Tiredness & TFT Madness

February 13th, 2004 - 22:51 | 8 comments

I picked Kate up from York today, and am now exhausted. So I have nothing of import to say. No change there then. I shall, however, tell you a little story:

I was setting up a TFT monitor yesterday. I attached the stand, feeding the VGA cable through the appropriate slot, then looked for the power socket. It was one of those little round ones (that’s the technical term) rather than a large 3-pin hole. It wasn’t visible. So I did what any self-respecting tech shouldn’t do, and checked the manual. It was apparently next to the VGA socket. I chastised myself for being so stupid as to miss this, and removed the stand. No socket. There was, however, a sheet of metal punctured with various holes, that looked like it might be the remains or unfinished portion of where the socket should have been. This seemed possible, but highly unlikely.

I spent another fifteen minutes looking for the damn socket…slowly becoming more and more frustrated. It definitely wasn’t anywhere on the stand, or, as far as I could tell, the monitor itself. Eventually I left it, thinking I must have got to the stage where it’s right in front of me but I can’t see it, and would go back in an hour’s time. I felt very stupid, but sometimes these things happen. An hour later, still no joy. Two minutes later, I found it.

Guess where. Once someone gets it I’ll update the post.

UPDATE: Simon B deduced the location. The socket was part of the VGA connector that attaches to the back of the computer. Weird. I’ve seen this on rechargeable mouses and PDAs before, but never on a monitor. Ah well, at least I know for the future!

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8 Responses to “Tiredness & TFT Madness”

1 Simon Feb 14th, 2004 at 3:09 pm

was it next to the VGA socket?
2 Edward Feb 14th, 2004 at 3:20 pm

on the edge?
3 Andrew Feb 14th, 2004 at 4:17 pm

Nope and nope
4 Simon Feb 14th, 2004 at 5:23 pm

Did you have to say “open sesame seed bun”? Is it powered by a ballistic duck?

Or more seriously, was it situated near a headphone jack, or was it dismissed as this? On some monitors the is a raised bit at the back and on the bottom edge there is the jack. Horrors of horrors, it wasn’t on the front was it?
5 Andrew Feb 14th, 2004 at 6:00 pm

Sadly there was no secret code phrase, though I would suggest that to prospective monitor designers as a good strategy.

Nope, nowhere near the jack, or the front. It wasn’t on the monitor itself at all.
6 Simon Feb 14th, 2004 at 6:21 pm

if not on the monitor that leaves the stand or remote power. Sadly, the closest anyone has got to remote power was when tesla managed to get everyones light bulb in a town to turn on at once…if that was even true. If its on the stand would all those holes on the metal plate be some kind of interface to pass the power up through? I still find it hard to believe that you could miss the jack though… I suppose there is the possibility that the power was conducted up the supplied vga cable, but then why would you have the power cable? unless it plugged into something on one end or other of the vga cable…its too weird.
7 Andrew Feb 14th, 2004 at 6:57 pm

You’ve got it It was a hole on the VGA connector into the back of the PC. I’ve never seen this on a monitor before!
8 Simon Feb 14th, 2004 at 7:42 pm

Totally pointless. I suppose it could tidy things up a bit, but there really are only two kinds of pc set ups. The main type is messy. Cables everywhere. The second is if you have some kind of cool desk set up. Little holes to drop cables down, perhaps have the monitor mounted into something somehow, with the base locked away where no one can see it. If you fall into case one then no amount of weird cable design is going to reduce the mess. If you fall into type two then there is no mess, the existing system already allows for a monitor power cable, and so it all becomes pointless. The only other reason is wear and tear. The more complicated something is the more likely it is to break. The more unique something is the harder it is to replace. High breaking chances combined with uniqueness equals hefty replacement costs.

Or, perhaps I am just paranoid.

Oh, btw, it seems I have temporarilt been able to sneak my site out of Oxford. Try http://baguetter.homelinux.com:19000

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