This Broke One Week out of Warranty... Can I Fix it for Cheap?

[Plouffe]

Plouffe's old Asus VG27AQ monitor broke after three years of service, just out of warranty. We're not sure WHY it's power cycling, but a new mainboard is inexpensive enough and we're comfortable tinkering with electronics... what's the worst that could happen?

 

Buy an ASUS TUF 27" VG27AQ Monitor: https://geni.us/aJxRCB8

Purchases made through some store links may provide some compensation to Linus Media Group.

 

 

[swimtome]

Most warranties you have a 7 or 14 or 30 days to contact them, and you list the day it died as the day within the warranty range.  (Obviously check the T & C).

 

@Plouffe I love these more off-the-cuff videos (and thanks for shouting PicClick) but jeez, second half... WHAT DID YOU CHANGE?!?!?!

[Thaldor]

Just to say VG27AQ has external power supply brick and that flickering tells pretty well that the power brick has exited it's contract. The separate board is probably for the backlight.

To educate people: Most of the time when your monitor has barrel plug (that small circular plug) it has external power supply and you can usually see this as some kind of box either halfway of the power cord or as the wall adapter. If your monitor has internal power supply, it most likely has the usual C7 (the small two contact standard plug you find everywhere) or C13 ("the PC power plug", the bulky 3 contact square) power cord.
Usually you should get a monitor with external power supply because most of the time, that is the one part that breaks just over time and it is quite simple to replace without opening anything. Even if you have older monitor and cannot find direct spare PSU for it, no worry, take your time and check the voltage and amperage of the PSU the monitor has and you most likely can get by with some external PSU that gives out EXACTLY the same voltage and the same or higher amperage. If you go with "something around there" PSU you may need to get the barrel plug changed and this is the PSA part: DO NOT do that yourself, take it to some electronics repair store or similar and get professional make that change (unless you are 110% sure you KNOW what you're doing).

[Needfuldoer]

At work we have over a hundred Dell 24" monitors deployed. After about 3 years of running 24/7, some of them started developing an issue where the backlight flashes in about a 1hz cycle. At first we got them replaced under warranty, but after a couple months we got cut off. (Probably as identical stock dried up.) It looked like we would have to eventually buy all new monitors to replace these.

 

On a hunch, I tore one apart one day. There's a power filtering capacitor on the power supply board, that's installed right next to some of the power rectifier circuitry that gets hot. They only used a regular 85c cap, and it was puffy. I replaced it with another one, and that fixed the monitor. 

 

Then I took apart another monitor with the same symptoms. Same failure, same cure.

 

I ordered a bunch of 125c caps, and we started fixing all the flashing monitors. So far we've done about 30 of them, with a 100% success rate. I'll take $0.50 for a new capacitor over $140 for a new monitor any day.

[sub68]

3 hours ago, swimtome said:

(Obviously check the T & C).

I know lenovo does to the day no qustions.

45 minutes ago, Needfuldoer said:

On a hunch, I tore one apart one day. There's a power filtering capacitor on the power supply board, that's installed right next to some of the power rectifier circuitry that gets hot. They only used a regular 85c cap, and it was puffy. I replaced it with another one, and that fixed the monitor. 

Yeah that would be the problem.

My bet is coivd messed up supply chain stuff so they go hey we only have 85c caps.

 

[mdk777]

1 hour ago, Needfuldoer said:

At work we have over a hundred Dell 24" monitors deployed. After about 3 years of running 24/7, some of them started developing an issue where the backlight flashes in about a 1hz cycle. At first we got them replaced under warranty, but after a couple months we got cut off. (Probably as identical stock dried up.) It looked like we would have to eventually buy all new monitors to replace these.

 

On a hunch, I tore one apart one day. There's a power filtering capacitor on the power supply board, that's installed right next to some of the power rectifier circuitry that gets hot. They only used a regular 85c cap, and it was puffy. I replaced it with another one, and that fixed the monitor. 

 

Then I took apart another monitor with the same symptoms. Same failure, same cure.

 

I ordered a bunch of 125c caps, and we started fixing all the flashing monitors. So far we've done about 30 of them, with a 100% success rate. I'll take $0.50 for a new capacitor over $140 for a new monitor any day.

This has been been experience many times over the years. 

The amount of electronic waste I have generated over my lifetime because of things that should be fixed...that failed at one insignificant but crucial point...it could fill a small landfill.

 

Heck I should have junked my current car three times over. (every time the repair bill comes back higher the total value of the car I cringe.) I SHOULD ignore the sunk cost and move on...but I can't.

Its not that I don't understand depreciation and replacement costs...I just have an emotional problem with it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Gokul_P]

6 hours ago, Needfuldoer said:

At work we have over a hundred Dell 24" monitors deployed. After about 3 years of running 24/7, some of them started developing an issue where the backlight flashes in about a 1hz cycle. At first we got them replaced under warranty, but after a couple months we got cut off. (Probably as identical stock dried up.) It looked like we would have to eventually buy all new monitors to replace these..

I changed the backlight cable and it fixed the issue on my SE19HX but after a while the panel is slowly coming out from the backlight and there is a large opening now. (I prob pushed the panel while trying to open it). Using the image retention prevention thing in the OSD will sometime fix the issue temporarily also. Like you said caps are also prob the most common failure but in my case wire seems to be burnt slightly so i just replaced it. 

[Gokul_P]

The tape is prob Not structural you are holding down the monitor with the Vesa mount it is efficient engineering at its peak (aka cost cutting).  And like everyone else said You should considered changing the power brick first. and likely the board revisions from the new board is incompatible with the older backlit controller and Vise versa you should always get the same revision bcz pc companies like to change stuff drastically making them not compatible with each other. 

[Plotter]

12 hours ago, Thaldor said:

Just to say VG27AQ has external power supply brick and that flickering tells pretty well that the power brick has exited it's contract. The separate board is probably for the backlight.

100% agree as I had the same issue on another Asus monitor and fixed it by changing the power brick only

I hope it was more common knowledge as I almost change the whole thing (asus support did not help) and I'm a bit sad it was not addressed in the video

[Thaldor]

3 hours ago, Plotter said:

I'm a bit sad it was not addressed in the video

It's just normal LTT "half winging it" as it often is with these repair videos. They either assume some part is so clear and known that mentioning it is stupid, it just slips from them or they are really winging it and don't actually know what they are doing.

 

At least this time it wasn't anything too dangerous, as it still is with the battery repair video where they fail to tell "tiny little detail" that 18650 is just a battery size and you should always look at the actual cell to figure out the amperage of the battery so you don't stick too low rated battery into something that will try to take a lot more juice from the battery and you get a battery that is going thermonuclear. Especially knowing that someone who knows even less will try to fix their stuff by "just getting 18650 cells" and buys Trustfire or other explosive graded garbage cells that can blow up even within their specifications because someone decided to lie on those too to get few extra sales.

[nhand42]

On 6/6/2023 at 7:33 AM, sub68 said:

My bet is coivd messed up supply chain stuff so they go hey we only have 85c caps.

My bet is they figured out putting an 85c cap next to a source of heat would cause it to fail exactly outside the warranty period, and then they all high-fived each other and did it on purpose.

[sub68]

6 hours ago, nhand42 said:

My bet is they figured out putting an 85c cap next to a source of heat would cause it to fail exactly outside the warranty period, and then they all high-fived each other and did it on purpose.

Doubt, if it's there enterprise line that would make the consumer pretty angry and turn away from dell.

[Kilroy747]

Just had 2 out of 3 power bricks of my triple VG27AQ setup die on me. Each died almost exactly 1 month after the 3 year warranty ran out (Asus engineers are getting really good at timing these post warranty deaths).

 

Symptoms:

Monitors just shut off suddenly. Attempting to boot the monitor up, it would get into the Asus splash screen for a few frames before shutting off and trying to boot again repeatedly. Swapped power bricks with the only one that wasn't broken, and the monitors themselves worked just fine.

 

Solution:

Found an OEM replacement on amazon for about $30/unit. Working so far.

Cant speak to the longevity of these replacements, but its better than buying a whole new monitor.
Wont be buying an Asus monitor ever again.