Recently, when I lift my laptop off the table, the screen has vertical lines on a background, kind of like Xorg failing, but then it shuts off moments later. I cleaned the contacts on my laptop's battery, and it doesn't happen when I lift the computer off the table, but every so often the screen flickers for no apparent reason. It's not like a constant CRT flicker, but the screen goes black for about 1ms and then comes back the way it was. I don't understand...

-Peter

Can you verify that this ONLY happens while booted into Linux? If you left it on, say, the BIOS setup screen, does it still happen? What happens if you close your case to the point right before it turns off, and leave it like that for a few seconds? Does it flicker then? When the screen flickers, do the case fans fluctuate?

You don't mention your brand and model of laptop, but, for what it's worth, the screen on my Gateway MX6436 flickers about every 60 seconds when the laptop is running on battery power.

I suspect that it a "feature" of the battery reserve monitoring software since it doesn't happen when I've booted to XP, or when I've booted to a Fedora installation on a USB drive that doesn't run the monitoring software.

I have a compaq presario v2000, but it has never done this before. I'll try booting into Vista and see if it still flickers.

Ok, I just got Vista to do it. The screen didn't flicker, but I lifted the Laptop slightly and the screen turned entirely blue (similar to the vertical lines I get on Linux). It didn't recover and I had to turn it off manually. Not only that, but the APM is totally messed up. Sometimes it says that the CPU has reached critical temperature (128degrees) and turns off, right after udev starts, or somewhere around there. Then it shuts off. After that, if I pull out the battery, sometimes that fixes it, but otherwise I have to pull out the battery, blow on the contacts, and then put the battery back in. I'm really irked by it, and I can only think of cleaning the contacts, but what abrasive is thin enough to get in the 1-2 mm space inside the battery contacts that won't fry my fingers? Would canned air help? Any other ideas?

@worldgnat,

This laptop sounds as though it is heading for hardware failure.
Backup your personal files while you still can.

Cleaning the battery contacts is unlikely to help (and DON'T abrade them!) - something else is loose inside.

If it is out of warranty, I suggest you take it carefully apart and clean everything with air / vacuum & a soft brush. (NO abrasives, NO solvents). Make sure everything is connected securely.

Then reassemble and hope for the best.

I have a compaq v2000 as well, and as of my last linux install (gentoo 2.6.19, sabayon) i get a screen flicker about every 60 seconds. Also only while running on battery power.

This only happens while in linux, windows works fine. I have tried a couple profiles in Kpowersave but nothing has changed. I also installed newest ATI drivers.

:s