My Acer XB271HU (bmiprz) 27" 1440p IPS monitor failed to start yesterday morning, quite possibly due to the lightning storm the previous night.
It does seem
somewhat unlikely to be caused by the storm as I was using it without issue until about 11pm, then powered down and pulled everything out of the wall when the storm got closer. I saw it work as usual maybe 15 seconds before pulling the cord. On the other hand, it's a hell of a coincidence that it's worked perfectly for two years and breaks when powered down for the night during a lightning storm!
Symptoms are that the power LED blinks blue, which AFAIK it should never do -- power save mode is amber. The soft power button doesn't do anything, so I can't turn it off. There's no image of any kind whatsoever, and the backlight seems to be always off, though I'm only 90% sure of that.
A friend with a very similar monitor (XB271HUA) says his turns on to a manufacturer logo, then says "no signal" and the LED goes amber, if nothing is plugged in. Mine simply blinks the power LED in blue and that's it. The soft power button on the front also does nothing, so I can't turn it off that way.
As I have no way to get it repaired (for a reasonable price), I figured I'd take a crack at it as I have some experience with electronics repair. There are also power supply PCBs for this exact model available from e.g. eBay, to fully replace the power supply.
Board images:https://imgur.com/a/jT6rwA7 -- I recommend right clicking the images and opening in a new tab to see the full size.
Especially note the discoloration/bad solder joint at Q703, and the resistor next to it (R720).
The output connector (shown in the capacitor image)
does produce 12.1 V between the magenta and black wired while powered; the other colored wires appear to be at 0 V relative to black.
There's also a big capacitor near what seems to be the output side (see images in the "bonus question" below), that was changed to something very high, IIRC 380 V and drained very slowly (1.5 hours or so until it was at a safe voltage of 15 V or so).
The main question is really this:Based on the images and the fact that there *is* output voltage, do you think this PCB could be the only reason the monitor doesn't work, meaning it's relatively likely replacing it will make the monitor fully usable again?
Bonus question:Is the weird discoloration around the transistor (on both sides of the board) likely to be a sign that it's dead (and likely by overvoltage)?
There is no such discoloration in the eBay images I found of this power supply:
https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/URYAAOSwsCliqHPM/s-l1600.jpghttps://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/18YAAOSwPIdh7Wue/s-l1600.jpghttps://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/-2sAAOSwBGRiqHPM/s-l1600.jpgIf so, I'll most likely buy a replacement power supply PCB. I figure component-level repair is probably more trouble than it's worth, especially considering the risk that many components are damaged despite looking fine.