[Splatocaster]

I'm trying to fix my Residential Wiring teacher's laptop

HP Pavilion 2700
nVidia MPC67M Geforce 7150M / nForce 630M

The screen is normal brightness for about a second, and than turns black. By holding a flashlight up to it, you can faintly see the screen. My original assumption was that the inverter was bad.

However, as I troubleshooted further to avoid a false "prescription", I found out that the VGA output and the S-Vid output yield the same results.

This makes me assume that the video card is shot, however it is an integrated card. Replacing the video card would require complete mobo replacement.

Is there any possibility that it is the inverter? Is there any thing else I should check before replacing the mobo?

[no2pencil]

Check the bezel, see if the 'lid closed' button doesn't have something forcing it down.

You should also be able to troubleshoot this by disabling any 'lid closed' options in the Operating System.

[moopet]

I've seen a lot of HPs (mostly the 6xxx range, to be fair) die with that problem, and it's usually the board rather than the inverter or lid switch. Inverters are cheap on ebay, if there's no lid switch problem and you can get one, try it. It's quick enough to swap out.

[no2pencil]

If the problem is coming across the svideo, then I have a hard time believe it would be the inverter board. The inverter board powers the CCFL. There is no reason why a secondary output device would also be dimmed.

You can also verify this by using a 2nd laptop (if you have access to one) by plugging the LCD into it's inverter board. Since it's just power you'll know right away if the problem replicates or not.