Comments on: Hacking Monitor to Fix Too Bright Screen Issues

By: Debroah Kagawa

Debroah Kagawa — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 04:56:31 +0000

this article is very usefull..

By: James Newton

James Newton — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 01:31:44 +0000

Hi, I’d like to get some feedback on connector differences between different monitors. I make the cable sold at http://techref.massmind.org/techref/io/serial/rlc2.htm and the pinout I show there worked fine for my Sony monitor, and has worked for many others, but your diagram here shows “RX” and “TX” reversed.

Part of the problem is that RX and TX only make sense if you include the direction. E.g. data being sent from the monitor is being RX’d by the PC but is being TX’d from the monitor, so either label could be used and still not tell us the direction of flow.

My monitor talks if I send data to it from the PC on pin 4 (farthest from ground) and look for data back from the Monitor on pin 3. The diagram on your page shows data going from the monitor on pin 4 into the MAX232 (and so on to the PC) and out of the MAX232 and into the monitor on pin 3. At first glance, I would say that there must be a difference between your monitor and mine, but then I notice that in the paragraph above the diagram, you also said
“You might need to switch around between the TX and RX…” which makes me wonder if that is what you had to do to get it working?

It would be very good to get some more experience from people telling us which direction of data flow worked for them while NOT using terms like RX and TX which are so easy to confuse.

By: Rob I. Trujillo

Rob I. Trujillo — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 00:46:16 +0000

Thanks for this info. I haven’t had a chance to try it yet. I noticed some broken links. I eventually found what i think is all of the software i need at the link:

http://www.bloggybloggy.com/randomdownloads/windas.zip

The links to the premade cable at ebay didn’t work, i’m assuming these will work:

http://shop.ebay.com/?_from=R40&_trksid=m38&_nkw=RS232+to+3.3~5v+TTL+Converter+Cable

That ebay search as of 14jul09 pulls two matches, both look like the same cable, are from the same seller, but have different prices, unsure if there is actually a difference between them, i sent a letter to the seller.

By: cable rs232

cable rs232 — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 15:22:13 +0000

cable rs232…

Didn’t realise there was this type of information out there…

By: Sumeet

Sumeet — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 06:47:52 +0000

Nice to know that Anthony, but that 21 inch screen uses a lots of power .

By: Anthony Lum

Anthony Lum — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 17:25:06 +0000

Just wanted to say thanks a million for your blog. It made my task of fixing my P1110 extremely straight forward.

By: Jeff

Jeff — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 05:14:18 +0000

i would like to thank you for your time and say that there is an alternate methode for rs232 to ttl conversion with transistors that work very well and may cost less or even nothing if you have an old radio handy. i have an dell p1110 21″ that had the over bright prob and i found the schematic for the level converter at (http://www.uchobby.com/index.php/2007/06/11/ttl-to-rs232-adaptor-explained)
and after building this from spare parts i could not get it to work with the windas program but after looking at your schematic for the max233a i saw you connected pins 4,6,8 togather and then it worked after i took out pin 2 from the collector of the pnp and placed the tied up pins on one lead to the transistor i hope this helps and again thnks.

By: It’s HARDbutWARE » Hacking Monitor to Fix “Too Bright Screen” Issues

Wed, 07 Nov 2007 11:25:32 +0000

[...] read more | digg story [...]

By: Sumeet

Sumeet — Sun, 30 Sep 2007 20:46:17 +0000

What parts did you not understand daniel ? The main thing is setting up a cable to interface the computer to the monitor. Other than that it should work for all the models listed in the program itself.