Laptop Video Issues?

I have a Toshiba Satellite A65 that is going crazy on me. Out of no where when I turned it one I got a error message saying System32/ntfs was missing or corrupt. Just as I finished reading the message the words and letters on the screen started bouncing all over the place and the message got all jumbled. After many attempts to get it started back up I was finally able to, but after a minute or two on it would shut off and when turned back on, the errors were back. On some attempts to turn it back on it would start okay but then there would be red lines through the screen, start to go crazy again, then shut off. I took it to Geek Squad and they said my Video Ram was shot and it is cost prohibitive to repair? Anyone know anything about this issue or experienced anything similar. If it is was he says, shouldn't I be able to just replace the video card? I really don't want to have to buy a new computer, but that's what Geek Squad said my only option would be.|||Since this is a Toshiba A65, although the video RAM tested corrupt it would actually be more accurate in most cases to say that your northbridge chip (the primary chip that handles all routing of information around your computer) has failed. Although some A65's did come with seperate video chipsets, which would have their own RAM.



In either event, however, to resolve the issue would involve replacing the system board, also known as motherboard, planar board, or primary logic board. This part is the heart of the notebook, to which everything connects to. As such, it is the single most complex part in your system, and the one which costs the most labor to repair. The Toshiba A65 has the entire video subsystem, regardless of how it was configured on your particular A65, on this board.



Given a system of your age (the Toshiba A65 was made from 2003-2005) sourcing parts for your notebook becomes more problematic (they are not making replacements and haven't been for at least 3 years) and hence more costly. Parts ALONE on a repair like this would set you back easily $500-$1000, if you can even get parts for it. Labor would be several hundred dollars on top of that.



So yes, they are correct. Given the age of your notebook, it is not cost effective to repair it. If you wish to, they can still send it to their centralized notebook repair facility to have it repaired. That said, be prepared for a bill in the $800-$1400 range for the repair. And to be quite honest, anything you purchase today is going to be faster and more powerful than your old notebook, and all of your information on the old notebook can relatively easily be moved to a new computer.



Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but The Geek Squad got their assessment basically right.|||who te hell is going to read all that|||video RAM is a type of random access memory that stores each bit of data in a separate capacitor within an integrated circuit. Since real capacitors leak charge, the information eventually fades unless the capacitor charge is refreshed periodically. Because of this refresh requirement, it is a dynamic memory as opposed to SRAM and other static memory.

there is no solution better than to buy a new computer.... sorry