.

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onthelimit1

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Posted March 16, 2013 at 3:16PM

Hmmm - curiouser and curiouser. If I do the remove battery etc bit, it starts normally. After a subsequent shutdown, there is no sign of the initial actions on the screen, but after a few seconds the screen lightens and the Vista logo shows. It then continues to boot normally. weird, but will have to be lived with, I think.

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