Maniac Monitor Messing with me.

[osram]

Well i know the Dell P991 19" Sony Trinitron Monitor isnt the newest thing around. But i wonder whats happening to it because first i started to get a couple of horizontal, slighty diagonally offset red lines. Now it isnt a couple anymore.. its about every 2.5cm intervalls.

Also it has got a way to red colouring scheme since quite a long time which is really perfect for people working with computer graphics like me. o.O (Looks like having a semi-transparent, red layer placed

It is also way too bright, so if i set my monitor brightness to 0 it looks really crap because there is way too much gamma value somehow and you cannot correct it.

Recently it also has some Blue color error (Blau-Stich? German..) coming from the lower left corner.

The only thing i know: My mate told me to cover my eyes when i happen to hear a loud whistling sound.. So my Face doesnt get sucked in when that crap old device should implode. -.-

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edit: ah yes and i also wonder if it could be the cause for my 5V rail being way too low refering to my hardware mobo etc. area thread.

 

[iss]

Dell P991 19" Sony Trinitron Monitor

yep had one of those worked great for three years. then it started doing the same thing you are describing. there is nothing you can do but replace it, because it is dying. the good news is you can get a way better monitor for a fraction of what the P991 cost back when it was new.

 

[jaroddog]

Yeah, when they start smoking (or what you describe), it's officially new monitor or vid card time.

 

[MarcFOnline]

Dell P991 monitor fix

yep had one of those worked great for three years. then it started doing the same thing you are describing. there is nothing you can do but replace it, because it is dying. the good news is you can get a way better monitor for a fraction of what the P991 cost back when it was new.

Wow... this reply is definitely over a year too late, since I would assume both these guys have since gotten rid of their P991 monitors...

But since this is a very common issue with the Dell P991 (and possibly other Sony Trinitron-based CRT monitors), I still feel that it's worth it to post the solution I literally just discovered.

My monitor was exhibiting the same symptoms (insane brightness, reddish retrace lines, black not really being black, etc.) as the folks mentioned above, and I was just about to shell out the cash for a new LCD to replace my aging -- but beloved -- P991 when I thought for the heck of it I'd try one last thing that I had never yet tried.

Turns out, it fixed the problem.

If you go to the monitor menu (hit the OSD button) and select "Option" (second item from the bottom), scroll down to the very last icon, which is "Color Return". Note that this feature is only available after 30-45 minutes of continual use of your monitor, so if it just came out of standby, you'll have to wait a little bit. Once you can select this option, make sure it's highlighted and hit the right-arrow button on your monitor. Your screen will now cycle through several colors and do a few funky things, but once it finishes, you'll be happy to find that your brightness settings are back to normal levels, the retrace lines are nowhere to be found, and other mysterious symptoms may have disappeared as well.

Quite literally, the picture on my monitor is as if it's brand-new. Which is a relief, because in order to get an LCD with a picture that's equivalent in quality to this one, I'd have to shell out a healthy chunk of change.

Anyways, just thought I'd toss that out there. Those of us who still use CRT monitors -- never mind the Dell P991 -- are now something of a diminishing cult, but if at least one person can benefit, it was worth my time creating this post! Happy computing everyone...


P.S. I did some reading around the interweb and it turns out the above solution (using the Color Return feature) is something of a temporary fix, though by the time this becomes an issue, even those of us die-hard P991 users will probably have switched to LCDs. Just in case, though, if you're looking for a more permanent fix and don't mind hacking your monitor's EEPROM (Electrically Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory), here's a great guide for you to check out: http://www.geocities.com/gregua/windas/

 

[osram]

lol, i was still using my P991 with all the messy colors, lines and behavior for a very long time now.

I tried your suggestion and after doing some strange "recalibration" it seems that the lines are gone.. the colors are back.. and i dont have to keep @ 0 brightness and 100 contrast anymore.

nice one. :]

P991 cult FTW!