Aerothorn on 11/6/2008 at 02:17
So I came home for the summer and fired up my old computer (from maybe around 2002 or 2003) and it works fine, except the text is all blurry. Messing with cleartype doesn't do anything to fix it, nor does messing with the resolution. Is there some weird setting somewhere, or is the CRT just dieing? The smaller the text, the more blurred it is.
doctorfrog on 11/6/2008 at 04:28
This happened to me... twice.
Once, with my first monitor, a very nice 15" NEC, gorgeous color.
Tossed it for what I thought would be a worthy replacement, a 20" Viewsonic. It lasted a year. Text became unreadable at resolutions higher that 1024x768, and this is after being used to 1280x1024.
Never again. In spite of the lack of true black, I've been happily using a moderately priced Samsung 19" flat panel for years now with no issues at 1600x1200. But oh, do I miss that true black sometimes.
I think your monitor's just getting old, though it is possible that some degaussing might put things back to rights. Failing that, try lowering the resolution, or lowering the refresh rate to 60hz (which comes with its own eyestrain issues). Test readability with (
http://majorgeeks.com/download.php?det=960) ntest.
Rogue Keeper on 11/6/2008 at 12:14
Yes, try various combos of refresh rate and resolution. I have similar problem on my 9 years old CRT (decent longevity for mere 'folk brand' Relisys, I refuse to buy LCD until this one definitely gives up), but only with text on the edge of the screen. I'm afraid degauss won't help much in the autumn of CRT's life cycle.
bikerdude on 11/6/2008 at 15:03
can you post a photo of said problem..?
biker
Aerothorn on 11/6/2008 at 20:47
Photo probably wouldn't have enough detail to give a good idea of it.
The good thing is that tons of quality CRTs are being give away on Freecycle by those who have upgraded - a high-quality 21' one was listed back in January, for instance, and there's a new one listed every day. So I'll probably just replace it.
baeuchlein on 14/6/2008 at 18:33
If it's really the hardware's fault, then the problem should already be visible in the BIOS setup screens. When these are displayed, no software drivers and no operating systems are used, and if you still see blurry text then, it could be the graphics card or something with your monitor. You can as well look at any horizontal or vertical line which might be displayed in the setup screens, and check whether these look blurry or not. All hardware faults I can think of should create blurry text and blurry graphics at the same time. These faults are not limited to onscreen text.
Attaching another monitor to this computer (and maybe attaching the old monitor to another computer) should show you whether it's the graphics card or the monitor that does not work well here. If the monitor is responsible for the blurry display, then there are some things you can still do to get the monitor up and running again. Controls for focus (=sharpness/crispness of picture) and sometimes for convergence can be found on or in many monitors, and these could have an effect on the blurry image you see now.
If your text looks blurred and has a colored outline, then your monitor lacks convergence: Its three electron beams (red, green, blue) don't hit the same place on screen, thus creating colored edges and creating an apparently blurry picture. These colorized edges can most easily be seen with light gray or white text on a black background.
If, however, the picture is not crisp anymore but you can't see much color distortion at the edges of text characters or lines on screen, then it might be a focus problem. Unfortunately, many old monitors have only one control knob for this problem, and this "focus" knob is located inside your monitor's case. It's dangerous to work in there, but if you know what you're doing, it should not pose more danger than driving a car on the road. I have survived working inside monitors for many years, so it can be done. As far as I remember, I recommended Aja to do something similar in his/her monitor one or two years ago, and Aja didn't die from it either...
Aerothorn on 17/6/2008 at 18:10
Great advice. Currently not using that computer, but next time I do I'll be certain to do that. Thanks!
