My backlight went out on my sony vio pcg-974L is there a way to repair this without having to replace the whole screen?

I have replaced many backlights. 1st thing to do is pull the lcd to see who makes it(LG,Samsung and so on ),then you must find someone with a broke lcd . 99% of broke lcd's have good Backlight tube. I always make sure the lcd is same model # just to X out any other issues. TRicky part next just to warn you I broke about the first 5 or 6 lights just trying to remove them from busted lcd , they are brittle so if you find an lcd we'll continue . My recommendation is if you scourer eBay long enuff you will find a good working lcd I would do that and save you the frustration , unless you work on laptops for a living. Hope I shed some light ill chk back w/ you.