Yesterday afternoon, I shut down as it appeared there might be another of our summer thunderboomers coming through. After taking care of a few odd errands and chores, I decided to fire back up as we seemed to have escaped the boomer which has become all but a daily occurrence here lately. Plug in, click power switch. Black screen. Usually annoying Windows theme song came and went. Still black screen. Check power switch for monitor. Light is green all systems are go, but I still have, you got it ...black screen.
Cables are checked, dust critters cleared way. Reboot. Try disconnecting monitor from computer to attempt to get the diagnostic box that tells me it is not connected. Black screen. Arrrrrggghhh. My pretty, just under two year old flat panel is doornail dead.
With my ancient lappie [lovingly called the *Runt*] fired up, I did some [slow!] window shopping. I had already spotted an NEC sitting in a row of flat panels at one of the local office superstores recently that had a show stopping display. Walked all over everything around it. Checked some reviews and prices. Owners were raving about pretty much everything except the fact that the display option buttons are a bit hard to see at the bottom of the monitor. Narrowed myself down to two choices, NEC MultiSync 1760V or 1765V. I'd have loved to spring for a 19", but not this week.
Headed to my favorite local computer shop [one of the fabulous Computer Renaissance franchises, which just happens to be closeby] this morning for a quick check to make sure I wasn't losing my mind and the monitor was really working, but I had bumped some setting. Nope, still dead. Tower got a quick check, all seemed well there.
They don't seem to believe any sort of power spike caused my issue, but there may have been something happening and I just hit my last shutdown/restart. Good news is that it's still under the 3 year limited warranty with AOC and from what I was told, they are really good about honoring those. Bad news, expect it to take a month or a wee bit less to either have a new or repaired monitor or word that the issue was non-warranty related.
And more good news. There was ONE bright, shiny new NEC 1760V sitting on display with a price I already knew was comparable to the one at BestBuy. Warranty possibilities or not, I had to have it. No way I was waiting around for a month on the dear old Runt, and not much sense in spending even a little on a used, throw away CRT to get by until I received word.
So I may end up with two nice flat panels and a good excuse for an extra tower, or a dual monitor setup. We shall see. Wallet may be a bit lighter, but I have a big grin. And a poppingly bright new monitor with which to catch up on some blog reading I have been meaning to do.
TaTa for now,
Farron and Indifferent _^..^_
Posted by farron at July 7, 2004 11:49 PM