Sorry to say I think you got distracted on looking for a big problem here when a smaller one was likely the issue.
Apple uses fuse links to protect some areas of the system. I suspect you blew the one for the backlight. To verify you'll need to use a flashlight to aim though the Apple logo in the lid to be a poor mans backlight. If you can see the faint images of your desktop icons the issue is the fuse link and/or the backlight driver. My money is on the fuse link ;-}
Here's the location (marked in blue) its the little tan chip with the '''P''' on it (sometimes its just a dot):
[image|992907]
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=== Update (12/20/2016) ===
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Now with the better images it does look like the pins at the bottom here need to be re-soldered (marked in blue).
Sorry to say I thing you got distracted on looking for a big problem here when a smaller one was likely the issue.
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Sorry to say I think you got distracted on looking for a big problem here when a smaller one was likely the issue.
Apple uses fuse links to protect some areas of the system. I suspect you blew the one for the backlight. To verify you'll need to use a flashlight to aim though the Apple logo in the lid to be a poor mans backlight. If you can see the faint images of your desktop icons the issue is the fuse link and/or the backlight driver. My money is on the fuse link ;-}
Here's the location (marked in blue) its the little tan chip with the '''P''' on it (sometimes its just a dot):
Sorry to say I thing you got distracted on looking for a big problem here when a smaller one was likely the issue.
Apple uses fuse links to protect some areas of the system. I suspect you blew the one for the backlight. To verify you'll need to use a flashlight to aim though the Apple logo in the lid to be a poor mans backlight. If you can see the faint images of your desktop icons the issue is the fuse link and/or the backlight driver. My money is on the fuse link ;-}
Here's the location (marked in blue) its the little tan chip with the '''P''' on it (sometimes its just a dot):
[image|992907]