Laptop's screen goes black randomly. Everything else is still on

[Mind Man]

So, recently, I've acquired this problem where every now and then my laptop's monitor will go black. Everything else is still on. The lights are still on, the fans are still running, but I have to turn off my laptop in order to turn the screen back on. It seems to happen more often when I'm playing a game like Skyrim or using a 3D modeling program. Although it has happened when I'm doing things like browsing the internet or watching a video.

Connecting it to an external monitor like an HD TV won't work. The screen has gone black when I connected my laptop to my TV, and that in turn, makes TV screen go black as well.

I've tried cleaning out my fans and the problem still persists.

I have this laptop.

[url]http://www.cnet.com/products/gateway-p-7805u-fx-edition/specs/[/url]

[GiGaBiTe]

If it was just the screen going out, I would say you have a bad inverter. But since the video out to another display also stops working, I think you have a problem with the motherboard.

I would take a guess from experience that the 9800M GTS GPU on the motherboard has a fractured BGA joint. These fractures are so tiny that the heating/cooling of the chip can connect and disconnect said bad BGA joint.

You have a few options:

1) Leave it alone until it completely fails and get a new laptop.

2) Attempt to fix it yourself with a heat gun. If you don't have intimate knowledge of laptop motherboards, heatguns and soldering; I don't recommend it.

3) Take it to a shop that specializes in reflowing BGA ASICs. Shops that fix game consoles like the Xbox 360 RRoD/ PS3 YLoD can do it. This can be expensive and cost more than the laptop is worth.

3) Try and find a used replacement motherboard on Ebay or elsewhere for your laptop and do a motherboard swap. YMMV on finding an exact replacement board depending on whether it was a popular selling model at the time.

4) Of course you can always buy a new laptop.

[Mind Man]

[QUOTE=GiGaBiTe;46420447]
3) Take it to a shop that specializes in reflowing BGA ASICs. Shops that fix game consoles like the Xbox 360 RRoD/ PS3 YLoD can do it. This can be expensive and cost more than the laptop is worth.
[/QUOTE]

Could I also take it to a place that repairs motherboards?

[GiGaBiTe]

If they have a BGA rework station and know how to use it, yes.

[Levelog]

Also note it is a very real possibility that the repair will be more than the laptop is really worth.