LCD Monitor Fixed!

**Sgt.TmH** · 07-24-10, 08:53 PM

If your LCD Monitor starts getting dimmer and dimmer, even with Brightness set to 100, or periodically blanks out, it is NOT time to get a new monitor.

Most likely you just need to replace a couple of capacitors.

This is what happened with my Samsung 204B. It was taking 15 minutes before it would brighten up enough to see any image and playing games, like BF2, was like playing at night.

Replacing it with a new monitor with the same specs and features was going to cost me $350. But doing some research, I found that this, and other makes/models, suffer from notoriously cheapo Chinese capacitors that slowly fail progressively faster.

Though I've ordered an replacement set of quality capacitors from Digi-Key, I was able to replace the 2 main culprits with Radio Shack caps today and my monitor is like new again! WOOHOO!

So before you throw out that failing monitor, do some research and, for less than $4, you might be able to breathe new life into it!

**WileECyte** · 07-25-10, 12:04 PM

Out of curiosity, what size/type of capacitors did you need to fix your monitor. I've got a 204B sitting behind me that had that issue. It'd be nice to get it running again.

**HeavyG** · 07-25-10, 02:30 PM

Did the caps look like they were about to pop? Just curios how you determined which ones were bad. I mean, you can get a 23" LCD for $150-180 nowadays. Sometimes the work isn't worth the trouble if you have to spend a lot of time troubleshooting. You have to think of opportunity costs... if I make $30/hour and it takes me 3 hours, plus $20 in parts, I am already at $110 invested into this project to get something that would cost me $40-50 more to solve in 5 minutes if I buy a new one.

Then again, I like to fix broken things, so this would be right up my alley, just as long as I could easily identify what is broken.

**WileECyte** · 08-19-10, 10:53 AM

There's only like 8 electrolytic capacitors in the entire monitor. Three of the 8 showed tell tale signs of bulging and one was actually perforated and you could see where the electrolyte solution leaked out. It's what happens when the Chinese fail at corporate espionage. A buddy of mine spent about 30 minutes removing all the capacitors and replaced with nice, reliable Panasonic capacitors. Works like a champ.