Debate: Is it better to recap an old CRT monitor yourself or pay a pro to do it?

I recapped a 1998 Sony Trinitron myself and it works perfectly now, but my buddy spent $150 on a pro job for his Dell and got a 2-year warranty, so which side actually wins out in the long run for these things?

2 comments

2 Comments

riverp371mo ago

A buddy let the magic smoke out of his monitor doing it himself.

the_mason1mo ago

Wait, did he actually see smoke or was it more of a burning smell? I've fixed a few monitors over the years and honestly, that smell usually comes from capacitors blowing, not actual smoke you can see. The whole "magic smoke" thing is a joke about components letting the smoke out and then dying, but in reality it's usually just a pop and then the screen goes dark. If it was a modern LED monitor, probably a bad power supply board rather than anything he did wrong with the disassembly.