PC said:
I've got a couple of MiniNote 2133 netbooks - their screen resolution is
1280 x 768.
I just picked up a couple of refurbished 2140 netbooks (with 2 gb ram,
160 gb hard drive and Windows 7 home premium for refurbished PC's ->
$170 each).
The 2140's have a screen resolution of 1024 x 576. I thought that maybe
I could swap the screens and end up with a 2140 with better resolution.
Anyone know if this is possible?
AFAIK, laptop panels have no Plug and Play. If you can find a datasheet
for the panel, and can look at the interface for it, there's probably
nothing there that says "I'm a 1024x576" panel. Therefore, the video
driver has to fake it, and perhaps even the BIOS needs a VESA module
added, so it can render properly to the panel as well.
So it could be an uphill battle, getting it to work properly.
If you do nothing, what should happen is the 1280x768 panel ends
up with a 1024x576 active area in the upper left hand corner. And
the rest of the pixels remain black. At least, a poster who put
the wrong replacement panel in a laptop, that's what happened.
If there is a mismatch in the color depth (6 bit, 8 bit, deep color
or whatever), it's also possible the colors could be all screwed up.
Or the image could be completely illegible. But if the panels are
basically the same on color, then you might see an active area
in the upper left corner. And no way to make it "fill the screen".
To make it "fill the screen", the driver has to be modified in such
a way, that a different max resolution is available. And I think there
are people who know how to do that. I don't know what files, or
what needs modifying. There are a couple laptop forums, that
might have the details needed. And it is more involved than
just changing a single entry in the registry. (Because the BIOS
info needs to be changed so the BIOS uses the full screen as well.)
Paul
