Gaah! My monitor's all foggy! It's all that wall-socket's fault >:(

[JediSonic]

Yesterday my dad painted the room the computer is in, so he had to unplug everthing. So this morning, I plugged in the cable, and my monitor made a really loud "sckkreeeech" noise. And it wasn't even on! I had to do this twice, since the first time I pulled it back out, not wanting to damage anything. So guess what? Now all the colors on my monitor are messed up! It's as though there's a layer of gray fog between me and windows! I can probably fix the problem with the video card software, but I can't seem to find the setting that feels natural

Or maybe my brain is just ticked off at the new "haystack" paint my dad drenched this once-white room in?

[JediSonic]

Oh great, now my eyes are starting to adjust :rolls eyes:

[Technomancer]

Ugh. You probably shouldn't have plugged it in the second time, although the damage was already done. You'll have to take it into the shop or replace it.

[JediSonic]

Hehe, the first time I was startled and I thought the sound came from the printer...

Yeah I just came back to my computer and it is definitely messed up.

[Retten]

ooooh fog sounds bad like something burnt and created some smoke thats what happends to light bulbs if you have ever seen one burn out it pops then smoke rises from the burnt part and fills the bulb thats why they sometime have those black scorch marks so Technomancer has the right idea take it into the shop good luck fixing it

[JediSonic]

This happened before at some point, I think... my monitor has always been pretty dark and messed up, but I was able to more-or-less fix the problem by adjusting my graphics card configuration.

When I set it back to default config NOW, though, it looks about 3 times as bad as it used to be! For some reason, I guess the lights get surged and burned whenever we plug in our monitor? It says "HP pavilion" and "M50" at the top.

[Technomancer]

You can correct for to defects to a point. However, the electrical problem is still there and will probably get worse (especially if the current defect that you have is causing excessive heating anywhere). It's very possible that the monitor may become irretriveably damaged, or that it may present a fire or shock hazard (there are *extremely* high voltages in those things). That's why I recommend you have it looked at.

[Mithrandir]

This is why you shouldn't clean your monitor with your hankerchief during flu season. Oh sorry...

Is it under warrenty? That's always the first question to ask during hardware problems. To a point, I'm with TM. Dude, repair or replace. That thing could overheat and do some serious damage. Monitors are coming down in price these days. Unless it's a 21" or something, you can most likely replace it cheeper than you can repair it. (And you usually get a better warrenty).

For a cause, I'd be tempted to say something got into the monitor, not the outlet. But don't open it up and look. If you cross the leads of that main capacitor... *shudder* Let's just say you won't be posting on the board anymore, if you get me drift.

[JediSonic]

Well it may be worth mentioning that my dad seems to have gotten paint on the outlet and the end of the cord. I didn't mention that up to this point because I thought that, if anything, paint would keep the electricity from getting there at all.

Hmm, now is not a good time to buy a new monitor -- I'm still trying to convince my dad to help buy a scanner, and I seriously doubt this is going to put him in a good mood for buying new hardware

[Technomancer]

No, it's definately not the outlet. If there was a short there, you'd know about it pretty fast. Anyways, a surge at that point would have tripped a breaker.

[Heaven's Cloud]

Actually my moniter as pretty much the same problem except there is no fog.

My computer's colour is really dark. I know this because I can barely see the pic in Shatterhearts sig, and I can see it perfectly at my grandma's computer. There are also dark lines across the computer from boxes/pictures/writing, and it really bugs me.

Now I have done everything I can, turned the little wheel on my computer and select brightness, but it was all the way up. I have gone to the settings and all that stuff and done the colour check thing, but for some reason it's all dark and like I said before it really bugs me. I would love for anyone to tell me how to fix it, and if we have to go to the repair shop, I do not know if that will be any time soon, and I know I am not replacing it, I couldn't trade this thing for anything, even if it was another crappy computer.

Since this is a thread on the topic of that, I said to myself that I shouldn't create a new thread since we are on the same topic basically. Just to fill you in on one thing, this problem that I have has been here for quite awhile, maybe a year or so.

[madphilb]

I can't remember exactly what the problem was, but I had a VGA monitor that was really dark (and continued to get worse).... it was an expensive fix (more than the cost of a new monitor)

I was going to ask (till you posted about it) if the outlets where taped over and all the plugs pulled and everything covered. I'm pretty sure it is possible to pop the breaker this way, in theory anyway, though the amount of wet paint that would have to get in to do that would be a mess.

It sounds like the problem is an existing thing that's just getting worse (I think it's a timing issue more than anything to do with the painting, though if the monitor itself wasn't covered then it's possible that paint could have gotten inside the monitor itself).

In the end you're going to have to replace the monitor itself, repairs are just too expensive to justify it (usually as much if not way more than a new one).

Locally we have a company or two that sell refurbished monitors for a decent price. I got a 17" Trinitron tube (sold as a Gateway monitor) for about half what a new one would have cost (little more than the cheapest junk monitor at Walmart/Office Depot.

PHIL

[JediSonic]

Well heaven's cloud, here's what I had to do to get mine looking better the first time (win98):

Click the start menu. Go to "settings". Click on "control panel". In that folder, click on "display". In the window that appears, click on Settings. You will see a button saying "advanced". Click on it.

After that, I'm not sure what you'll get. I have a nVIDIA GeForce2 card, so what I have to do from there is click "nView" and then "Device Connections>>", and click "Color Correction". If you have a different card, you'll have to find the thing yourself

I can't say for a fact that there is actually smoke in my monitor btw, I just meant it the damage gives a foggy appearance.

[Heaven's Cloud]

Uhh, a window popped up and I clicked okay, but nothing really happened.