My Sony LCD monitor has failed. Help!

December 22, 2004 12:08 AM

My Sony LCD monitor has apparently failed, in what I think is a very odd manner (details inside). Has anyone else encountered this?

It's a SDM-HS73; a pretty standard 17-inch LCD monitor. The failure mode is as follows: upon being powered up, or the computer restarting, or the video resetting (e.g. X windows starting up), or being plugged into a different computer, or having the video cable unplugged entirely, it displays an image for about 2 seconds. It then goes entirely black. In the case of the cable being unplugged or the computer being powered down, the displayed image is the standard "no signal; entering power save mode" message.

The blanking after two seconds is not a power save mode: there's an LED indicating this mode (green=normal, orange=power save), and it stays green. Unless there's no signal, in which case it'll turn orange after the standard interval (about 30 seconds).

This happened suddenly this morning, with no warnings or indications. I can't find any reports of this failure mode on the web. Do any of you know what might be going wrong, and if it might be fixable? It's an 18-month-old monitor, so it's young, but out of warranty.

posted by mr_roboto to computers & internet (4 comments total)

wag 1: the logic that autosenses the signal and adjusts the display accordingly has failed. have you tried checking/reducing resolution/refresh rates, just in case a setting has changed somehow?

wag 2: no-one will fix it.
posted by andrew cooke at 2:45 AM on December 22, 2004

The only option you have is to look into the warranty. I make sure not to buy Sony because the warranties are notoriously difficult and time consuming. Oh, if you don't have the original receipt get ready to pay out of pocket!
posted by Keyser Soze at 2:52 AM on December 22, 2004

Is it actually totally blank? Or can you see a very faint image? (You might have to try from wierd angles or something to see it, though).
If it's the latter, the backlight has failed. It would be warranty replacement time, if 'twere covered by warranty. Otherwise - 12ms 17" LCD panels are dirt-cheap these days....
posted by coriolisdave at 2:13 PM on December 22, 2004

Well, I was amazed to learn, thanks to Keyser Soze's link)that it is still under warranty (Three years! I could have sworn it was only one, and didn't even bother checking!) And even without the original purchase receipt, Sony is shipping me a (refurbished) replacement. Thanks, guys!
posted by mr_roboto at 6:36 PM on December 23, 2004