It appears my 20 inch four plus year old flat screen LG monitor is acting up. It is connected to a video card using the digital connection. It has been that way for four plus years. The monitor when running shows no ill effects. Three days ago it abruptly started or did not start.

When starting pc after shut down the monitor will not light up. Black screen, no mouse nothing.

I have been checking every possibility since Friday. The monitor has been using Windows 7 plug and play drivers. I have no LG drivers and LG does not have drivers on their web site for this model.

Today I discover hooking up an older than spit Dell monitor using the DVI cable it fires up instantly from start up using those very same win7 plug and play drivers. I do have the Dell drivers not installed. The point was to determine if win7 dropped a driver. That answered that question.

Taking the Dell DVI cable connecting it to the LG same result LG will not light up when I restart from shut down.

I discovered if I connect the LG with analog cable the thing starts up and runs fine.

Am I right in thinking the issue is with the monitor's DVI connector, not the cable? The cable works with the Dell and it is the same DVI connector on the video card. It sounds like the monitor.

Am I right in thinking even though the monitor works with analog cable to analog connector we are on borrowed time?

Once it is running it shows no signs of difficulties.

Any ideas?

It sounds like you've assessed the situation properly. Is it only when starting up that the monitor has problems? If you use the monitor with the analog connection for a few days, does it ever not start? or is it dependable?

There are several things that could be wrong but unless you have not mentioned doing something recently to the DVI cable, there is no reason why the DVI cable or connector would go bad. That leaves the LG monitor itself.

You need to indicate whether the LG starts faster if on for 5 or more minutes and then turned off and back on, than from a completely cold start. That seems likely from your description.

If that is the case, I'd bet some electrolytic capacitors in the LG have gone bad. Do a Google search on bad caps in monitors and you will get many hits including methods for repair. It seems some suppliers stole capacitor formulas, screwed up production, and sold many bad caps to electronic equipment suppliers. The caps either don't work or go bad with usage. They will swell and may start to leak.

I had exactly this happen to my Samsung monitor and repaired it by replacing two swollen electrolytics. You will need to decide if you are good enough at tinkering to make the repair or at least check for bad caps.

Jenny

I have only been running this with analog for a few hours. I did one full shut down and restart an hour later and it started right up. I will try this set up for a couple days to see what happens.

Robert it is always after a cold start with digital connector. Both digital cables worked with the Dell.

Once it is running either in DVI or analog. You would think there is nothing wrong. No flickers, no loss of brightness, no narrowing at the edges. Nothing at all.

I'm pretty certain it is the monitor and your explanation sounds like what I have.

Three days of trying everything and I finally think I found it. I hate running out and buying new stuff and pick the wrong thing.

Thanks for your ideas.