theclay
asked on
Collect data from notebook with messed up screen
I have a Samsung notebook running Windows XP. We used it to record some data in the field. As it was being transported back to the office to get the data off of the notebook, the screen became competely unreadable. I believe the notebook is still functioning other than the display.
Obvious solutions would be to find some kind of USB display so we can see what we're doing. I could also plug in a USB keyboard and - using another notebook - figure out which keystrokes to use to copy the data to a thumb drive.
A third option (and this is where i need your help) is to write some kind of script that I could have on a thumb drive that would run automatically when the machine starts up. I am familiar with C++, but that's about the extent of my programming prowess.
So the question(s) would be:
1. Is it possible to get the thing to run a script from a thumb drive on startup? Obviously at this point we have no way of accessing the registry or startup menu.
2. Would there be any other simple solution to this problem? I don't have a USB display device or keyboard in the office. If we have to, we can go out and buy one, but I'm exploring other options first.
Thanks
Obvious solutions would be to find some kind of USB display so we can see what we're doing. I could also plug in a USB keyboard and - using another notebook - figure out which keystrokes to use to copy the data to a thumb drive.
A third option (and this is where i need your help) is to write some kind of script that I could have on a thumb drive that would run automatically when the machine starts up. I am familiar with C++, but that's about the extent of my programming prowess.
So the question(s) would be:
1. Is it possible to get the thing to run a script from a thumb drive on startup? Obviously at this point we have no way of accessing the registry or startup menu.
2. Would there be any other simple solution to this problem? I don't have a USB display device or keyboard in the office. If we have to, we can go out and buy one, but I'm exploring other options first.
Thanks
Try connecting the laptop to an external display
The best solution? Buy a new laptop. You can them remove the HD from the broken laptop and remove the data using a USB HD enclosure.
Of cours, the other option would be to get the laptop fixed. The VGA screen would work short term, but it may be a pain to have to continuously attach it every time someone comes back from the field to retrieve data. If you have a docking station for the laptop, this would alleviate this issue, however
Of cours, the other option would be to get the laptop fixed. The VGA screen would work short term, but it may be a pain to have to continuously attach it every time someone comes back from the field to retrieve data. If you have a docking station for the laptop, this would alleviate this issue, however
ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION
membership
This solution is only available to members.
To access this solution, you must be a member of Experts Exchange.
ASKER
No VGA port. This is a notebook with a touchscreen - not a laptop. All that I have are 2 USB ports.
Do you have an optical drive? What about Safe Mode? Do you see any legible video during initial boot-up, before Windows starts to load?
ASKER
I see nothing during bootup and I have no keyboard to hit F8 during startup. The screen looks like it took a blow - has a shattered look that starts on the bottom right corner - although you can't feel anything abnormal. It seems like the cover is still good but underneath it's destroyed. I'm thinking the best move would be to go out and buy a USB keyboard.
ASKER
Autorun.inf works but isn't running automatically as soon as I plug in the thumb drive. I have to click on the thumb drive to run the program. If I had a keyboard on the thing it would be a simple matter of typing in the path to the batch file on the thumb drive. I appreciate all the input here. At this point I'm planning on buying a keyboard as it will be good to have one around here anyway for similar problems in the future. If anyone has any other insite I'm still open for suggestions.
ASKER
OK, correction there: Autorun DOES work IF there are no other files on the thumb drive. When the only files on the drive were Autorun.inf and the batch file I wanted it to run, it happily copied the files I needed from the dicrepit notebook.
Good luck
ASKER
This worked great since this is an XP machine. Thanks
You can potentially boot using a thumb drive or a DVD/CD image of a Linux OS, if it's a display driver problem and not a hardware problem you may see the screen that way.