Preface

Author and Copyright

Author: Samuel M. Goldwasser

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DISCLAIMER

Working inside a CRT-based television set, or computer or video monitor can be lethal from line-
connected and high voltage power supplies as well as CRT implosion. Read and follow ALL of the safety
guidelines found in Safety Guidelines for High Voltage and/or Line Powered Equipment and the section:
SAFETY , below. If in doubt about your abilities or experience, leave repair and internal adjustments to a
professional.

We will not be responsible for damage to equipment, your ego, county wide power outages,
spontaneously generated mini (or larger) black holes, planetary disruptions, or personal injury or worse
that may result from the use of this material.

Back to TV Repair FAQ Table of Contents .

Introduction

Television at the crossroads

Television in substantially its present form has been with us for nearly 50 years. It is a tribute to the
National Television Standards Committee (NTSC) that the color television standards agreed upon in the
early 1950s have performed remarkably well making quite efficient use of valuable radio spectrum space
and the psychovisual characteristics of the human eye-brain system. However, HDTV (High Definition TV)
will supplant and ultimately replace the current standards. We will all come to expect its superior
resolution, freedom from noise and ghosting, and pure CD sound. Yet, the perceived quality of TV
broadcasts and cable will never likely be the major issue with most consumers. Content will continue to
be the biggest problem.
As of June 2009, all analog broadcasting in the USA has been discontinued by law, except for some low
power local transmissions. This (so the justification goes) frees up a large amount of electromagnetic
spectrum for other (more lucrative!) applications, since the Digital TV (DTV) channels occupy less
bandwidth. Low cost DTV converter boxes enabled existing TVs to receive the digital signals so there was
no need to buy new digital TVs, though this did make for one darn good excuse to upgrade to a 60" flat
screen HDTV! :)

There is plenty of information available elsewhere with regard to the pros and cons of the DTV
conversion, the trials and tribulations of people using antennas (as opposed to cable or optical fiber),
and the ultimate benefits, real and perceived. Suffice it to say that when digital reception is good, the
picture and sound are very very good and there is essentially no comparison with the analog system it
replaced. This is true even when a converter box is used with an analog TV in good condition and
standard definition digital is better than the best analog. HDTV with multi-channel sound is simply
exquisite.

However, unlike analog TV, poor reception doesn't result in snow or ghosts, but rather the picture (and
sound) totally drops out or (in the case of the video) freezes or pixilates. For over-the-air reception, the
type of antenna and its orientation becomes much more critical. And even in areas close to the
transmitter, local terrain and obstructions in the line-of-sight like hills and buildings may result in
problems.

Television receiver fundamentals

The basic color television receiver must perform the same functions today as 40 years ago. (Since B/W is
a subset of the color standard, most references in this document will be for color except as noted). A
studio video monitor includes all of the functions of a television receiver except the tuner and IF (which
rarely fail except for bad connections or perhaps lightning strikes to the antenna or cable connection).
Therefore most of the repair information in this document is applicable to both TVs and studio monitors.
Modern computer monitors share many similarities with TVs but the multisync and high scan rate
deflection circuitry and more sophisticated power supplies complicates their servicing.

As of this writing, the majority of TVs are still based on the Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) as the display device.
Tiny pocket sets, camcorder viewfinders, and the like have started using LCD (Liquid Crystal Display)
panels but these are still inferior to the CRT for real time video. There has always been talk of 'the picture
on the wall' display and these are now appearing as large screen plasma panel displys but their cost is
still high compared to even projection TVs using CRTs. The reason is simple economics - it is really hard to
beat the simplicity of the shadow mask CRT. Of course, prices will drop as the technology matures.

Projection - large screen - TVs, on the other hand, are able to take advantage of a novel development in
integrated micromachining - the Texas Instruments Inc. Digital Micromirror Device (DMD), now called
DLP for "Digital Light Processing". This is basically an integrated circuit with a tiltable micromirror for
each pixel fabricated on top of a static memory - RAM - cell. This technology would permit nearly any
size projection display to be produced and would therefore be applicable to HDTV. Since it is a reflective
device, the light source can be as bright as needed. This technology is already appearing in commercial
high performance projectors and is competing for use in totally digital movie theaters to replace the film
projector and has begun appearing in high-end consumer projection TV sets - yet.

(From: Kurk MacKay (kurk_mackay@telus.net).)

"DMD TVs have been on the marketplace for about a year now. The DMD is more commonly referred to
as DLP (Digital Light Processing) in the marketplace. From what I've heard Samsung has had a DLP TV on
the consumer marketplace as of last year in the US and this year here in Canada. My boss was looking at
buying one so we went around to view them. The picture quality looks to be between the LCD projection
and Plasma. I believe the current Samsung uses a color wheel but they are working on a three color
independent system.

For more info or if you want to buy one, see DLP TV Showcase."

As noted, the plasma panel flat screen display has been around for several years in high-end TVs,
typically in the 42 inch diagonal range. However, they are very expensive ($5,000 to $15,000 as of
Winter, 2003), and their life expectancy may be limited due to the gradual degradation of the active pixel
cells - which occurs faster than for a CRT. The physical resolution is also still low enough that visible
discrete pixels may be objectionable to some viewers. However, there is little doubt that this or a similar
technology will eventually replace the direct view CRT and 3-tube projection TVs in the mid to large
screen sizes in the not too distant future.

The remainder of this document concentrates on CRT based analog TVs since these still dominate the
market and realistically, these are the only type where there is a good chance of repair without access to
specialized test equipment and parts. I wouldn't recommend any sort of attempt at repair of flat screen
TVs or monitors - no matter what the size - beyond checking for bad connections, dead power supplies,
or other obvious problems. The chance of success is vanishingly small and it's very likely that even with
great care, damage could occur to the panels or circuitry.