Video
Chapter 17
© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved
Overview
• In this chapter, you will learn to
– Explain how video displays work
– Select the proper video card
– Install and configure video software
– Troubleshoot basic video problems
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Video
• Video consists of two devices—the video
card (display adapter) and the monitor
• The video card consists of two distinct
components
– One takes commands from the computer and
updates its own
onboard RAM
– The other scans the
RAM and sends data
to the monitor
Monitor
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Video card
CRT Monitors
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CRT
• All CRT monitors have a cathode ray tube
(CRT), which is a vacuum tube
• One end of this tube is a
slender cylinder that
consists of three
electron guns
• The wide end of the
CRT is the display screen
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CRT
• When power is applied to the electron
guns, a stream of electrons is generated
• This stream is subjected to a magnetic
field generated by a ring of
electromagnets called a yoke
• The phosphor coating releases energy as
visible light when struck by the electrons
– Phosphors continue to glow momentarily after
being struck—called persistence
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Essentials
CompTIA A+
Essentials
CRT Refresh Rates
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CRT Refresh Rates
Video data is displayed on the monitor as the electron gun
sweeps the display horizontally, energizing appropriate areas on
the phosphor coating.
• Horizontal refresh
rate (HRR)
– The speed at which the
electron beam moves
across the screen
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• Vertical refresh rate
(VRR)
– The amount of time
taken by the monitor to
draw the entire screen
and get the electron
beam back to the start
CRT Refresh Rates
• Video cards push the monitor at a given
VRR, and then the monitor determines
the HRR
– If the VRR is set too low, you’ll see flicker
– If it is set too high, you’ll have a distorted screen
image and may damage the monitor
• Multisync (multiple-frequency monitor)
monitors support multiple VRRs
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Phosphors
• Phosphors and
shadow mask
– Phosphors are dots
inside the CRT monitor
that glow red, green, or
blue when an electron
gun sweeps over them
– Phosphors are evenly
distributed across the
front of the monitor
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One group of red, green,
and blue phosphors is called
a triad
Shadow Mask
• Shadow mask is a screen that enables
the proper electron gun to light the
proper phosphor
• Electron guns sweep across
the phosphors as a group
• The area of phosphors lit at one time by
a group of guns is called a picture
element, or pixel
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Resolution
• Monitor resolution is always shown as
the number of horizontal pixels times the
number of vertical pixels
• Some common resolutions
are 640 x 480, 800 x 600,
1024 x 768, 1280 x 1024,
and 1600 x 1200
• These resolutions match
a 4:3 ratio called the
aspect ratio
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Dot Pitch
• Dot pitch—diagonal distance between
phosphorous dots of the same color
– Range from 0.39 mm to as low as 0.18 mm
– The lower the dot
pitch, the more
dots across the
screen, which
produces a
sharper, more
defined image
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Bandwidth
• Bandwidth—number of times an electron
gun can be turned on or off per second
– Bandwidth is measured in megahertz (MHz)
– VRR determined by bandwidth and resolution
Bandwidth

pixels per page = Maximum VRR
For example, a 17-inch monitor with a 100MHz bandwidth and a
resolution of 1024 x 768 can support a maximum VRR of 127 Hz
100,000,000  (1024 x 768) = 127 Hz
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LCD Monitors
• Liquid crystal displays
– Thinner and lighter
– Much less power
– Flicker free
– Don’t emit radiation
– Called flat panels or flat panel displays
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How LCDs Work
• Liquid crystals take advantage of the
property of polarization
• Liquid crystals are composed of specially
formulated liquid
– Liquid is full of long, thin crystals that always orient
themselves in the same direction
• The crystals act exactly like a liquid
polarized filter
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Liquid Crystal Molecules
• LCD monitors use liquid crystal
molecules that tend to line up together
– These molecules take advantage of polarization
– Fine grooves in a piece of glass will cause the
molecules to line up along the grooves
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Twisting Molecules
• Use two pieces of glass with fine grooves
oriented at a 90° angle
– Molecules in the middle will try to line up to both
sides—creating a nice twist
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Add Polarizing Filters
• Now add polarizing filters to both sides
– The liquid crystal will twist the light and enable it to
pass through
– Adding an electrical potential will cause the crystals
to try to align to the electrical field
• To darken an area, apply a charge
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Passive Matrix
• Uses three matrices to produce color
• Above the intersections of the wires,
glass covers tiny red, green, & blue dots
• Slow and tends to create an overlap
between pixels
• Slightly blurred
effect
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Dual-Scan Passive Matrix
• Refreshes two lines at a time
• Still used on some low-end LCD panels
• Largely replaced with TFT
– Thin film transistor
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Thin Film Transistor (TFT)
• Thin film transistor (TFT) is also known as active
matrix
• It uses one or more tiny transistors to control
each color dot
• Brighter, with better contrast
• Can handle a variety
of colors, and has
a much wider
viewing area
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LCD Components
• Backlights illuminate the image
– Inverters power the backlights (with AC)
• LCD logic board uses DC
• Cold cathode
fluorescent lamp
(CCFL) used
in backlights
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LCD Resolution
• All LCD monitors have a native resolution
– Display sharpest picture when set to this resolution
• LCD panels cannot display more than
their pixel limitation
• When set to lower resolutions, image
quality is severely degraded
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LCD Components
• Brightness
– Determined by backlight
– Measured in nits (100 to 1000 with the avg. at 300)
• Response rate
– Similar concept as refresh rate
– Lower rate (6–8 ns) better
– Low-end LCDs (20–25 ns) have ghosting problems
• Contrast ratio
– Difference between lightest and darkest
– Low end (250:1) to high end (1000:1)
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Projectors
• Front-view and rear-view
– CRT projectors used first and are expensive
– LCD projectors light and comparatively inexpensive
– Today, almost all portable projectors are LCDs
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Projector Features
• Lumens
– Amount of light provided by a light source
– Higher lumens = brighter picture
• Throw
– Size of an image at a certain distance
– Related to aspect ratio
• Lamps
– Get very hot
– Expensive—typically a few hundred dollars
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Common Features
• Overview
– Size
– Connections
– Adjustments
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Common Features—Size
• CRT monitors measured in inches
• Monitor size (not viewable area)
• Viewable image size (VIS)—screen size
from diagonal corners
• LCD monitors use
just the VIS value
Monitor size
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VIS
Common Features—Connections
• Traditional CRT monitors use
a 15-pin, 3-row, DB-type
connector and a power plug
• LCDs can use DB-15 or
digital video interface (DVI)
– DVI-D (digital)
– DVI-A (analog)
– DVI A/D or DVI-I (interchangeable)
DVI to VGA Adapter
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Common Features—Connections
• The Random Access Memory Digital-toAnalog Converter (RAMDAC) chip
– Converts digital signals into analog signals for
analog CRTs
• LCD monitors use digital signals
– Circuitry for converting analog signals to digital
usually on board the LCD monitors
– When using the DVI connection, not translated to
analog (RAMDAC not used)
– Digital from video card sent and used as digital on
LCD monitor
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RAMDAC
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Common Features—Adjustments
• Controls
– On/off button
– Brightness/contrast button
– Onboard menu system
• Two main functions
of menu
– Physical screen adjustments
– Color adjustments
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Power Conservation
• About half the power required by the PC
is consumed by the CRT monitor
– Monitors that meet the VESA specs can reduce
power consumption by +/–75 percent
– Done with Display Power-Management Signaling
(DPMS)
• CRT monitor consumes +/–120 watts
– Power-down DPMS mode reduces to +/–25 watts
– Full shutoff DPMS mode reduces to +/–15 watts
– Takes about 15–30 seconds to restore display
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Power Conservation
• LCD monitor uses less than half the
electricity as a CRT
• 19-inch 4:3 flat panel display uses
+/– 33 watts at peak usage
– Less than 2 watts in DPMS mode
– Replacing CRTs with LCDs can have an impact on
the electric bill
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Video Cards
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Video Card
• Two major components
1. Video RAM
– Stores the video image
2. Video processor circuitry
– Takes information from video RAM and sends it to
the monitor
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Video RAM
• Text video cards display only the 256
ASCII characters
– Older systems displayed on 80 chars/row and
only 24 rows—only 1920 bytes of RAM needed
• Graphics video cards could turn any pixel
on or off
– Resolution of 320 x 200 pixels required 8 KB
– To add color, multiple bits added
• 8 bits = 256 colors
• 24 bits = 16.7 million colors (true color)
• Color depth is represented as bits (color depth of 24 bits)
and not the number of colors
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Color Depth
• Color depth is represented as bits
– “Color depth of 24 bits”
– Not the number of colors
– 24 bits commonly referred to as “true color”
Number of Colors
2 colors
4 colors
256 colors
64,000 colors
16.7 million colors
16.7 million colors
8-bit opacity
Number of Bits
1 bit (mono)
2 bits
8 bits
16 bits
24 bits
32 bits
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Video Modes
• VGA (640 x 480)
• Beyond VGA
– SVGA, XGA, and more
Mode
QVGA
WVGA
SVGA
XGA
WXGA
HDTV 720
SXGA
Resolution
320 x 240
800 x 480
800 x 600
1024 x 768
1200 x 800
1280 x 720
1280 x 1024
Mode
WSXGA
SXGA+
WSXGA+
UXGA
HDTV 1080
WUXGA
WQUXGA
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Resolution
1440 x 900
1400 x 1050
1680 x 1050
1600 x 1200
1920 x 1080
1920 x 1200
2560 x 1600
Motherboard Connection
• PCI slots
– 800 x 600 with refresh of 70 Hz at 8 bits (256
colors) requires 33.6 Mbps bandwidth
– 24 bits (16.7 million colors) requires 100.8 Mbps
– Not enough bandwidth available on shared PCI bus
• AGP (accelerated graphics port)
– Dedicated to video
– Several advantages over PCI
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AGP Benefits
• AGP is a single special port dedicated to video
– Derived from the 66-MHz, 32-bit PCI 2.1 specification
– Strobing increases signals two, four, and eight times for
each clock cycle
– Uses its own dedicated data bus connected to Northbridge
– Supports pipelining
– Uses sidebanding (can send and receive at same time)
– Can “steal” chunks of regular system memory
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PCIe (PCI Express)
•
•
•
•
Developed to be replacement for PCI
Designed to replace AGP also
Incredibly fast serial communications
Supports many of the AGP benefits
– Sidebanding
– System memory access
PCIe card
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Graphics Processor
• The most important decision in buying a
video card is the graphics processor
• Most video processors are made by
– NVIDIA
– ATI
• ATI Radeon X1950 XTX 512 MB
– ATI
– Radeon X1950 XTX
– 512 MB
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Manufacturer
Processor & Model No.
Amount of RAM
Graphics Processor
• NVIDIA and ATI release multiple models
of graphics processors each year
• Most features only seen in 3-D games
–
–
–
–
–
Textures
Transparency
Shadows
Reflection
Bump mapping
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Video Memory
• Video RAM constantly updates to reflect
every change that takes place on screen
• Three bottlenecks
– Data throughput speed
– Access speed
– Simple capacity
• Overcome bottlenecks in three ways
– Wider bus between video RAM and video processor
– Specialized super-fast RAM
– More RAM
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Video Memory
• Bus widths
– 64, 128, and even 256 bits wide
• Most of the graphics rendering and
processing is handled on the card
– Dedicated video processor rather than the CPU
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Video Memory
• Video RAM Technologies
Acronym
VRAM
WRAM
SGRAM
DDR SDRAM
DDR2 SDRAM
GDDR3 SDRAM
GDDR4 SDRAM
Name
Video RAM
Windows RAM
Synchronous
Graphics RAM
Double Data Rate
SDRAM
DDR Version 2
Graphics DDR V. 3
Graphics DDR V. 4
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Purpose
Original
Never caught on
Special SDRAM
Used on budget
graphics cards
Replaced with GDDR3
Faster DDR2
Upgrade of GDDR3
Installing and Configuring
Video Software
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Physical Installation Issues
• Two primary issues
1. Long cards
• Some video cards are tall
and may not fit in all cases
• Get a new case or new
video card
2. Proximity to nearest PCI card
– Video cards run very hot
– Leave space for ventilation
– Good practice is to leave the slot next to an AGP
card empty to allow better airflow
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Software
• Two-step process
1. Load the drivers
– Install from CD or use built-in
driver (if you must)
– Built-in driver likely the oldest
– Check the manufacturer’s
Web site for updates
2. Check the drivers
• Use the Display applet
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Display Applet
• Found in Control Panel or right-click the
desktop and choose Properties
• Making the screen pretty
– Themes
– Desktop
– Appearance
– Other tabs
– Screen Saver
– Settings
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Display Applet
• Screen Saver
– Power Management
features
– Covered in Chapter 19
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Display Applet
• Settings tab
– Allows you to configure multiple monitors
– Can configure resolution and color depth
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Display Applet—Advanced
• Monitor tab
– Can update monitor
driver
– Can set the screen
refresh rate
• Change in small
increments
• Can cause damage
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Display Applet—Advanced
• Many video cards have card-specific tab
– Color Correction
• Can adjust screen colors
– Rotation
• Portrait or Landscape
– Modes
• Very advanced settings
• Usually not needed
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Working with Drivers
• Video drivers work same way as other
hardware drivers
– Can access this screen
from Device Manager or
Device applet
– Update driver
– Roll back driver
– Uninstall driver
– As a basic rule
• Uninstall old drivers before
installing drivers for new
video card
© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved
IT Technician
CompTIA A+
Technician
3-D Graphics
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3-D Graphics
• Improvements driven by games
– Although improvements used in other applications
such as computer aided design (CAD)
– First-person shooters (FPSs) such as Wolfenstein
3D and Doom started move to 3-D
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Transformation and Sprites
• Movement of 3-D objects referred to as
transformation (CPU intensive)
– Intel’s SIMD and AMD’s 3DNow! expressly designed
to perform transformation
– Early 3-D games used sprites
• Just a bitmap graphic moved
around on the screen
• Each figure had a limited number
of sprites or angles of view
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3-D Objects
• The second generation produced 3-D
objects thru a process called rendering
–
–
–
–
Composed of a group of points or vertices
Vertices were connected with lines (called edges)
The edges form triangles that create polygons
The last step is adding a texture (or skin)
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3-D Video Cards
• Graphics processing units needed
– Screens redrawn at least 24 times per second
– 3-D video cards have massive amounts of RAM for
textures and fast processors for transformations
– Application programming interfaces (APIs) created
to talk to hardware directly
• OpenGL ported from UNIX
• DirectX (Microsoft only)
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DirectX and Video Cards
• DirectX provides direct access to
hardware as follows:
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
DirectDraw: for 2-D graphics
Direct3D: for 3-D graphics
DirectInput: for joysticks and game controllers
DirectSound: for waveforms
DirectMusic: for MIDI devices
DirectPlay: for multiplayer games
DirectShow: for video and presentation devices
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DirectX Diagnostic Tool
• Accessories | System Tools | System Information
– Tools | DirectX Diagnostic Tool
• Or…Run DXDiag
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Web sites
• Some useful Web sites to visit before
making a hardware-buying decision
–
–
–
–
www.arstechnica.com
www.hardocp.com
www.tomshardware.com
www.sharkyextreme.com
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Troubleshooting Video
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Video Card Problems
• Vast majority of problems are
– Improper or corrupt drivers
– Incorrect settings
• Incompatible or corrupt driver symptoms
– 640 x 480 mode
– 16-color VGA
• Your response
– Boot into safe mode and remove driver
– Use Add/Remove programs if available
– Use Device Manager
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Video Card HW Problems
• Hardware problems usually just
one of two
– Fan has gone out
– RAM is faulty
• Faulty hardware
symptoms
– Bizarre output
– May see mouse moving
– Display is a mess
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Video Card Problems
• Don’t forget the obvious
– If everything is sideways, check the rotation
settings
– Limited colors—check the color depth
– Resolution set too high
• “Input signal out of range”
© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved
Troubleshooting Monitors
Opening up a monitor
can be deadly
Even when the power is disconnected, certain
components inside a monitor retain a substantial voltage
for an extended period of time. If you accidentally short
one of the components, it could actually kill you!
© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved
Troubleshooting Monitors
• Dangerous inside a monitor
• Proper adjustment requires specialized
training
• Your goal is to determine if a problem is
in one these three categories:
– Common monitor problems
– External adjustments
– Internal adjustments
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Common Monitor Problems
• Control buttons are replaceable
– Check with the manufacturer
• Ghosting, streaking, fuzzy vertical edges
– Check the cable connections and cable itself
• Missing color
– Check cable for breaks, bent pins, and
monitor adjustments
• Loss of brightness
– Normal with age, so use power management
– Internal adjustments may be made
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Common Problems—CRTs
• You may be able to fix this
– Big color blotches—degauss it with degauss button
• It’s probably beyond fixing
– Dim display (with brightness turned up)
• Take it in to a repair shop
– Out of focus—adjustment near the
flyback transformer
– Hissing or sparking sounds
– Bird-like chirping sounds
– Single horizontal or vertical line
– Single white dot on a black screen
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Troubleshooting Monitors
• External controls provide users with the
opportunity to fine-tune the monitor’s image
– Brightness and contrast
– Pincushioning
– Trapezoidal adjustments
– Tint and saturation of color
– Monitors have a built-in circuit called a degaussing coil
• Eliminates magnetic build-up
• A fuzzy looking monitor may be fixed by degaussing it
• Disregard the loud “thunk” sound—it’s normal
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Troubleshooting CRTs
• Convergence defines how closely the
three colors will combine
• Misconvergence causes halos
– Most likely near the edges of the screen
– Can be set by internal adjustments
– Schematics of monitor will show location of variable
resistor that can be adjusted
• Manufacturers won’t give you the schematics
• Leave to a trained specialist
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High-Voltage Anode
Lifting this
suction cup will
almost certainly
kill you!
High-voltage anode
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• Under the suction cup
is the actual highvoltage anode
• The wire leading from
the suction cup goes
to the flyback
transformer
• There’s a big
capacitor that can
hold up to 25,000
volts of charge for
days, weeks, months,
or even years
Discharging a CRT
Do NOT attempt to
discharge a monitor
unless properly trained
and equipped
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Common Problems—LCDs
• Symptoms
– Cracked LCD monitors: not repairable
– LCD goes dark: lost either lamp or inverter
– Hissing noise: inverter is about to fail
• LCD repair companies
– Specialize in repairing LCD monitors
• Bad pixels
–
–
–
–
Normal to have some bad pixels
Dead pixel: never lights up
Lit pixel: stays on pure white
Stuck pixel: stays on certain color
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Cleaning Monitors
• Anti-static monitor wipes or anti-static
cloths should be used for cleaning the
monitor
– Do not use window cleaners
– Avoid commercial cleaning solutions on
LCD screens
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Beyond A+
• Video setting for EGA/VGA
– Has no meaning today and is ignored
• Init Display First
– Determines which monitor to boot first in a multimonitor system
• Assign IRQ for VGA
– Not needed for low-end cards
– High end: Try it each way
• VGA Palette Snoop
– Not used today
• Video Shadowing Enabled
– Typically ignored but sometimes required to be off
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SLI and Crossfire
• Splitting the processing load between
two or more GPUs
– NVIDIA calls theirs Scalable Link Interface (SLI)
– ATI calls theirs CrossFire
• Two video cards installed and connected
with a bridge card
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TV and PCs
• TV Out connects computer to TV
• Tuner cards
– Allows PC to mimic some
features of Tivo
• HDMI (High Definition
Multimedia Interface)
– Designed to replace
DVI connections
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TV and PCs
• Plasma
– Not suited for PCs
• Odd native resolutions (such as 1366x768)
• Burn-in—tendency for a screen to ghost an image
• DLP
– Digital light processing
• SED, FED
– Combines CRT strengths with LCD strengths
– Surface-conduction electron emitter display
– Field emission display
© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved
© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved