God, seems like my luck is all bad lately. Fix my motherboard and my bloody monitor goes weird. Anyone know anything about monitors? I have an Acerview 76i 17 inch I think. I turned it on yesterday and got a partial display but it was dark and kind of fuzzy. The monitor light on the front flashes quite fast with an orange light. Now and again it will turn green and the monitor will display. Yesterday I took it apart and went over the solder joints. Good lord there's alot of points in that puppy. When I try to turn it on, the light on front blinks quickly and slows down the blinking and gets quite dim and eventually goes out. Here's the odd part, at least I think it's odd, If I turn off the computer the light seems to glow more stable and much brighter. The light displays and flashes normally with comp off. What I mean by normally is the light is normally bright and flashes slowly if comp is off. Keeps flashing slow and turns to green when computer starts to boot. Never flashed fast and dim at all in the past until yesterday. To me, it sounds like a power issue in the monitor but where do I look for the problem? What should I look for or test? I don't have the money to go buy one right now. I just forked out the cash I had on a new motherboard when I thought mine was toast. I'm so frustrated right now it isn't funny. I wanted to take the monitor and slam it as hard as I could on the sidewalk out here but I refrained. Can anyone help diagnose this thing before I lose my marbles?

Thanks
Crash

same thing happened to me last night, and a few other times before, which upon h/w inspection turned out to be a squished vga cable connector pin - see if its alright, because the kind of behavior you describe can be attributed to misaligned, shorted or missing connector pins. At leaast this is a cheap fix if it turns out to be the problem. Chris

You know, it's funny that you mentioned the monitor cable. Now I did try the old jiggle and watch the display trick but that did nothing. I even bent the cabling several angles to see if maybe there's a loose connection. Doesn't seem to make any difference. The part that puzzles me is that it seems like the monitor will work if I leave the cable unplugged from the computer, then plug it in after the computer has boot up. I haven't tried this yet. Will do later tonight. I've been up all night with a toothache. I'd have to buy a cable to test with unfortunately but deffinately cheaper than buying a new monitor. Thanks for the advice.

Crash

Well, sorry for the delay in posting a follow up. Been a bit busy lately. lol Anyway, does anyone know anything about monitors? More specifically, the electronics end of them.

I tried the monitor again. Strange thing, it worked and stayed working for about 20 mins. Then the screen just slowely started fading out. Right now I can't get it to power up again. Any help appreciated.

Thanks
Crash

How old is the monitor? Did you rule out the video card being the problem?
Typically CRT monitors only last 4-5 years. My Daiwoo 17" monitor finally went up in a puff of smoke literally, but wasn't worth repairing so I trashed it (well..recycled it).

I opted for a sweet LCD monitor and it was the best decision I ever made.
They are quite reasonably priced too.

That's why you don't buy Daewoo, you buy Sony or Panasonic ... my Sony CRT lasted 10+ years (hard to believe), and then we sold it for $100 (yes it worked as well then as when we bought it) ... so by buying cheaper you are actually spending more money, at least for monitors and sometimes computers. The computer attached to the monitor was still working, except for the CD-ROM drive, it opened and closed but that's about it ... we included it free of charge with monitor, oh and my old sega genesis ... I say it was a pretty good deal.

I now got an LCD, and it works great, and resolution is awesome, response time is better than pretty much any other, and it's a Sony, and yeah it will last a long time.

Well, it's about 9 years old so I guess that's pretty old for a monitor. The video card I was using at the time is the same one I am using now.

Money is a bit of an issue right now so I opted to fix the monitor rather than try to get a new one. I was hoping it was something simple like a blown cap. $uck$ using a 13". Alot smaller than the 17" lol. I never really thought about going lcd mainly because I was always told that lcd typically responds slower when playing games.

Thanks
Crash

Well ... you have heard right ... response times on LCD monitors get as low as about 4 ms (lowest I have seen) ... while CRT response time is less than 1 ms (pretty much instantaneous). I have an LCD with response time of 5 ms, and you can see some ghosting while playing games with a lot of movement ... other than that you really cant see too much ghosting. Personally I like LCD better than my old CRT, because the CRT flickers and makes me dizzy after more than 3 hours of games ... with the LCD I can play for like 4-6 hrs with no side-effects

(You might say that playing that long is un-healthy ... so to make up for it ... I jog/run for about 1 hour non-stop ... it counteracts the effect )

Well it helps if you are a electronic technician. Otherwise, fixing it could be a "shocking" experience. ..literally unless you know what you are doing.

First generation of LCDS had lousy refresh rates, but they have come a long way. Unless you are a hardcore gamer pushing the 3D frame rate on DOOM3 or HALF LIFE 2, you won't notice a lot of difference on newer LCD monitors. Lot easier on the eyes and text is lot crisper if you do word processing for extended periods of time.

P.S. To my credit the DAIWOO monitor was the first I owned on my first desktop computer system (Pentium 2-350) so didn't know any better.
I have learned a lot since then.

My first monitor came with a Compaq (my first computer, and last Compaq) ... and guess what ... the Compaq hard-drive broke after 5 days of using it ... and the monitor burned out 2 weeks after using it .... was it that I bought a knock-off ... or that Compaq $suck$ ? ... maybe both ? It was insured ... luckily

(So ... I wouldn't buy Compaq ... or knock-offs - if you can spot em)

Well, too bad I didn't have a LCD monitor to test with. Flicker in CRT? Normally I don't notice the flicker but that might explain the headaches if I play a game for more than 3 hours.

I don't consider myself a "*spam* Gamer" but I do like my games. Doom 3 and Half-Life 2 are probably my favs at the moment. As far as cost goes, is the cost of a decent LCD monitor comparable to a CRT? If so, what would I look for in a good LCD monitor?

Compaq $uck$ imho. Used them in my computer tech course and hated them with a passion. Wasn't as thorough of a course as I thought it would be. Didn't deal with monitors at all. Got ripped I think. Oh well, lessons learned.

Thanks again
Crash

Ok, first make sure you look for LCD TFT (Active Matrix), not passive matrix, active matrix is sharper, passive matrix can ba a bit blurry.

Next you look for response time ... anything from 5 - 8 ms is pretty good.

Then you consider prices ... average price for 5-8 ms response time 17 inch monitor is about $200-$300.

Here are a few examples of what you might find ... you can look around and find better prices.

Example:
http://www.shopping.com/xPP-Monitors--pric...9_ms~S-213~OR-0

I recommend Samsung if you want to stay within a budget, and Sony if you want a very good monitor that will outlast most others, but it don't come cheap (about 2x the price).

Besides response time (10ms or lower), other factors to consider:

• contrast ratio (600:1 or higher is better)
• warranty (most offer 3 years)
• connector (get DVi instead of VGA if video card supports it)
• max refresh rate (min. 75hz for less eye strain & better sharpness)
• size (17" and higher is better if doing autoCAD/spreadsheets or want better gaming experience)

P.S. TFT is better if want to view monitor at different angles. Passive does have merit using laptops where privacy is more of a concern.

Good point about the constrast ratio ... I didn't think they would sell anything under 500:1 ... but there is one on the site I posted

My monitor has both VGA and DVi ... and I've tried both .... and hehe ... I can't tell a difference .... I chose the DVi just for the heck of it .... my brother uses VGA on the same type of monitor, cuz the video card he has supports color enhancement under VGA only ... but there are advanteges to both.

Sweet, now I have some guidelines for looking for a good LCD Monitor. Thanks guys, that answers the questions I had.

BTW, kickass forum you got here. I see lots of helpful people here. It's great to see.

Oh yeah... Mischcabob, when I was a kid I was struck by lightning. Now there's a shocking experiance I wont soon forget. lol. You're right about working on monitors though, a 30,000 volt jolt isn't fun. For all those out there thinking of tinkering with monitors or tv's, Make sure you KNOW what you are doing before you touch them. They can hold a charge strong enough to drive you through a wall.

Thanks again.
Crash