Slashdot Mirror
DIY LCD Backlight Repair
Bill Nye (not the science guy) writes to tell us that InventGeek has an interesting article on do it yourself LCD backlight repair. From the overview: "Those of us that have used LCD monitors for a while know that over time the backlight starts to dim and will eventually completely fail. Leaving you with some electronic scrap that you could sell on eBay for 35 bucks or so. Well for less than $20.00 and about a half hour of your time you can replace the backlight and rejuvenate that monitor to as good as new condition."
Often there is a soft small clear plastic O' [sic] ring that suspends the bulb in the reflector. If you can not salvage these you can use a few wraps of a thin strip of a good quality clear tape.
...
If you had to replace your inverter your on screen controls will not likely work for brightness, but if you have a half descent [sic] video card you can do it in the video card settings if needed.
...
But if your [sic] about your wit's should do just fine.
I don't think I'll be following these instructions for my dimming 17" powerbook. Anybody have any *good* instructions for fixing one of those?
Time to buy some cheap monitors on ebay!
"pr0n": An anagram of "porn," possibly indicating the use of pornography. - www.microsoft.com
Forgive me for asking...but would a similar process work on laptop screens? I've got an old laptop whose screen is completely fubar and this may be the problem...
I may be wrong but you're downright ugly!
Hmm. No thanks. I'll sell mine on ebay.
Just FYI Fry's carries everything you need, from those special power modulators to mini flourescent tubes to repair your LCD's.
Now we deal with the case lighting. The cold cathode is incased in a plastic case to protect it and defuse the light. We will need to remove the casing very carefully. Most cold cathode tubes have mercury vapor in them this is very dangerous if it was broken. Avoided damaging the bulb at all costs as mercury vapor has been linked to brain damage and cancer. so be careful.... unless your some arch-villain with a diabolical plan.
Wait... complicated instructions that can lead to brain damage and cancer if done improperly, given to me by a guy who can't be bothered to fix your->you're mistakes? Somehow I don't think I'll be trying this fix any time soon.
This probably voids your warranty, although if the screen is going blank the warranty has probably already expired.
I wonder how hard this actually is to do. I've read countless tutorials on do it yourself projects and they almost never work for me.
There's always some little detail that you miss that could leave you with a pile of broken junk instead of a new monitor.
-1 disagree is not a modifier for a reason. -1 troll, flaimbait, redundant, overrated are NOT acceptable substitutes.
A barely legible article that contains the absolute minimum information about a potentially lethal operation involving jillions of volts of capacitance and using power tools to cut almost-but-not-quite into one of the most toxic substances around, which, not at all incidentally, we are advised to just "dispose" of when we're done with it. Gee, I wonder what the author did with his? Tossed it in the garbage, or throw it into the sewer?
Frankly I'd rather that we just linked to bomb making instructions, as it would probably result in fewer acute injuries and chronic health problems.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Those tubes are pretty long life, how often do they fail on average? I thought it was something like 50,000 hours, so something that fails in the first three years or so of average use (40 hours a week * 50 weeks of use a year = 2000 hours a year) should be pretty rare. If the display is too old, it might not be worth that much anyway as older LCDs can get pretty bad for colors, contrast ratio, viewing angle and such.
They do dim with age though, which isn't a problem for me, I try to reduce the brightness anyway.
It would have been MUCH cooler if they didn't state the Bill Nye in question was not the Bill Nye that science guy. None the less, this is one of the most helpful articles I've seen on /.
Ebay here I come!
LINUX ONLINE POKER: Linux Poker
Here's a little more info that laptop users might find useful and I stress "might". http://iantha.vectorstar.net/ccfl.html#replace
gasmonso http://religiousfreaks.com/Posted Nov 1 on hackaday.com
http://www.hackaday.com/entry/1234000523065961/
It'd be a lot cooler if you replaced the bulb with a blacklight instead (press cmd-opt-ctrl-8 on a mac for a simulation)...
Be a real patriot: Question authority. Think for yourself. Formulate your own conclusions.
LCD backlights are seldom bright enough when I want to sit outside (I know, I know, outside is sooo unnerdlike but sometimes it's nice to sit outside while working at a coffee-shop). But why try to compete with the ultimate light source? If the back of the laptop lid could swing open or be removed, then the sun could flood in. A diffuser/polarizer on the back of the LCD would let the sun be the perfect outdoor backlight.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
Yes, I've been able to fix multiple different laptop screens this same way as well. IBM T21's T41's etc... Most laptop lcd are relativly easy to dismantale is you've got a sharp set of #000, #00, and #0 phillips screwdrivers. I found almost all my bulbs from http://lcdpart.com/. I found there prices to be really affordable as well, $10 for the 14"-14.5" bulb! You'd be surprised how easy this whole procedure is if you can solder a few wires. ;-)
and it is easy to do. I'd start with the inverter first and then if that doesn't do it, look at replacing the light. There was an ask slashdot about obtaining lcd parts a while back. You can read good info. in that thread.
I also wrote up a journal entry when I fixed my dad's laptop, but I can't find it. (Note to self, do better job with titles)
I was nervous the first time I replaced a laptop inverter - but it was cake. The best place I found to buy the hp inverter I needed was ebay.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
I was not very impressed with this article. I've never done this before but would like to attempt to do so. Unfortunately, there are not enough pictures and of what there are, they are not especially clear. Also, the article is FULL of misspellings and typos. I understand that may not change the steps you need to take, but it greatly decreases my confidence in the author's intelligence. Sorry, my $0.02.
off to remedial highschool physics with you
On the page it rates the "difficulty" of this operation as "novice."
"The cold cathode is incased in a plastic case to protect it and defuse the light. We will need to remove the casing very carefully. Most cold cathode tubes have mercury vapor in them this is very dangerous if it was broken. Avoided damaging the bulb at all costs as mercury vapor has been linked to brain damage and cancer."
Sounds like fun! I also heard the best way to tell if a wire is live is to lick your finger and touch it. Don't forget to stand on one leg while you do it though! Otherwise you might get hurt.
If you wanna get rich, you know that payback is a bitch
if the backlight isn't dead, it's likely the voltage inverter. That piece of equipment ranges from $20 to $100.
Be really careful when handling the LCD screen itself and the ribbons that go to the monitor. If you sever a ribbon, prepare to lose a good 2" of screen. And no that can't be repaired.
I know this the hard way.
Why does every inventgeek story make the Slashdot front page?
Repant. Thy end is sheer.
It seems that no one on ebay is willing to say they are selling "broken lcd monitors"... if only the people who are trying rip people off hadn't just been honest they might have had a sale. Despite having no technical experience in the field, I figue the worst that can happen is a few shocks/deadly gas, if i let those worries bother me i'd never leave the house... the second my current monitor breaks... bring it on!
*''I can't believe it's not a hyperlink.''
Ok, some comments from somebody who works with cold-cathode lamps.
First the mercury is pretty much a non-issue, it only escapes if you break the lamp and the ammount is miniscule anyway. As long as you are in a well ventilated area don't worry at all.
Second the manufacturer fits high-performance cold cathode lamps, subsituting hobby grade lamps is going to give you terrible colour rendering (I've seen cheap lamps that were more pink than white), and also the light output will be _considerably_ lower.
And last if you use the original inverter you are going to be overdriving the new lamp horribly. So the colour will suffer and the life will be affected (plus the lamps will run very hot indeed).
These are not at all like incandesent lamps, the inverters are tuned to the lamp parameters and cheaper/different lamps are likely to not match the inverter very well at all.
The answer of course is that most of these hazards are serious for people who are exposed to them continuously as a result of work or environment (e.g. asbestos, radon.) Occasional exposure to a small amount of mercury is unlikely to do you a lot of harm; it might even kill a bacterial infection you didn't know you had. Working continuously in an environment containing detectable levels of mercury vapour could be very bad indeed.
Pining for the fjords
You know what you were thinking when you saw the poster's name:
Bill! Bill! Bill! Bill! Bill Nye the Science Guy.
[I know you can hear this song in your head]
"Those of us that have used LCD monitors for a while know that over time the backlight starts to dim and will eventually completely fail. Leaving you with some electronic scrap that you could sell on eBay for 35 bucks or so. Well for less than $20.00 and about a half hour of your time you can replace the backlight and rejuvenate that monitor to as good as new condition."
...I'll give you a grammar lesson. Let's start with run-on sentences:
Those of us that have used LCD monitors for a while know that, over time, the backlight starts to dim and will eventually completely fail, leaving you with some electronic scrap that you could sell on eBay for 35 bucks or so.
Wow people here have a short memory span. I'm looking for LCD monitors (specifically the LCD part) to shiny a mssive light through and make myself a DIY Projector. If anyone's got an LCD that's busted and they're willing to give/sell to me, I'm all for it!
The laptops we repair does NOT have a backlight with at tube - it is a thin plastic layer with between to conducting metal grids. Laptops with tubes is +5 years old?
Typical fault is the inverter!
I dont know about standard LCD monitors/TVs, but I dont expect them to use cold cathode tubes?
Sheesh!
Required disclaimer: When breaking fluorescent tubes, do so in an area with some ventilation. Do not huff the tube. Do not lick the insides of the tube.
Or a ramp of cheaper white LED:s may also do the trick.
If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
"overhead projector" you speak of? I kid, of course, but I believe they don't make laptops like this is because it makes it hard to sell the $3k SVGA projectors. I realize that overhead projectors are comparitively cheap and still useful, but I see that the institutions (businesses, schools, etc.) that need overhead projectors are moving on to digital projectors.
Of course, that doesn't mean that it is a great idea to replace a $300 overhead projector with a $3k digital one, but the digital projector also can replace a slide projector, a film projector, TV, etc.
This is just the march of technological progress I suppose. I expect certain laptops will have built in projectors in the future, if it hasn't been done yet.
If you can do it do it if you can't dont, I've fixed countless things using bits of tape and odd things I've found lying about, :p )
Best was a laptop, one of the first with a plasma screen given to me by my sisters boyfriend who had one on loan from the manufacturer ( begins with tosh.... ). He'd dropped it in the airport, his own stupid fault. he was throwing it out ( or hiding the evidence depending on your point of view
Two hours later and 10 bits of wire and a lot of fiddly soldering, I owned of the first plasma screened laptops in the wild.
Regarding cold cathodes, all the guy is saying is 'be careful' , as in 'don't stick your dog in the microwave'
Mind you I know plenty of people who should be banned from owning any sort of tool
Turn the LCD panel, plus an overhead projector, into a projection TV.
(I did it; it actually works quite well. I'm using it as my TV.)
Paleotechnologist and connoisseur of pretty shiny things.
As others have pointed out, the linked article is unreadable, barely informative, and likely to damage the environment and one's health. So here's a better idea: if you want to reinvigorate an aging LCD monitor, why not just remove the back altogether, and mount the panel on a nice white LED lightbox? It seems like it would be a big improvement.
... wouldn't it be easier to get an extended warranty, for about the same price?
I know Philips offers a 4 year warranty for some(most?) of their monitors... They are usually more low-end, but for general and office use I think it would be beneficial!
ANCIENT. /., digg, and hackaday, then on boingboing, then on the makeblog... research your stories, editors.
Why the hell do I have to view the same crap over and over? Why do I have to see the same thing on
http://www.hackaday.com/entry/1234000523065961/
http://diggvsdot.com/
This has been up on that site for a very long time, /. thanks for nothin
He also neglects to mention that "disposing" of the old tube cannot be done by throwing it in the garbage, as mercury containing lamps are classified as hazardous waste in the US (40 CFR part 273). The mercury in the lamp is the reason why most scanners and LCD monitors contain a "do not dispose" symbol, which is a trash can labelled with Hg, containing an X over it.
Unless you like mercury in your food and drinking water, it's best to dispose of these items properly.
I don't know. How _will_ they prove you are cancer or brain damage was caused by this?
Volts don't kill, current does. There are always warning signs for "DANGER: HIGH VOLTAGE" because high voltage can arc further, surprising you with a large bolt when you're a foot away.
Shows what you know, dick.
Dumb question:
I have 2 lcds that are foubared, 1 that has a weird green tint to it and 1 that blinks on and off and is discolored. Is there any hope for fixing these, or should I toss them?
It's much more entertaining to lay them out on a road and watch as cars run them over.
I really hate Dan Patrick.
Sure, Nye is an actual scientist, but Paul Zaloom is a kickass comedian, and that made "Beakman's World" much more fun to watch.
Circumcision is child abuse.
We need to pass a law to make these things more easily fixable.
Shady business practice not letting you fix things.
Maybe with a law ?
A 30 second search turns up this lamp+inverter.
http://www.mpja.com/productview.asp?product=14840+ LA
Search a bit longer to find one the right size :)
Now all those people selling broken LCD's on eBay will be able to fix them! That means I won't be able to use them to make my DIY LCD Projector
It is kinda funny that two articles involving DIYs on LCDs came out within one week of eachother.
I get a kick out of the seemingly sarcastic sounding "how do I fix this" things that I see here, and have seen in many other places. Fact is that with "tech" moving at such a pace these days, people (those with lots of ready-cash) are more likely to just dump this stuff into the trash (and landfills) and just go buy something new, rather than fix it.
I have been doing this sort of thing now since something like 1998 with relative ease. The only hassle has been scrounging up the cold cathode tubes that are large enough to cover the screens like the originals. Some will note that these have been conspicuously absent from the after-market parts shelves up until a couple years ago when it became fashionable to "light up" your box with colored lights. You quite literally had to know how to find them prior to this because they did not want them to be found. Any technician worth his salt knew that if you could replace the tube (and it wasn't hard at all to do), you could revive a computer or screen and make some money rather than having the user tossing this item into the landfills and spending whopping amounts of cash on "new models". (Yea, thats an accusation about the major OEM players; NEC, Toshiba and Sanyo; IMO)
As for the brightness issue... If you've replaced the tube and it's still dim, it's nothing more than the capacitors failing on your DC to AC converter boards. The caps are rated so close to tolarance in manufacture that with heat buildup and time, they fail prematurely. I've successfully pulled the boards and replaced the caps to bring them back to life assuming the transistors and IC have not failed. The brightness issue is nothing more than deviating the PWM (pulse width modulation) of the AC out to the tube. This change in PWM changes the resonance for the tube's circuit and hence it's brightness level is related to the PWM circuit efficiency. When the caps become leaky and dry, the circuit can no longer approach its normal or calculated PWM value or resonance, and hence your screen no longer can get as bright as it used to. Color temperature changed screens are the same issue. The cc tube is just more sensative to the current PWM and is lighting up in a particular color temperature; usually a brown or reddish hue.
Theoretically these LCD screens can last for many, many years if you want to simply replace these tubes and fix their circuits when they fail. Based on past history and my direct attempts to get these cc tubes and parts from several OEM's directly; replacing the entire LCD screen as a complete part; at a hefty price I might add; is generally your ONLY choice. More often than not, the replacement LCD panel cost more than the whole monitor did new!!!
I expect however that replacing the cc tubes as a standard repair will not be available because the folks manufacturing the LCD screens seem to control the access and if there is limited or no access to the parts, you only have access to "NEW" screens... or obviously new monitors!
Your market... you decide!!
Cheers;
All content in this message is copyright (c) 2008. All rights reserved. RIAA is prohibited here.
Mercury poisoning was the basis for the phrase "Mad as a hatter", and of course the character at the tea party in Alice in Wonderland. They used to steam top hats with mercury vapour, if I recall correctly, and after years of such work suffered brain damage. Not quite so likely with LCD backlights.
I disagree, I look at it as, "if this dumbass can do it without killing himself, I most certainly can."
This sig rocks the casbah.
my old 15' lcd went very dark and dimmed more and more until it refused to light up at all. i thougt oh fsck! now i have to use my old crt display again! (it had some 'funny' colour-effects). :-)
but then i discovered something: when i turned up the heating, the lcd started to work again (it stood on a desk right over the radiator).
because i didn't want to make a sauna of my room i used a hair dryer to warm the disply up (that used to take 5-10 minutes). i continued to use that display for over a year
since i didn't sell it on ebay, i'll try to fix it now...
there is a better way than a sun hatch, it is called transflective LCD. it is partially reflective and partially transmissive. so use a backlight while indoors and it automatically reflects sunlight while outdoors. it is used in some of the high end PDAs and might i dare to say, they looks damn good.
I haven't repaired many LCD's (only about 20 in the past year), but have already found some common trends.
HP Pavilions- the inverters usually go out on these (CCFL still good). Almost always it's the coils. (while some inverters from other manufacturers use piezos, most are enameled copper coils). I _think_ this might be do to using the same inverter for 15" panels that they were using for 14" panels. I have replaced the inverter on laptops less than a year old (I don't know why they paid me to fix it and not warranty).
Toshiba Satellites- I have seen on several occasions where the inverter has come unplugged or was a lose connection (I remember a couple of 8100's but I don't remember the other models). Just unplug and plug back in.
The rest are the CCFL's. Remember that there are only a handful of LCD panel makers out there (Samsung, LG (aka goldstar), Hitachi, NEC, Sharp, etc). So you aren't specifically looking for a Dell4150 backlight, but for the LCD you are working with. (take it apart and check).
Don't assume you can just throw a CCFL that is the same length (typically about 310mm). There are CCFL's that are 2.5mm, 3.0mm, etc. Heck, I have had some that were thin enough, but were 1mm too long.
Also take heed when looking to replace a CCFL. Some panels have the reflector up under the layers and you actually delaminate the panel upon disassembly. Not pretty and you can ruin the LC.
I have had twice (2 years ago) where I was all finished. Everything worked. Go to snap in the plastic trim bezel and SNAP! A crack shot up through the panel. Ouch. I had to eat the cost of the new panels.
I have heard from customers that Sony wanted $700 to replace the panel in the 17" Vaio (sp?) and HP wanted over $400 to replace the backlight in their notebook.
So, it's a gamble. But evenso, if you screw up, go find a good new panel on eBay for $250 (for a typical 15").
For inverters, stock up on coils and swap them yourself (for similar coil). Otherwise, these can be had for $14-$65 depending on model.
FWIW: In the end, it usually takes me 15 minutes and an average of $35 to repair a fault LCD.
I've had to take my powerbook LCD apart a few times (I left it outside in -40 temperatures... not a good idea... it now has flaky internal connections and requires 'shims' to maintain those connections.) Anyway, if you need a new display, just get a new module and install it. I don't have the link right now (reply if you're interested) but I found a link that details the replacement and provides multiple generic component ids that work in powerbooks.
I think his concern is most likely with units that have a built-in PSU. I'd want to be careful with these too. PSUs and CRT monitors are the two things I won't work on for safety reasons.
It's pretty fun to do. A friend didn't want to fix his laptop himself but did want to save some money, so a few of us got togther and replaced his LCD backlight for him. It's really cool to see how many layers of various films are stacked up in there, as at least on this one we had to prety much completely disassemble the panel to get to the light tube.
:)
My friend got slightly the wrong tube length, so the two ends are a bit dark. There's a coupel fingerprints inside the LCD now, and someone's eyelash. If you end up seriously tearing the thing apart liek we did, get some latex gloves or somethign to help with the fingerprints, and try not to shed during the operation.
I've got a Ceiva2 ( http://www.rangat.org/rthille/Computer/Ceiva2/inde x.html ) of which the backlight has failed. I tried my Fluke DMM to check the voltage out of the inverter, but the frequency is too high. Anyone have a good way to decide (before I go buying inverters or tubes) which is the part I need to replace?
Awesome furniture, accessories and cabinetry in Santa Rosa, CA: http://humanity-home.com/
cold cathode just like domestic flourescents have a "half life", which means a light quoted as having a 10,000 hour lamp life will be half as bright in lumens at 10,000 hours, it will also be emitting different spectrum of light as it ages.
http://slashdot.org/~GuyFawkes/journal
I'm not going to tomshardware, but there was a lcd projector on hackaday the other day, it should still be on their front page. It was kinda cool. I haven't been to tom's site in about 5 years but from what I hear here it still blows.
Serious- rather than waste your time with a hack like this why not turn your monitor into an inexpensive but high quality projector? Check out www.lumenlab.com.
-sirket
No Joke. In 4th grade our teacher's 'handyman' dad came into the class with a bottle of mercury. We were all given a small cloth and a penny. . We polished the penny to a nice silvery shine with the mercury. . most of which was lost in the carpet.. everyone took their pennies home. .
Seems a bit wrong to me.
Gentlemen and Ladies:
Jared Bouck shouldn't be allowed to leave the house or go to the bathroom without a proofreader looking over his shoulder. You do understand the concept of proofreading, don't you?
Thanks so much for helping to elevate the literacy rate, especially amongst technorati who, as we all know, are already legendary for their spelling and grammar skills.
Sincerely,
Mark A. Craig
Anyone who uses the phrase "jillions of volts of capacitance" obviously doesn't understand what the hell they are talking about...
Capacitance is measured in Farads, not Volts...
Slashdot needs a "(-99; idiot) moderation....
When I was in school
I did wash my hands with soap after that,but now this thread has got me worried about it after so many years!!! :-(
And what about this white incandescent lamps [ Tube lights ]that are used in Asia.They are the normal lighting used in homes.Are they safe? [Probably,thats the reason why american homes are lit by yellows bulbs instead of incandescent tubes that give white light?]
Why does yahoo do this
Well this might be offtopic but I find the Browser Statistics interesting. Looks like more geeks are using firefox...
Firefox 53.3%
IE 6.x 26.1%
AppleWebKit 2.86%
Mozilla 1.x 2.78%
Opera 2.77%
IE 5.x 1.17%
Mozilla/4.0 0.91%
Netscape 7.x 0.13%
Konqueror 0.00%
However, as with most pieces of consumer-level computer technology, the first few production runs of a product will often use well-designed parts and be made to last. It seems to me that the manufacturers aim to create excellent products for the initial 'settling in' period of a new technology, which results in favorable industry reviews and higher placements of a given company in the competition for market share. Then, after the technology is well in place and people are addicted, the quality can be safely dropped and the money-grab of planned obsolescence and super-cheap parts usage in manufacture can begin.
My little 15" LCD from Samsung is an old model, but it runs like a trooper. Like a venerable old HP Laserjet II, I expect it will run tirelessly for years to come. And luckily, unlike the Laserjet II, there's nothing a new, up to date model LCD screen can do which is so spectacular and so necessary that I'd consider re-investing in the same technology. An old screen which displays bright and clear and accurately, is a screen which has pretty much hit the upward limit of my requirements.
-FL
I'm still smarting from the article a couple of years back about revitalizing dead CRT monitors with a blowtorch, some pixie dust and a household vacuum cleaner.
:)
Anyone want a pile of old, dead CRT monitors? Useful as boat anchors, door stops or untraceable murder weapons.
Trying to become famous by taking photos. Visit my homepage please.
Here is a company that does this for you, at a price. http://moniserv.com/ Their prices are: 14.1" or Smaller $115 Parts and Labor are Included. Except Panel, Polarize Film & Motherboard 15" to 15.4" Screen $125 Parts and Labor are Included. Except Panel, Polarize Film & Motherboard 16" to 16.1" Screen $135 Parts and Labor are Included. Except Panel, Polarize Film & Motherboard 17" or large Screen call Parts and Labor are Included. Except Panel, Polarize Film & Motherboard So make an honest appresal of your skill level and the cost benefit to you, then go with what ever seems best.
Kevin M. Childers
Computer repair and networking tech.
Available over most messaging services as KC1111111111