Diagnose this: Thinkpad screen fades off on startup... ?

[stultus]

My friend has a 3 year old Thinkpad 600 series notebook that's starting to give her problems. When she tries to boot up, the LCD lights up for a second and then slowly fades, but the computer continues to boot up. It used to work correctly when she turned it off and on again, but now the screen won't work at all (ie, still on for a sec but then back to black).

She thought it might be the battery, so she replaced it with a new one, but that didn't solve anything.

Any idea what the problem could be? The laptop isn't under warranty any more; what's the best way to get this fixed?

 

[Gunbuster]

Prolly a bad FL tube or Inverter board

With a little digging you can find all the parts breakdows on IBM's site

 

[stultus]

How much would it be to fix these parts? Oh, BTW, she is just within 3 years since she bought it July '98.

 

[stultus]

bump