[TTVV33CC]

I've got a question I'm hoping you guys might be able to help provide me with some insight into. I've was recently given a used TV and it's pretty decent but I've noticed a problem I haven't seen before.


I only use the TV for games and playing DVDs.

While playing certain DVDs certain scenes consistently cause the part of the screen to blur (and sometimes flicker).


When it happens it's not always affecting the same area of the screen; that is, although the same scenes do affect the same areas of the screen, different scenes will cause the blur effect in different areas.


I've only got a few DVDs that cause this effect at all. There doesn't seem to be anything special about them, or the scenes which trigger the blurring (although they generally seem to be brighter / outdoor scenes - I'm not sure the blur would stand out as much if it happened during a darker scene).


the first time I saw this I thought it might be a problem with the DVD or the signal from the DVD player to the TV, but when the blur happens to the lower left hand side of the screen I can pause during those frames and bring up the TVs on-screen display menu and the menu options (brightness, contrast etc) are also blurry.


If I continue to play the DVD until the blur inducing part of the scene is over I can pause the show and pull up the OSD menu and everything is clear again. When the blurring occurs on other parts of the screen (top, right side etc) the OSD menu does not blur at all.


Except for this problem (which doesn't come up all the time) the set is fine - although it still needs to be degaussed (there's one persistent blob of colour near one of the corners). I have a feeling that degaussing is unlikely to correct the blur/flicker problem.


Any idea what the cause might be? Is the TV on it's last legs? Is this something that can be fixed?

 

[raouliii]

Does the blurring occur consistently with the same scenes or is it random? What type of tv is it and how is your dvd player connected?

 

[TTVV33CC]

The TV is a Philips Magnavox (model TS2746C I believe). I'm not sure how old it is or what might have been done to it before it got to me.


The DVD player is actually one of the recent slim PS2s (It's used mostly for games). It's connected to the TV's AV1 using the composite cable that came with it. That's the only thing still connected to the TV. Everything else was disconnected when I first noticed the problem.


The blurring isn't random - it's defiantly tied to particular scenes.

If I'm watching a movie and one scene during the first 10 minutes causes the blurring, then after the movie is over I can go back and rewatch the first 10 minutes again and once I get that to that same scene the problem will show up.


Last night, I pulled out a couple of DVDs where the blurring was very noticeable and distracting to try watching them again. The blurring was much less noticeable!


Many of the same scenes that caused problems before didn't show blurring at all this time, but instead at the very start of those scenes, and for just a split second the screen would distort and/or blur and then snap back into place and clarity.


It only ever takes a fraction of second but for some scenes it was more obvious than others. Two scenes which previously had some of the worst blurring also had the most obvious distortion last night. At the start of one scene the bottom third of the image expanded, At the start of another the whole image was pulled to the left. In both cases the image just snaps back into place and the rest of the scene plays out with the blur or other signs of trouble. I replayed those two scenes several times and the result was always the same.


I didn't see that happen anywhere else but at the very start of scenes that had caused the blurring before, as if there's still something my TV doesn't like about those scenes but this time it was able to recover from it more gracefully. Other scenes that caused blurring before still caused the blur last night but it wasn't as bad.


I turned off the TV and then this morning tried one of the disks again and I got the same results I saw last night. Much improved over the first time I tried watching those movies, but no less strange.

 

[raouliii]

Were the blurred scenes relatively bright? Since this seems to consistent, I would guess that the content of those scenes may be pushing the power supply in the tv to the extreme. If its an old set that has been driven hard through its life, the power supply may just be coming to its inevitable end. You might try experimenting with turning the white level (contrast) down to see its impact on your problem.

 

[Th3_uN1Qu3]

I'd turn down the contrast instead of the brightness. Apart from delving inside with a multimeter and a soldering iron there's not much else to do.

 

[TTVV33CC]

Thanks for the suggestions!

I had a feeling this wouldn't end up being a problem with an easy fix.

I'll give contrast changes a try and see if anything improves.


Right now it's a pretty rare occurrence. I have maybe 5 DVDs which cause the problem out of many and even then only a couple of those disks had the problem for longer than a few minutes.


If this TV has a failing power supply any idea if I could expect to see a gradual increase in the number of times this happens or is it more likely to just blow out and die suddenly?

 

[Th3_uN1Qu3]



Quote:
Originally Posted by TTVV33CC /forum/post/18262794


If this TV has a failing power supply any idea if I could expect to see a gradual increase in the number of times this happens or is it more likely to just blow out and die suddenly?

The first more likely. It's most likely dried capacitors in the power supply, and those just degrade over time. They will take out a transistor at some point or another, but i don't see it happening too soon.

 

[ADU]

2 questions (if the OP is still around). Is this an HD TV, or is it just a standard def TV? And do you have a standalone/dedicated DVD player you can try, to see if it produces the same effects as the PS2?