[coder12]

So I've had my mini 10v for a few months here, and we've been pretty happy together. I take it everywhere with me, and I mean everywhere. School, football games, lunch, and car rides (but not the bathroom!)
Last week between classes, I carried it under my arm as normal, but when I went to do work (I'm a tech admin at our school, plus a student) there was a green line on the right hand side of the screen, (about 70% of the way across, I'd say) I popped out the battery, wiggled the screen, and powered the machine back on. All was well. Then I put it back into standby a few more times, went to different classes, and it did it again. I powered it off, and turned it back on, The green line appears in the BIOS too, so it's not an OS issue. After I took out the battery and wiggled it around a bit, all was well. I disassembled my laptop (fully) later that day to check it out, the cable on the motherboard itself seemed fine. However I didn't check the cable in the screen itself. After reassembly, it seemed fine, so I put it in my car since we had a dance for our homecoming game. The line was back after the dance, and hasn't gone away since. It's been 2 days.
It's one pixel wide, and reaches all the way from the top of the screen, and goes to the bottom. It tends to be invisible when there is a solid white color being displayed. I'm placing my money on it being a cable issue.

However, I've seen similar things happen with a bad chipset.

My question is, I guess, Is this a Cable issue, Chipset issue, or an actual display issue? My next operation is to swap out the ram for 2gigs, swap the bezel for the mini 10's, and add the bluetooth chip. If I can, I'd prefer to fix this at the same time.

Any help here?

[rrfranczak3]

you cant change the 10v screen to a 10...you know that right?

[coder12]

Originally Posted by rrfranczak3

you cant change the 10v screen to a 10...you know that right?

Yup, that's why I'm switching the 10v's Bezel for the 10's. Since it has the protective layer over it

[lauriem04]

My guess is that it is a problem with the display itself. I had an almost identical problem with my 10v's screen. I contacted Dell (via support chat), they remoted in, ran some diagnostics, and found a screen fault. Fortunately, the unit was still under warranty, so they replaced the screen for free.

Be prepared to argue a bit, though - I had to really convince them that it wasn't a case of accidental damage. In my case, I truly don't believe it was accidental damage (the screen was fine when I shut it down before I left for work, and the line appeared as soon as I started it back up that evening), but since yours appeared after you carried it around, they may try to say it was somehow your fault. :-(

[coder12]

Originally Posted by lauriem04

My guess is that it is a problem with the display itself. I had an almost identical problem with my 10v's screen. I contacted Dell (via support chat), they remoted in, ran some diagnostics, and found a screen fault. Fortunately, the unit was still under warranty, so they replaced the screen for free.

Be prepared to argue a bit, though - I had to really convince them that it wasn't a case of accidental damage. In my case, I truly don't believe it was accidental damage (the screen was fine when I shut it down before I left for work, and the line appeared as soon as I started it back up that evening), but since yours appeared after you carried it around, they may try to say it was somehow your fault. :-(

Thanks! Unfortunately I'm not sure if my 10v is still under warranty--I bought it off of ebay, however I've had things off of ebay be warranted by the manufacturer before.

As far as arguing against customer service reps I'm a pro, especially since I work in the CS field myself! (At a grocery store that values CS as our #1 pillar)

If they ever get on you about something, simply tell them, "so you are saying that a customer is wrong? who keeps you in business?"
Depending on whom you are talking to they will usually stop arguing pretty fast.

[rrfranczak3]

go to the Dell site and put in the service tag number (usually located on the bottom of the unit) and it will tell you everything about the machine you can also check the warranty status also

[lauriem04]

Originally Posted by coder12

Thanks! Unfortunately I'm not sure if my 10v is still under warranty--I bought it off of ebay, however I've had things off of ebay be warranted by the manufacturer before.

As far as arguing against customer service reps I'm a pro, especially since I work in the CS field myself! (At a grocery store that values CS as our #1 pillar)

If they ever get on you about something, simply tell them, "so you are saying that a customer is wrong? who keeps you in business?"
Depending on whom you are talking to they will usually stop arguing pretty fast.

Assuming that you're in the U.S., and if you find that the unit is still under warranty, you can transfer the warranty to yourself here (necessary before contacting Dell support):

Dell - Ownership Transfers

If you're outside the U.S., just Google "Dell warranty transfer" + your country and the relevant form should come up.

I totally agree that reminding a company that their customers are the ones who keep them in business should be enough to get them to work with you on issues like these. Unfortunately, Dell seems to be very stubborn on the accidental damage issue. I work for a large public sector organization which places millions of dollars worth of IT orders with Dell every year (and have some say in deciding who to order from), but reminding them of that fact wasn't enough to get them to fix the power port on my original 10v for free. :-( They claimed that the damage could have been caused by me pulling on the power cord too hard to remove it - ridiculous, to say the least. Fortunately, I was able to fix the port myself, but now I'm afraid it will break again whenever I unplug it. Most of the time, I just use it at home near a power outlet. For travel, I picked up a second 10v from the Outlet during a coupon sale - for about $100 less than it would have cost me to have the original one repaired.

[coder12]

Unfortunately my service tag is quite worn off, so when I replace the bezel and add a gig of ram and add a glowing apple logo .... I'll just have to see what the deal is with the screen!

[reflex]

Originally Posted by coder12

Unfortunately my service tag is quite worn off, so when I replace the bezel and add a gig of ram and add a glowing apple logo .... I'll just have to see what the deal is with the screen!

You can get the service tag via software. The BIOS setup screen will also display it.

[coder12]

Turns out this problem started the day after my warranty was void..

Maybe I should just get a new macbook air :P