Installing LibreELEC on a broken laptop

maerk · April 25, 2017 at 5:28 PM

The laptop I'm using has a totally broken screen. After the initial installation, Kodi defaults to displaying on the laptop's screen and not the TV it's plugged into. It's possible to switch the display from the terminal with SSH, but I can't actually enable SSH after a clean install. Is there any other way to either enable SSH, or switch the display?

**Nicolas** · April 25, 2017 at 6:03 PM

Hello!

The most Laptops has FN-Keys for wifi Display etc...
Have you tried that?

Regards
Nicolas

maerk · April 25, 2017 at 7:13 PM

Quote from Nicolas

Hello!

The most Laptops has FN-Keys for wifi Display etc...
Have you tried that?

Regards
Nicolas

F4 looks like I'd be the one to change displays, but it does nothing. I pressed every other key out of desperation, and none of them seemed to do anything. The laptop screen still sort of displays colors, so I can kind of get an idea when something is happening.

bubblegum57 · April 25, 2017 at 8:40 PM

Quote from maerk

F4 looks like I'd be the one to change displays, but it does nothing. I pressed every other key out of desperation, and none of them seemed to do anything. The laptop screen still sort of displays colors, so I can kind of get an idea when something is happening.

Can you try an external keyboard?

maerk · April 25, 2017 at 8:43 PM

Quote from bubblegum57

Can you try an external keyboard?

I guess I should have worded that differently. I pressed every other function key but none of them did anything. The laptop keyboard works for sure, since I can hear a camera shutter sound when I press print screen and the UI sounds when I press the arrow keys. I also don't have an extra keyboard with shortcuts on the function keys, just old Dell keyboards.

**Nicolas** · April 25, 2017 at 10:15 PM

Can you tell us the brand and model?

Stupid question did you hold down the fn key and f4?

On Windows ctrl-alt-return can help...

Regards
Nicolas

vitorp07 · April 26, 2017 at 6:18 AM

If you really can't SSH/Samba, my suggestion would be to Plug the laptop's HDD/SSD in another PC/laptop,
and while connected to the TV the broken laptop will be connected to, create an autostart.sh file with the xrandr command.
(you might have to guess the HDMI output of the laptop for the xrandr command)

Bubba2017 · April 26, 2017 at 11:14 PM

I to had no display (just cracks of light) on my laptop.

Try this trick............. laptops typically use a magnet to sense when the screen(lid) is closed. Use a magnet and run it close to the top edge of the hinge till you see the broken screen flicker off.
Keep the magnet there.
Now turn off the computer and turn it back on. The computer will disable the laptop display (thinking the laptop is closed up) and LibreELEC will default to your HDMI1.

Good Luck

maerk · April 27, 2017 at 12:09 AM

Thanks for all the suggestions, but I just ended up installing regular old Ubuntu with Kodi installed. I'll probably try to get LibreELEC on there some other time.