Hardware Analysis - McFly's Monitor: [b]The Resurrection[/b]

Re: McFly's Monitor: [b]The Resurrection[/b]

McFly — 2008-10-09T16:33:08-05:00

$56, wow ... that's nuts. Almost seems like a shame to replace the whole monitor with another 19" though, since the entire LCD screen itself on this one is working top-notch.

Really, if I could just fine some thin-enough, 16-inch, bright white CCFL's and a high-quality dual inverter, I'd be quite happy with just using this until going for a 22-inch.

Re: McFly's Monitor: [b]The Resurrection[/b]

Meats_Of_Evil — 2008-10-09T03:26:27-05:00

Yeah Carl is a good man, God bless him and his cheap ass prices.

Re: McFly's Monitor: [b]The Resurrection[/b]

A_Pickle — 2008-10-09T02:58:54-05:00

Well... I just got this e-mail from Carl Fiorentino...

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/searchtools/item-Detai...=WEM1724TT

Good deal. Also, Black Friday is coming up... recently here in Cheyenne, there were a couple of 19" LG widescreen monitors for $56. It was ridiculous.

Re: McFly's Monitor: [b]The Resurrection[/b]

McFly — 2008-10-09T01:52:37-05:00

Yeah I know ... it's ugly, I might try to clean it up, but even just moving the wires makes the CCFL's act up. I'm only running the bottom one right now because the top one keeps wanted to go real pink. :-\ They both have trouble (the top one much more so obviously) when they're just starting up getting to the right brightness, so I'll probably have to spend 5 minutes or so a day fiddling with their wires to get them ready for the task. Once they get bright white though, they'll stay that way until after I shut them off, and the inverter has a chance to cool down.

But at least it's a monitor that I can get work done on, and I didn't have to spend any money on it, just time soldering and the canibalization of a couple of inverters that I already had laying around. If I had the extra money for a new monitor I would get one, but this will certainly hold me over until I can afford a 22" widescreen or something like that.

And hey, the chance to bring a generically-branded monitor back from the dead so it has the chance to see it's second birthday is nice. Not to mention, this option is much better than my second option was going to be ... a 15" CRT.

Re: McFly's Monitor: [b]The Resurrection[/b]

Beavis Khan — 2008-10-09T01:23:50-05:00

[Chief Wiggum]

That's some mighty fine electrical work there, McFly.

[/Chief Wiggum]

Re: McFly's Monitor: [b]The Resurrection[/b]

Mothow — 2008-10-09T00:50:54-05:00

Awesome fix.

Re: McFly's Monitor: [b]The Resurrection[/b]

McFly — 2008-10-08T23:15:55-05:00

I wish this had an LED backlight. F**king CCFL's are so goddamn finicky, esspecially when you *really* want them to be pure white. Pink doesn't make a very good backlight.

Re: McFly's Monitor: [b]The Resurrection[/b]

Dragon, Peaceful — 2008-10-08T03:39:00-05:00

I fixed one of my old LCD monitor, too. But it's a lucky fix. It's one of those monitors that the VGA cable is soldered directly onto the LCD (i.e. there is no VGA port on the monitor, simply a cable coming out of it). What happened was over time the rubber on the inside portion of the cable got pull down a bit, exposing the wires inside the cable, and shorting out with a metal surface near by. Causing the screen to display nothing but a white haze. Just before I was about to toss that thing in trash, I was like WTF, why not open it up and take a look. Using electrical tape to go around a couple of times to cover up the exposed section, viola, the monitor was back to life. Never thought it's that easy.

Another monitor of mine is not so easy, it's getting extremely dim. Backlight's out for sure. May be need some of McFly's tricks here for fixes. But it may be LEDs instead of cathodes. When I have time, I may open it up and take a look.

Nice external backlight, McFly. LOL

Re: McFly's Monitor: [b]The Resurrection[/b]

Sean Costello — 2008-10-07T23:46:00-05:00

Well done, sir.

It looks like there's a bomb strapped to the back

Re: McFly's Monitor: [b]The Resurrection[/b]

McFly — 2008-10-07T22:11:41-05:00

First look at the desktop ... not bad! :
http://img148.imageshack.us/img148/6522/dsc0550az9.jpg

The classic bitch-rig :
http://img379.imageshack.us/img379/941/dsc0554vh6.jpg

It's not quite this bad, but it gives you an idea:
http://img379.imageshack.us/img379/8507/dsc0556ew3.jpg
That's the backlight only, monitor off, so it should be all-white. That top-left corner was fine ... after a few minutes it started going all pinky.

Grr. Oh well. At least I know my way around the inside of the monitor now, should I ever get some new cathodes to chuck in there. And it "works," in the meantime.

Re: McFly's Monitor: [b]The Resurrection[/b]

McFly — 2008-10-07T21:50:56-05:00

Using a better inverter eliminated the flickering. One other thing is, the bottom half of the screen is noticably darker than the top half ... not by much, but enough to be annoying. >:-[ I guess that considering it's working ... I shouldn't complain too much.

My monitor is now officially on it's last surgerically re-attatched leg ...

McFly's Monitor: [b]The Resurrection[/b]

McFly — 2008-10-07T18:38:08-05:00

Well by golly, I *may* have revived her. Two problems atm:

1) the backlight is always on, so when the LCD shuts off (when changing res, or when booting), the screen goes all white, and I can see the LCD shutting down. It looks cool, and I suppose it's not dangerous at all to the screen, since that what it does normally, the only difference now is that I can actually see it. Not a biggie, I can live with that, and I could always fix it later by hooking the CCFL inverter to a relay (which I probably never will ).

2) the bigger of the problems, one of the two remaining CCFL's is flickering ever so slightly. Probably won't bother me that much, but I may try moving the wires around (with that much voltage going to the CCFL's, even just moving the wires makes a difference). Or I'll try another inverter.

But HOT DAMN, she's back. Pictures coming soon.

Re: McFly's Monitor: 2006 - 2008 [b]R.I.P.[/b]

McFly — 2008-10-07T16:43:40-05:00

Well, looks like two of the bulbs ate it (one might still be salvageable). But even with 3, I wouldn't want 1 on top and 2 on bottom, so I'm just going to go for 1 on top and 1 on bottom.

That's not really a problem, because this monitor has always been INSANELY bright. When it was brand new, the first time I hooked it up I thought I was going to go blind. My normal brightness setting is for 5-10%, and even then, it's very bright. So I'm sure with half the CCFL's, I'll still be fine. Plus then I won't have to run 2 inverters, I can just use 1.

I've got 1 CCFL already soldered to the new inverter, and she works, so here comes the second.

Re: McFly's Monitor: [b]2006 - 2008 R.I.P.[/b]

McFly — 2008-10-07T15:20:05-05:00

I'm assuming that it's the backlight that is going out. I'm also assuming that the backlight is the largest draw upon power. Having said that, most LCDs use an external power converter/block. Have you attempted to replace this as of yet?

I wish. My monitor takes a normal PSU cable directly to the back, so the power board is internal. I already looked at it briefly, no visual damage (not that that means much), and the company that manufactured it appears to have gone out of business.

I figured it was either the backlight(s) or their inverter. Seems like it was probably the inverter, since I've hooked up the lights themselves to an external CCFL inverter and they seem to be working. The problem right now is that at least one of the CCFL bulbs (there are 4 in this monitor, 2 on top and 2 on bottom) has gone bad, I haven't gotten in there to test them one-by-one with the external inverter yet.

The other option is, I did see at least 2 monitors of this make/model for sale around the internets. Both were recent posts (within the last month or two), indicating that they would be selling the monitor for cheaps due to it needing an "inverter replacement."

As long as this doesn't get to be more expensive than a new 19" widescreen.

I would say the VGA board or the power board has gone.

The VGA board appears to be fine, even with the backlight out, I can shine a flashlight at the screen and VERY faintly see my mouse moving. Not a great way to do programming work, hmmm ...

Sadly, on this model, the inverter for the CCFL's and the power regulation for VGA are on the same board, so I can't just rip out the inverter (if I still want pixels ).

If this can't be fixed, my monitor might be joining my scroll lock key.

Re: McFly's Monitor: [b]2006 - 2008 R.I.P.[/b]

Kieran Blenkarne — 2008-10-07T04:17:25-05:00

I would say the VGA board or the power board has gone. It could be something as simple as a bloated capacitor. Hows your soldering?

My BenQ LCD my Dad got me from China 3 years ago is still going strong. I can't read the date of manufacturing on it because its in Chinese but, its working swell