Sad monitor

[Nill Toulme]

I guess it's a bad sign that my trusty and beloved NEC 2090uxi will no longer calibrate to anything higher than 75 cd/m²?  I don't suppose there's any chance it's something wrong with my equally trusty and beloved old Eye One Display 2?  Do old LCD monitors not die, they just ... fade?

I've been offline for a while.  What's the current equivalent in a sweet-spot bang-for-the-buck sub-$1k monitor?  Would it be the PA 241W?

Nill

[bill t.]

That's what happened to my old Lacie Electron Blue CRT!  What a boat anchor!

Have you tried resetting the old monitor?  Is that possible?  I believe the 2690 can throttle down its backlight hardware by a few preset notches, maybe you've stumbled into the lowest notch somehow.

I've heard you can replace the backlight tubes in those things.  Something tells me that wouldn't cost too much more than buying a top of the line 30" monitor with calibration puck and Spectraview software.

I worked with one of those 241's for a few hours, my old 2690 has nothing better to offer except about an inch, and I can't say I felt the difference when I was using the 241.  I'm holding out for 271, the extra resolution is well worth it, IMHO.  My only gripe with 24+ inch monitors is that 1920 horizontal starts to get a wee bit sparse.

[Czornyj]

Don't trust i1display2. It fades quicker than a monitor.

[Steve Weldon]

If all else is fine with the monitor it might be an economical alternative to just replace the LCD panel.  There are many on-line sources to purchase a brand new panel and they're not difficult to replace.

[darlingm]

It could also be the internal power inverter, light source, or cable.  Could also be bulging capacitors on the logic board that could be removed and new ones soldered on, or the logic board could be replaced.  Can be very hard to diagnose, and the parts are usually quite expensive and often non-returnable if it turns out not to fix your problem.

I recently looked at the NEC PA241W, Asus PA246Q, and a few Dell models.  Decided to go with the Asus PA246Q, only being $460.  I highly recommend it, although haven't had an NEC PA241W to directly compare against.  On paper, they look nearly identical.

[Steve Weldon]

It could also be the internal power inverter, light source, or cable.  Could also be bulging capacitors on the logic board that could be removed and new ones soldered on, or the logic board could be replaced.  Can be very hard to diagnose, and the parts are usually quite expensive and often non-returnable if it turns out not to fix your problem.

I recently looked at the NEC PA241W, Asus PA246Q, and a few Dell models.  Decided to go with the Asus PA246Q, only being $460.  I highly recommend it, although haven't had an NEC PA241W to directly compare against.  On paper, they look nearly identical.

1.  The symptoms (a gradual dimming of the panel brightness) don't point at any of these other symptoms and the MTBF of the panel is like 10x less than discrete components anyway.

2.  The art of finding a technician who knows what they're doing can be a problem.  But once you find one they won't think it's hard to diagnose..

3.  Factory components are often way overpriced and no one accepts a return where the package has been opened.  Fair enough.  But there are tons of generic components out there.  As an example I recently repaired an LCD, LCD driver, and 9 diodes (lamps) on a transceiver.   Factory price was a stunning $78..  Generics came in at $5.20.. I've nothing against quality generics.

[Simon Garrett]

Don't trust i1display2. It fades quicker than a monitor.

In any case, getting something new (e.g. ColorMunki Display) will be a lot cheaper than a new monitor.