My 15" CTL 5Tx flatscreen monitor has fits of fuzziness. I've tried to remove it from any power sources (speakers, telephone, etc) but to no avail. There is always some degree of fuzziness, but sometimes it is much worse than others. What I have been able to research on the web that flatscreen failure symptoms are usually absence/loss of pixels. This does not seem to be the case. Bottom line: could this mean it is time to replace my monitor or could there be another cause?

Could you describe the "fuzziness" in a little more detail? That may help determine the cause.

I realize it was not very specific. The screen I am using to post this reply. Stare at the dark blue borders and the color blue is, for lack of a better description, appears to be moving. As if each pixel, mostly noticeable on the edges, in the vertical lines is jumping. The black arrow (cursor)--look closely and there are electronic dots "dancing" along the left edge of the head of the arrow. At its worse, when playing solitaire the cards can become almost unreadable. I believe I have ruled out electrical/magnet interference; its location was not changed before it started. Maybe the monitor is on its way out (5-6 years old)?

5 years on a monitor thats good My old monitor (Belinea) dated from 97 and has gone through everything from Win 3.1 to XP Picture is still at default settings
Reason for changing? The Power button broke (inaccessible to fix )
Back to yours the fuzzy display could be down to the Tube being overdue for degaussing
Most monitors do it automatically on startup the Big click/boom sound you hear
Not hearing these noises?
Have you a button on the monitor that says OSD or On screen display? Hundreds of possibilities
May even say Degauss or Demagnetise or a picture of a magnet?
If you can locate any of these select it and the screen will blank a big click and boom sound is heard and the picture returns (not broke anything)
Has it improved? May have to repeat 2 or 3 times if the display is really fizzy
PS The Manual degauss button is sometimes fitted either on the back of the Monitor or internally (on a very old monitor) if this is the case then a TV repairman is better able to carry out the job

No tube. This is a flatscreen. No degauss button(which is what it looks like it needs). It is my first flatscreen/LCD so I don't know what the usual life expectancy is.

Chief
I have Just switched to a brand New Flat screen monitor and this is the first posting I'm making using it So you and I are both trying to find out what is what
Like you said there is no Degauss I have none either
Have an Auto setup button which centers the screen and colors when pressed
Only thing that looks of any use on the set up on this monitor is to look around the OSD controls for anythin that says something like Default setting,Default,Reset display ect. ect.
The Auto button just shuffle things around
but the reset mode retuns it to the factory settings
I'll make some enquiries on this and see if there is a degauss method possible? (post back if there is)
Ps Nobodies welcomed you to Answerpool yet
As is our custom

Thanks for your words of welcome and thanks for looking into this for me. I have tried the reset (recall button on my CTL monitor), but to no avail).

The problem may be with your Display Adapter driver file. Perhaps unintalling, then reinstalling it may help. I don't know what your Operating System is, but hopefully one of these pages may help.

Video cards
Try these two links:

Flat Panel

Graphics cards

If you like, you can make another post detailing your Operating System, and the make/model of your computer. If you need help with gathering any of this information, Computer Help

One hardware tool that I find very helpful (and brought to my attention by bedstor) is PC Wizard 2006 available by clicking here.

Dwight

And let me join Mike with a welcome to AP!

Hi Chief
Here is the reply I got from my query

quote:

...It's also worth knowing that some flat-panel monitors may have a few extra features of their own. You may have the ability to switch between an analogue video signal or higher-quality digital video signal. Your choice here will depend on the type of graphics card your computer has, so check the card's manual for further information.

You may also find that flat-panel monitors are supplied with special software that provides additional features, such as colour calibration options that will come in handy for digital photography. As always, it's important to check the manual provided with your monitor so that you don't miss any useful features.

What it says is you have to go into the display settings and do some fine tuning.
Dwights advice that you update your display driver is Good as it will unscramble any wild settings and will try to clear up the display

Do play around with the picture settings making a note of the number where you started

The sharpness setting can be the best place to start
Contrast setting should Never be more than 2/3rds of the way across
Fully up shortens the tube life Applies also to TVs Something I check for when buying a 2nd hand TV NOTE : A high color temperature above 6000K?(but dull screen) is Also indicative of short tube life (advanced users only) Ok to run at higher settings for short periods Remenbering to return to the previous setting when you have done that task

Perhaps my computer illiteracy has solved the problem of the fuzzy monitor. After 4 days of trying to update the driver for my Radeon 7000 64MB AGP Video Card, I finally got the right information about where to find it on the ATI Inc website. Following their instructions to delete the older driver, then click on the newly-downloaded updated driver to it would install itself I got an error message. The new driver would not install. So I said the heck with it, put the disk of the original driver in the CPU, installed the original driver, and the monitor has been fine since (2 days now).

But I do want to thank everyone who has offered advice. It is nice to know there is a place to turn for answers.

Thank you for telling us what you did It will help others with a similar issue (in the future)
I agree with what you say some drivers are fussy to install Have to do several things beforehand (in a set order) before the computer accepts it... USB (plug and play) devices have took most of this work out of people hands
Driver updates are made without the user noticing click on the message ...wizard runs ..job finished
But the Windows XP Operating system still requires some of the updates to be made in the old Longhand method searching for the correct driver ,configuring,deleting...