I can fix that!

[WebJoel]

Around the neighborhood here in Toronto, it is a common sight to see old, out-of-date used computer equipment set out 'on the curb' or alongside buildings in 'collection areas', awaiting the twice-monthly pick-up of such objects for recycling. Most of these are hopelessly old (but perfect candidates for installing a LINUX distro if they still worked, -if one were so inclined to rebuilding them).

I often bring home a pc chassis or two and strip the cooling fans out of them for use in my other projects (like ventilating a Stormtrooper helmet, etc), and any other part that I deem salvage-worthy.
At any time I typically have a dozen such salvaged fans on-hand.

Last week in one of the more-usual recyclable drop-off places (this place usually has a quarter-dozen computers dropped-off weekly, every week), a "BENQ" brand LCD flat-screen computer monitor was dropped off. A fairly recent model (made 2004) is a bit uncommon to see such young faire 'dropped off'. The area kids picked it up and had it on the edge of the property where I live as object-trouve (along with automobile rims, discarded kitchen cabinets, busted baby-carriages, kitchen chairs, etc in their 'play house' games).
I sort~of had my eye on that for a few days and those kids seemed to have abandoned the playsite now that school has started up again. I saw a big rainstorm coming last Thursday, so I retrieved this and placed it in my basement bike shed. The only thing wrong with it that I could visually tell, was that the ON/OFF button on the front had been 'punched through' and was 'inside' the monitor jacket, rolling around inside loose.

-There is a chance that this was the reason when it was discarded... :D

Over the long Labor Day weekend, I opened up the monitor jacket and even though I have never viewed the inside of a LCD monitor before, things sort of 'looked right', -you know. I have seen the insides of enough computers to know when they have been 'tampered with', and this one looked un-opened previously...

I was able to unplug a long card-like device that has a row of forward-facing dip-switches on it that contact with the appropriate buttons on the front, -one of these dip-switches appeared to be the ON/OFF power switch. The 'punched-thru button' appeared to be exactly that... a round plastic 'button' with clear edges to let the mini-light shine thru when "ON", with a short plastic 'bar' welded across said button's posterior side, and one end of this bar is supposed to be 'plasti-welded' to the inside face of the jacket, forming a crude 'hinge'. I could see the melted point of used-to-be attached. The spacial orientation of this button suggested that this was a merely a 'hinged' toggle to reach the slightly offset dip-switch that would be the ON/OFF.

Using a really rubbery, super-strong adhesive called "shoo-goo" and a bamboo shish-kaboob spear as my tool, I glued one end of this button-bar to the inside-face of the monitor jacket to form a rubbery 'hinge', and re-installed the dip-switch card and plug back into the case, and allowed it to dry for a day.
Using a power-cord from another computer monitor, I plugged-in the LCD monitor and turned it on, -and it WORKS! It took a few minutes to 'light up'... the screen flickered and such for a few minutes. I was about to give up, when suddenly it 'just started working'. -Maybe it drew moisture from having sat outside for a week under those trees, and it took being plugged-in to warm-up enough to chase away any condensation(??).
I have since turned this off & on a few dozen times and it works perfectly, every time. No delays.

Since I do not have the '(appears to be)serial to USB' cord that supplies the computer output into the monitor, the monitor after normal start-up, goes into 'error mode' with a message to this effect ("missing data cord"), and shuts itself off gracefully.

Maybe this will work and be okay, -maybe it will run for a a day or a few hours and die again (maybe that is why it was discarded in the first place, and some idiot thought punching the ON/OFF button silly might help... I dunno). :confused:

-Looks as if I am going to TheSource this weekend (That's "RadioShack" to you in the States), looking for an appropriate BENQ-type data cord for their brand of monitor...

-Thought you'd like to hear about this... :)

[KDLA]

Interesting!

Could be that the former owner had a video card/driver problem that affected display, and he/she mistakenly attributed it to the monitor's performance. I once had a long argument - I mean debate :) - with an IT help staff member over that kind of issue.

[WebJoel]

Maybe. That the O/I button was 'punched through' to the inside tells of human nature... if is doesn't work, -get a bigger hammer. And if THAT doesn't work, toss it out in the trash.
Even without having fixed the broken I/O button, one could have inserted a finger into the jacket and pushed the dip-switch for the O/I and made it work, presumeably.

-About 10 years ago I used to drive a really nice, rust-free super-clean 1980 Chevy El~Camino pick-up truck. Coming home from the movies one night, I lost all drive-train power and it more-or-less was 'coasting' and only occasionally would it 'drive', shuddering horribly! I ended up having to park it and call for a ride home.

Upon towing the vehicle home the next day, it would start but would not 'move forward or backward'. I assumed it was a wrecked transmission, so I sold the truck for $100.oo as-such (all facts disclosed to buyer, whom agreed to buy truck still under the terms of "as-is"). -Turns out it was only a loose Torque-Convertor housing... two of the three bolts that hold that to the flywheel had somehow come out!
He replaced the two missing bolts and the truck ran perfectly, and he drove it himself for several more years... I basically bailed on a $2000.oo vehicle for the cost of two 2-inch automotive bolts that would have solved my problem... :(

[David Harrison]

Since it's an LCD and new(ish), it's probably a DVI cable you need. No monitor runs off a USB cable, there's nowhere near enough bandwidth.

Your best bet would be to find the make and model of the monitor and google it.

[WebJoel]

Since it's an LCD and new(ish), it's probably a DVI cable you need. No monitor runs off a USB cable, there's nowhere near enough bandwidth.

Your best bet would be to find the make and model of the monitor and google it.
Heard'jya, & done that. :D -It's a 15-pin mini D-SubCable. (analog). I see that just about every make of monitor Googled uses the same thing (unless "digital" is specified). It was only my assumption that it might connect to the computer via USB (like most keyboards do nowadays). It is a discontinued model of monitor (as many of the ones Googled were). I guess one will have that with devices that are 3-almost-4 years old. Anything much older than this I'd have not wasted my time attempting the salvage of what would have been two and a half-bills when new. For a $20.oo cable if this works, would be a cheap monitor.