lcd monitor damaged by static shock?

last night when i unpacked my 20" dell 2005 fpw, i picked it up and felt a static shock jump from my finger to one of the usb ports on the side. i am on vacation right now and the humidity where i am is pretty high. later when i tried to use the monitor, the color was off and the image would cut out every few seconds. today it has for the most part stopped flickering, but it has a "ghost" on the screen. it seems like one layer or something has shifted a few millimeters to the right so everything has a shadow sort of. also the color is pretty green but i think it just needs fine tuning. im not at home right now so i don't have other cables and monitors to test this computer with. has anyone experienced anything like this before/know anything about it?

 

ESD (Electro-Static Discharge) will easily kill an electronic chip/board. It takes 30 volts of static to kill a board, but it takes 3,000 volts of static before a person even begins to feel it.

It is good practice to allow an electronic device to reach room temperature before unpacking it. Was the device at room temperature? I thought I read somewhere that higher humidity actually reduces ESD.

You should try turning all the adjustments to the stock/factory settings. Then check the VGA/DVI cable is tight and move it around to see if the screen image changes. Also test if the USB ports still work.

If there is any sign the LCD is ESDed, send it back for replacement. You can ESD a device and it will work fine for a month, then suddenly die. Don't wait too long or you will have a hassle trying to get it replaced.

 

check the cable for crimps as the red or blue gun (RGB) circuit may be bad. See if the green colour goes away as you wiggle the cable from one end to the other.

 

i have reset the monitor to its factory settings several times, my vga cable is good. the monitor has several different imputs, the only other one i have been able to test was the AV imput, with a dvd player, and the color was fine and no shadows. my thinkpad doesnt have a DVI output, so i cant test that imput; i feel like only the VGA imput was damaged or somthing and maybe i will be able to just use the dvi imput. i tried contacting dell, but since i bought the display on ebay they wont even talk to me.

 

Dells aren't that bad. They get a bad rap mostly from the HORRIBLE customer service. Some people buy them because they never need customer service anyway. Big mistake. The hardware knows this. It knows everything about you, and it will make its move when you least expect it.

The worst part is, they know when you try to show someone, and won't act up at all when someone else is looking. They try to make people think you're a madman. That and they wait 'till you own them to act up. They act their best on the shelf, then when you get it home *BAM*

Love 'em or hate 'em, there's no denying they're evil little monsters.

 

Was this item NIB (New In Box), Refurbished, or Used?

Does this monitor have a Warranty (whether it be from Dell or the Ebay seller)?

Does the seller have a RMA plan?

Shipping insurance?

In any event, you had better take action very fast. Some RMA plans only give you 10 days to take action.

 

it was a refurb from ebay, i got it about 6 months ago. im planning on waiting till i go home to do some more testing... if worse comes to worse i might list it on ebay as broken and see if i can get $100 for it and cut my losses at 56 dollars and buy another. my house was also struck badly by lightning a few days ago, so my dad suggested making a claim on the homeowners insurance that it was damaged then...

 

now that i have all my stuff around, it was just the cable i was using that was bad. glad it survived the shock, still works like a charm.

 

Great news. I'm glad it was only the cable.

 

Well, this thread has taught me a lot of things. I should watch out for static then.