4012GZ laptop: dead video?

I'm guessing that I have a dead or near-dead graphics card on my wife's Gateway 4012GZ laptop ... let me know if that sounds like the right diagnosis...

Past two days: occasional freezes - display stays on, no mouse, no Ctrl-Alt-Del, only thing to do is hold down power button to turn off.

Last night: Freezes got more frequent, then wife reported that it wouldn't start up at all. Press power button, fan comes on, small noise from CD drive powering up, no BOIS, no video, no hard drive noise, nothing. Repeated attempts to startup would sometimes be successful, and it would run for a while before freezing as above.

I attached an external monitor and ran with the laptop screen turned off, and that seemed a bit better, but certainly not all fixed. I found newer video drivers and installed them. It seemed happier - I shut down and restarted several times and left it running for quite a while - no freezes, always started up fine. I saw that there were a lot of windows updates pending, including XP SP3, so I left it updating and went to bed.

This morning: dead dead dead - won't start up at all, as described above. I've probably tried over a dozen times this morning with not a single successful boot.


Like I said - my guess is dead video card - does that sound right?

Whether or not that's right, is there anything I can do or try to do to bring it back to life?

I assume the graphics card is integrated on the 4012GZ - I see lots of other accessories for sale on eBay but no replacement graphics cards. So if it is a dead card that's the same as a dead mobo, right?


Thanks for any assistance you can provide...