Backlight works for a split second, inverter or inverter cable?
Black MacBook Core 2 Duo 2.4GHz T8300 w X3100 GPU
My Core2Duo (model MB404LL/a) is currently around 2.5 years old. I've replaced the airport card a few months ago, and reapplied thermal grease (arctic silver 5) about a week ago. A couple of days ago, I used it to play a movie and some music on the TV. The day after, everything worked fine... This morning, the backlight started giving me some trouble.
When I boot it up, the backlight will flash on for a second, and then dim. If I toggle with the keyboard's backlight brightness buttons enough, sometimes I'll get the light to stay on for a minute or two. Otherwise, it basically will flicker on and then immediately turn off again. Also, I should note that earlier today, the backlight was definitely a bit more reliable- it stayed on for a while, and seemed like the problem had to do with the screen moving- any kind of abrupt jostle would immediately turn off the backlight. There is no issue with the actual display, as I can see the desktop with the backlight off.
I've done a bit of reading, and figured it's either the inverter or the inverter cable. What do you guys think? I am fairly comfortable with taking apart the laptop, but I would love to get some input on the issue before doing any serious work... Are there any quick ways to see if I had loosened the inverter cable during my thermal paste application?
Thanks.
Is this a good question?