LG gram 17 - monitor doesn't work anymore after a holiday.

Hi all. Trying to understand why the display on my LG gram doesn't work anymore. Here's what happened;

• Took my laptop on a holiday. LG gram 17, 2021.
  
  
• Spent 15 minutes outside in the sun working.
  
  
• The sun was strong. Noticed the back of the display was really hot, so I took it inside.
  
  
• Laptop continued to work fine throughout the day inside my room.
  
  
• The day after when I plugged it in for recharging I smelled burning plastic coming from the lower part of the laptop and the monitor had stopped working.
  

To sum up, my theory is that either;

A) The laptop display got overheated and broke down. What I find odd about that is the monitor worked fine through out the day. It died when I plugged the laptop into the wall.

B) It was my first time charging the laptop on holiday. So I also wonder whether the electricity at the hotel somehow fried my laptop? But I thought the AC brick was supposed to avoid that. Not sure if it matters but I was using one of these european plug adapters on the AC brick. https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61vYKwQwMYL._AC_SY355_.jpg

Is there anything I can try to fix the laptop? I live in Europe and have to send it to the US for repairs which is costly.

TLDR;Took laptop on holiday. Used it in the sun for 15 minutes. It got hot. Display stopped working.

 

How do you know it's just the panel that doesn't work? Did you try plugging it into an external monitor using HDMI/USB-C?

The power adapter shouldn't have hurt anything as long as it was a proper adapter, I've used those things many times traveling to Europe and UK (they have different plugs but I think they are both 220-230v I forget) and the LG laptops don't draw much power so I doubt it was that. Sounds like perhaps bad luck, but I would bargain that if it happened when you plugged in the charger something with the power delivery failed.

I don't have the adapter (if it's the barrel plug one you're reference) in front of me, but I can't remember if it is compatible with both 110v and 230v, some work with both and you just need a plug adaptor, some are 110v ONLY and you need an adapter that also steps the voltage down. Read the adapter text and also the specs for your plug adaptor. It could be you just fried it because you are using a plug style only adapter and the LG power brick is not BOTH 110v AND 230v capable.

I'm also making a bad assumption that you traveled to EU/UK from the US. Probably the voltage part would be true either direction perhaps or to two totally unrelated countries with differening power standards.

 

Hey, thanks for replying!

I hooked it up to an external monitor and it works fine. The laptop works, benchmarks are all normal.

I also opened it up and could not see an visible issues with the motherboard or other components. What I did notice how ever is that the display is actually still alive. It's just so dim that you can't really see it with your bare eyes, even if total darkness.

I was shining a really bright light at the panel and then I could see that it was responsive. Just so dim it's barely visible.

Sounds likely.

My current theory is that some component inside the display that has something to do with wall socket electricity or power delivery got destroyed by the heat the sun procured.

Because as soon as I plugged the laptop to the wall socket, the display stopped working.

I don't think it has anything to do with the plug to be honest. But I wanted to mention it. I've used it in other European countries before with no problems. The laptop is bought in the US but mainly used in the EU.

I'm wondering if I can manage to repair this my self if the panel it self isn't fried. If it's just a tiny component that has something to do with powering the display, then perhaps it's salvageable? Not excited about sending it to the US and back from Europe. It's expensive and so many things can go wrong!

 

Do you know which part this is? Watching screen teardowns of LG Grams and wondering whether this could be it? The smell of burning plastic did seem come this area.

 

Just got a response on another forum. The guy said if the display was responsive, but so dim you can't make anything out except with a flashlight (which it is), then it was because the power supply was fried and it couldn't power the display.

Anything I can do?

 

Which forum did you get the response?

 

It looks like the eDP cable goes through there, it could be that the cable got piched and shorted.

EDIT: now that I zoom in the eDP cable looks like it's on the left, that looks like the WiFi antenna cables. Not sure what those black things are though.

 

Reddit.

I'm guessing the guy is right, since he guessed that the display was functional if I shined a bright enough light on it (which it was).

To recap, he said the internal power supply was fried. Is there any way to get your local repair shop to fix that?

Otherwise I have to ship it out to LG and hope that repairs or replacement are covered under warranty.

What do you guys think?

 

When did you purchase it? Probably RMA to LG would be best if it's under warranty.