Screen flickering and Wi-Fi connection issues

Hey there.
I’ve got a new Latitude 550, picked it up back in January 2017. It didn't come with Windows pre-installed, so I had a technician set up Windows 10 for me.
The trouble started about two weeks ago. Out of nowhere, the colors on my screen went haywire—like a thousand different shades shifting at once—and then everything just froze. Eventually, the screen turned almost completely black, kind of like the image attached to this post.
It happened again today. Interestingly, both times I was using Excel, if that even matters. When the screen went dark, I had to force a hard reboot. The first time, two weeks ago, it booted up fine. But when I turned it on today, it acted like the Wi-Fi component was just... missing. I tried running HP Support to see if it was a driver issue, but nothing came up. Should I be installing something manually?But which one would I even download? Is it even a driver problem? Everything was working perfectly until that second blackout. Right now, I can only get online via an Ethernet cable. It might help if I shared screenshots of my Device Manager and what the connection options look like without Wi-Fi.

Anyway, I need some advice. I still have two years of warranty left, but is this actually worth sending in for service? What should my next move be?

I think my graphics card might be on its last legs, maybe around 99% dead

Grab HWmonitor or something similar and check if things are running too hot before you head back.
Your Wi-Fi drivers are definitely installed; otherwise, you’d notice right away because that Intel Dual Core would be showing a yellow warning icon.
The actual issue with your Wi-Fi is just that you've got "Airplane Mode" turned on.

Kenneth Cruz67 said:I think my graphics card might be on its last legs, maybe around 99% dead

So you're suggesting I take it in for repair? Should I rush to move all my data onto an external hard drive right now?

wearymason4 said:Grab HWmonitor or something similar and check if things are running too hot before you head back.
Your Wi-Fi drivers are definitely installed; otherwise, you’d notice right away because that Intel Dual Core would be showing a yellow warning icon.
The actual issue with your Wi-Fi is just that you've got "Airplane Mode" turned on.

Yeah, I ran the analysis and here is what it shows. There are entries where the temperature hits over 50 degrees. Even though the laptop doesn't actually feel hot on the outside and stays pretty quiet. Are you recommending a cleaning, or are those temperatures okay for certain components?

As for the Wi-Fi, it isn't in Airplane Mode because the icon turns blue and says "on" when it's enabled, just like here. The Wi-Fi is literally dead. The only way I can get online is via Ethernet.

Lisa Perez50 said:So you're suggesting I take it in for repair? Should I rush to move all my data onto an external hard drive right now?

Yeah, I ran the analysis and here is what it shows. There are entries where the temperature hits over 50 degrees. Even though the laptop doesn't actually feel hot on the outside and stays pretty quiet. Are you recommending a cleaning, or are those temperatures okay for certain components?

As for the Wi-Fi, it isn't in Airplane Mode because the icon turns blue and says "on" when it's enabled, just like here. The Wi-Fi is literally dead. The only way I can get online is via Ethernet.

The hard drive shouldn't have anything to do with the graphics issues. Your data should be perfectly safe, though I suppose it’s always a smart move to have a backup just in case.

Temperatures around 50 to 60 degrees are actually quite reasonable. Maybe try running a demanding game for a bit and then check the temperature again after about half an hour.

Regarding the Wi-Fi, you might want to check if there's a physical switch on the laptop to toggle it, or perhaps look in the BIOS settings to see if it's enabled. You could also check the Device Manager to see if the Wi-Fi device is even showing up.

It might be worth checking the Event Viewer to see if there are any critical system errors popping up.

From what I've seen before, when a screen starts fading like that, it's usually either a problem with the graphics card or the display cable—but since you're on a laptop, it's most likely the graphics card itself.

I’d honestly just run a quick test by hooking the laptop up to an external monitor, you know, just to see if the picture looks okay there. It doesn't strictly have to be about the graphics card, but I really just want us to be absolutely sure what we're dealing with.

It could be that the chip sitting right next to the LCD is acting up.

But hey, since it's still under warranty, you seriously don't even need to stress about it—just drop it off at the service center and let them handle it!

If it’s still under warranty, take it back immediately. I honestly doubt it's a graphics card issue, but I have a suspicion the monitor itself is starting to fail—specifically that LED indicator underneath. It’s an expensive fix since you'd likely need to swap out the entire display, but if that warranty is still active, you won't have to worry about the cost.

What’s the best move here? I’m not doing anything heavy on this thing, but considering what I paid, I expected a machine that was actually better than some bottom-of-the-barrel budget model.
Regarding the Wi-Fi, I managed to fix it myself. Even though Siri didn't find any necessary updates to install, I just went ahead and manually reinstalled the Wi-Fi drivers. It’s working fine now, which is my main priority since I don't exactly have an Ethernet port nearby. Honestly, how do drivers just "vanish" from a laptop out of nowhere? Makes no sense. 😁

As for the screen, I tried plugging it into my TV via HDMI for the first time, and when I connected it, the screen just went black. To be fair, I didn't wait forever because I was low-key panicking that the whole thing was fried, so I did a hard reset immediately. Maybe something would have popped up if I'd waited, but right now it looks like a dead laptop, except for these million different colors flashing on the laptop screen itself.

I’ve got a 3-year warranty, and I’m barely nine months into using this thing—not even a full year yet. I’ll wait until after the holidays pass and then take it in so they can figure out what's going on. This has only happened twice so far, and I'm hoping it stays that way, but I’ve got photos and video to prove there's a real issue. My biggest fear is that the tech at the service center will try to tell me everything is perfectly fine when clearly it isn't. But hey, I'm seeing this through to the end!

Thanks for the help, everyone! 👋