Plasthmatic Victory

[Gannon]

My father and his bride got a great deal on a 42-inch RCA-branded plasma flatscreen a few years back...I was surprised to see it appear around Christmastime.

It barely made it past the second year...and as a lifer in the Home Entertainment Electronics industry, that really pissed me off. I am against the whole land-filling trend of throwing broken product away, so I went on a search to see if it could be resurrected.

Discovered...after pulling off the back panel...that theirs is actually a re-badged Samsung set. That is not uncommon, I've seen other brand-name circuit boards and more marketed under another since I began in the business. Usually, at least in the past ten years, you cannot go wrong with Samsung.

I found a forum called BadCaps, which every tech-wannabee should know. It brought to my attention an epidemic which has caused unlikely failures with inexpensive hifi and computers for the last ten years...bad capacitors, reportedly usually from a few known sources in Taiwan. I suspect a bit of propaganda or bias, but will reserve comment until I see the proof. Their forum is filled with threads of other's problems with televisions, hifi, computers, and appliances...the chances of your product already having a fix description listed is pretty good.

Through them, I met the fine fellows at ShopJimmy...a Minnesota-based television parts clearinghouse. They have created a series of instructional videos specific to various flatscreen technology, and have on-call technical support. I do so wish they'd co-ordinate the instructions better with the board-purchasing portion of their site, but after buying five circuit boards for less than it would cost to have a professional out...then swapping 'em until we saw light on the panel...my dad has his flatscreen back for Easter.

So, if you have a flatscreen that fails...don't just toss it. There might be a reasonable way to bring it back to life...as long as the screen isn't physically damaged.


Cheers