• PhilipTheBucket@ponder.cat
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    1 month ago

    In college, a friend of mine had a TV whose picture would mess up every so often, and the solution was to take it in the hallway and drag up and then back down the hall by the power cord. Then, when set up again, it would work again.

    There was never an explanation, that I know of, for why. Presumably there was some simpler method that would have achieved the same result but no one was interested in that.

    • tyler@programming.dev
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      1 month ago

      CRT? You were probably generating enough static electricity to do the electron realignment thing that they usually have a button to do.

      • PhilipTheBucket@ponder.cat
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        1 month ago

        CRT, yes. I really hope that static electricity was the explanation honestly. I sort of always assumed that it was just tilting it forward jiggled something around back into place, something stupid like that, but they swore that was the only thing that worked. It would please me greatly to think that they were right and the dragging across carpet was actually a vital component that they had figured out.

    • seathru@lemmy.sdf.org
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      1 month ago

      Also in college, I had a “gaming” CRT that I refused to let die. Towards the end of it’s life, it wouldn’t turn on if the temperature got too low. But would work fine if I “preheated” it in the oven. Once it was on it would stay on.

      It rocked on nearly a year like that until I decided to smoke a bowl while it warmed up and came back to monitor shaped blob.