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help - is it monitor or video card problem



 
 
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  #1  
Old July 9th 15, 04:43 PM posted to alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt
Yes[_2_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 105
Default help - is it monitor or video card problem

I posted this in the sister a.c.h newsgroup and got no reply. Hope for
a better response here.

I have an Asus 24" VS248H-P R LED monitor and a PowerColor (Radeon)
HD6750 1GB DDR3 video card. Two or three times now over a six month
period, I noticed that the monitor screen will have a semi-transparent
grey splotch in the lower left quadrant of the screen. IIRC, each time
it happened when I woke up my desktop after it had gone into
hibernation mode. Its shape and color make me want to compare it to
that of a grey cloud. I can see the desktop, but the area it covers is
light to medium grey. At least it's not moving :-)

I haven't experienced this problem before. Is it a prelude to the
monitor or video card failing? If so, which one would be the likely
suspect? What would be useful search terms to use to find out more
about it?

Thanks,

John
  #2  
Old July 9th 15, 06:03 PM posted to alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt
Flasherly[_2_]
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Posts: 2,407
Default help - is it monitor or video card problem

On Thu, 9 Jul 2015 15:43:02 +0000 (UTC), "Yes"
wrote:

Its shape and color make me want to compare it to
that of a grey cloud. I can see the desktop, but the area it covers is
light to medium grey. At least it's not moving :-)

I haven't experienced this problem before. Is it a prelude to the
monitor or video card failing? If so, which one would be the likely
suspect? What would be useful search terms to use to find out more
about it?


Video cards don't fail, not with the quality of computer power supply
units and finely crafted MB regulators driving their PCI-E voltages. I
seen plenty of brandmake PS unit replacements listed on Ebay for
flatpanels, though.

My first Olevia model, (one of the first LED flat panels), developed
perhaps similar aberrations, on one fateful day, that had worsened
into half the lower screen being lost.

They send me parts, control modules I believe, when I first talked to
the American storefront for handling returns. I used a bedspread to
place the monitor face down to replace them. Second time I called,
because parts didn't help and it was doing exactly the same thing
after I replaced the controls, someone [else then] said I shouldn't
have replaced anything. After parlay, they shipped me the next dated
model up, either a reworked unit if not effectively new.

Dunno, except combine a couple, three years for the first model now to
this model, and it's going on no doubt 15 years usage. I'd say knock
on wood, but for a 32" replaceable in what I'd want in the event
should it fail, (Best Buy's inhouse brand model is my present
favorite) -- that's how that works at well under $200 on competitive
sales.

It's to a point that subscription they're looking is behind the price
for the $5 Samsung cellphone. At some point the end product falls
below the service mean, and it's in the over-the-shoulder mainsteam
groove. I got 2" or 3" galvanized pipes I used a Lincoln stick welder
to make my antenna aerial mast, and buy by 20-cent minutes to put
everybody else on the latest in blacklistings.

But, it's OK to be selective. Same Olevia cost $1500 when I first took
interest (kinda like $4000 curved and 4K-resolution units for discrete
marketing purposes now). I don't have to but I favor cheap at viably
reliable since $10K days, either way, and years in gambling dealings.
Get whatever spins the twirly for your cap, I suppose.
  #3  
Old July 9th 15, 07:40 PM posted to alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt
Paul
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 13,364
Default help - is it monitor or video card problem

Yes wrote:
I posted this in the sister a.c.h newsgroup and got no reply. Hope for
a better response here.

I have an Asus 24" VS248H-P R LED monitor and a PowerColor (Radeon)
HD6750 1GB DDR3 video card. Two or three times now over a six month
period, I noticed that the monitor screen will have a semi-transparent
grey splotch in the lower left quadrant of the screen. IIRC, each time
it happened when I woke up my desktop after it had gone into
hibernation mode. Its shape and color make me want to compare it to
that of a grey cloud. I can see the desktop, but the area it covers is
light to medium grey. At least it's not moving :-)

I haven't experienced this problem before. Is it a prelude to the
monitor or video card failing? If so, which one would be the likely
suspect? What would be useful search terms to use to find out more
about it?

Thanks,

John


I can find articles on such things, but it's unlikely
your setup has the same stimulus (too much heat behind screen).

https://discussions.apple.com/thread...art=0&tstart=0

*******

Video cards don't tend to make splotches. There was one video
card problem (driver related), where a discolored circle appeared
around some gaming elements. That's about as close to a splotch
as I could get. Otherwise, memory faults on a video card could
give colored rectangles (memory array that no longer writes
but reads back random garbage). I don't think I've ever heard of
a good "snow" type failure, except for people using too long
an HDMI cable. That makes colored snow. But with a short HDMI
cable, you're unlikely to have a video card make snow on
its own, or splotches for that matter. Some geometries
are harder to make than others.

Whereas a physical problem with an LCD monitor, can be related
to its physical structure. You can have vivid vertical lines
on an LCD screen, when the array driver ICs pack up. The array
driver failures seem to have a preferred direction for defects.
And on an LCD monitor with multisync scaler, the memory chip
on the scaler can fail - and you'd expect element geometries
similar to a video card defect. The difference is, the
video card can "amplify" a defect, whereas the scaler memory
failure, the faults stay "closer to the initial failure bit".

And the thing about the video card, is if something really
fails (shader program goes crazy), the video card driver
is likely to report "VPU recover" or "driver recovery in
progress" or similar. So a video card defect can't have too
much of an impact on card operation, or you'll be able to
tell from "screen blinking to black" that the driver
the OS uses is not happy with what the card is doing.

Paul
  #4  
Old July 10th 15, 07:58 AM posted to alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt
Yes[_2_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 105
Default help - is it monitor or video card problem

Yes wrote:

I posted this in the sister a.c.h newsgroup and got no reply. Hope
-- snipped --

I haven't experienced this problem before. Is it a prelude to the
monitor or video card failing? If so, which one would be the likely
suspect? What would be useful search terms to use to find out more
about it?

Thanks,

John


I did some deeper Googling and ran across a reference to "backlight"
failure. I don't know what that means, only that the symptoms I
described seem to match that term. Of course, the warranty on my
monitor expired about four months ago :-)

It would seem that the remedy is to replace the monitor, which is not a
big deal, but there was no info about how soon that you should do so
once the problem crops up. Between Paul's and Flasherly's responses,
at least I can rule out the video card. I would have hated to have to
deal with two problems at once. One at a time is more manageable.
  #5  
Old July 10th 15, 04:01 PM posted to alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt
Paul
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 13,364
Default help - is it monitor or video card problem

Yes wrote:
Yes wrote:

I posted this in the sister a.c.h newsgroup and got no reply. Hope
-- snipped --

I haven't experienced this problem before. Is it a prelude to the
monitor or video card failing? If so, which one would be the likely
suspect? What would be useful search terms to use to find out more
about it?

Thanks,

John


I did some deeper Googling and ran across a reference to "backlight"
failure. I don't know what that means, only that the symptoms I
described seem to match that term. Of course, the warranty on my
monitor expired about four months ago :-)

It would seem that the remedy is to replace the monitor, which is not a
big deal, but there was no info about how soon that you should do so
once the problem crops up. Between Paul's and Flasherly's responses,
at least I can rule out the video card. I would have hated to have to
deal with two problems at once. One at a time is more manageable.


There are two symptoms I know of, for backlight failure.

1) CCFL tubes change color when they get old. At 25,000 hours,
the light becomes brownish instead of white.

2) Inverter failures cause the CCFL tubes to go off completely.
Sometimes, the tube comes on for two seconds, then shuts off.
This means the inverter detects "too much load" when moving from
ignite to burn state. The tube operates at higher voltage and lower
current when it starts. And as it warms up, the voltage across the
tube starts to drop. The inverter and the tube characteristic are
matched to one another. But as the setup gets older, the load presented
can change enough, that the inverter no longer tolerates it. Or the
inverter just plain doesn't work right any more. There is an entire
130 page book, which discusses the quirks of CCFL lighting systems,
and its more art than science (making them work reliably).

LED based backlights are different. No nasty voltages. The LEDs still
age. Failure on LEDs is defined as the light output level dropping
below a certain level. So a user might still see light, but a LED
company person would say "all those LEDs are failed" because they
no longer deliver the amount of light expected. While the theory
says the LED based lighting should be very reliable, everyone has
seen instances of LED based lighting, where an early complete
failure happens and there is no light at all. You won't get
"brownish", or "on for two seconds, then dark" as symptoms with
LEDs. So in that respect, a LED lit monitor may have fewer
annoying symptoms over lifetime. But out-right failure (dead LED)
is still possible.

The "gray splotch" problem is probably a chemistry problem
with the chemical between the sheets of glass. Rather than a
backlight problem.

Note that, some LCD panels using LEDs, are "edge lit". They use
a fancy plastic element to redirect the light from an array
of LEDs on the edge of the panel, to cause light to appear
(uniformly) in the center of the panel. If any of the components
shift mechanically, this translates to "backlight bleed". So some
backlight bleed problems, change with time, as some of the
materials work themselves loose.

Paul
  #6  
Old July 11th 15, 06:41 AM posted to alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt
Flasherly[_2_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 2,407
Default help - is it monitor or video card problem

On Fri, 10 Jul 2015 06:58:06 +0000 (UTC), "Yes"
wrote:

I did some deeper Googling and ran across a reference to "backlight"
failure. I don't know what that means, only that the symptoms I
described seem to match that term. Of course, the warranty on my
monitor expired about four months ago :-)

It would seem that the remedy is to replace the monitor, which is not a
big deal, but there was no info about how soon that you should do so
once the problem crops up. Between Paul's and Flasherly's responses,
at least I can rule out the video card. I would have hated to have to
deal with two problems at once. One at a time is more manageable.


Good thing, as that involves a bulb or related support circuitry
changes, being more apt to find common replacement parts, than, say,
aberrations you may be experiencing from non-power related logic
circuitry directly addressing the 3 colors/black&white comprising a
pixel display (the surrounding cathode tubes further facilities by
brightening the pixel).

Most "video cards" are not: Most all MBs, though curiously not shrunk
yet far enough for yet having slots for prohibitively expensive "video
boards," in other words they're almost exclusively sold across the
broader market already chipped with video (dunno, personally, about
these newer offerings, with the CPU now formally incorporating video
subsystems).

Tedious, is it not, dealing with it? Good thing is you'll feel so
much better when your vast technical expertise accomplishes so many
amazing things you know.

Like that Behringer soundprocessing board, alongside possibly surface
mounted automated machine soldering, for the arrays of capacitors I
attempted to resolder last evening (bought 20 of them, at 15-cents
each, for starters...polarized 10u farads), to replace ostensible
Behringer ****.

Got as far as finishing two. Tolerances were too small and tight,
totally for working under a x15 or x20 stereoscopic workbench
microscope with a small, close and tight 20-watt soldering iron.

That I could do it, doing two (had to solder them from the backside of
the board's contacts, otherwise too much and tight of miniature real
estate) made me feel -- sooo savvy, like accomplished. I felt exactly
that way all the way to the garbage can, where I dumped the rest of
the capacitors alongside the Behringer unit. Just in time to return
and write a nasty-assed review of Behringer on Amazon. Mark my words,
matey.

--
Enduser: To be kept in the dark and never, ever watered.
 




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