A laptop malfunctioning can be quite stressful. Portable computers are more difficult to disassemble than PCs and users have a harder time trying to figure out where the problem could be. Replacing something is way more complicated. If there are problems with images, one can assume that the whole laptop will have to be replaced – or at least the repair will be costly.
Laptops have become more powerful and increasingly cheaper (a study by USA Today showed a comprehensive list of milestone PCs and laptops have reached since the seventies), but surely you would prefer a quick fix rather than a whole new investment. Let alone the data you might lose. Check the three most frequent issues regarding laptop functioning. Each one of them will be detailed in other articles on this site.
No image
When there’s no image, it’s not obvious where the problem comes from, but it’s not difficult to make a quick diagnose. If the power is supplied correctly and the LED is on, and if you don’t see anything broken, maybe a lack of RAM is the problem. Just don’t assume that the laptop is “dead” or that it can’t be solved more easily than you would think.
Overheating
A laptop is more likely to overheat than a regular PC, and the main reason is the engineering of it. Take all preemptive measures to prevent further damage to your machine.
Slow hard drive
Defragmentation is only one of the measures you can take to deal with a hard drive that seems to slow – and there’s a lot to do before replacing the laptop. Is your disk too loaded with data, and do you need to have all that readily accessible, daily?