Acer AL2423W Monitor Repair

March 14, 2010

I bought 24" Acer AL2423W Monitor about 3 and a half years ago. Recently, 6 months after the warranty expired, the monitor also expired. When I contacted Acer for information about out-of warranty service, they sent me an email explaining that if I would send them $60.00, they would be happy to talk to me on the phone for up to 30 minutes. Evidently Acer has no interest in fixing their old stuff; they want to sell you new stuff. Considering that I paid $700 for the monitor, I was not happy.

Sometime last year I came across several articles about people fixing their own monitors. It seems that laptop computers and flat screen monitors have one key point of failure. They are all built with electrolytic capacitors. See: these pictures for a look at what I am writing about

And these capacitors fail.

Well, these parts are very cheap. So folks have been opening up their dead monitors, looking for failed capacitors, buying capacitors on ebay or Radio Shack, and replacing the capacitors, and voila, the monitors work again. See: this article

Some 40 years ago, I had the opportunity to build some Heathkit projects, so thought, "Hey, I can do this."

So I removed the 4 screws that hold the monitor to the stand, and placed the monitor face down on the table, and removed a further 2 screws that secure the back to the interior sheet metal at the bottom of the unit.

Starting at the bottom ( In order to minimize the visibility of the tool marks), near the right corner, and using a broad blade screw driver and some wedges I carefully pried the clamshell enclosure apart. This was time-consuming. The back shell has a lot of perimiter clips that fit into slots in the front bezel, and while you CAN pry the two apart it is difficult to do without breaking one or more slots. In this respect the product is NOT designed for ease of repair.

Inside the case there is a (roughly) 7x11" sheet-metal box that holds the power-supply and video circuit boards. I removed the box from the rest of the assembly and the circuit boards from the box.

I found following failed or failing capcitors:

  • Viedo board: 1 100uf 25V
  • power-supply board: 2 1000uf 16V, 3 680uf 25V, 1 100uf 25V

I replaced the suspect capacitors, re-assembled the monitor and it is working again.

I took photos as I worked. I have include some below. Click on small images for larger version

Remove the monitor from the stand, and then remove the 2 screws that secure the back of the monitor to the interior sheet metal.
The holes for those two screws are visible here at the bottom back of the plastic case.

Separate the back from the bezel and set it aside. This shows the interior sheet metal construction with the bottom towards the camera. The rectangular box sitting in the center with the switch and the plugs holds the circuit boards that we need to access
Note you may break some slots in the bezel while doing this. The clamshell design is NOT best for ease of repair.

Peel away the tape from the bottomso you can remove the box
View from the top

Peel away the tape from the top so you can remove the box
There is a cable that plugs into a circuit board through the side of the box

Close-up of cable.
Remove the cable by the sides, don't pull on the wires.

Unscrew the 4 screws that secure the box to the rest of the assembly.
Rotate the box up along the top edge.

There is a cable attached to to the main assembly.
Remove it by the sides, don't pull on the wires.

Remove the plasic shield covering the left-hand board. (the power supply circuit board).
Remove the 4 screws that secure the left-hang board and the 3 that secure the right-hand board.

Remove the the 4 screws that secure the video plugs to the sheet metal.
Ease the two board out together from the embrace of the sheet metal. Note that they are joined near the center with a socket

Lay them face up.
And separate them.

This is the the right-hand (video) board.
The 100uf 25V capacitor near the cable was domed. (failed or failing).

This is the left-land (power-supply) board.
The same but with the obscuring sheet metal removed.

All of the larger electrolitc capacitors along the bottom and bottom-left edges of the board were failing or failed.
Two failed CapXon 1000uf 16V capacitors on the left side.

A failing 100uf 25V, and 680uf 25V capacitor along the bottom left.
Two failing 680uf 25V capacitors along the bottom right.

I purchased some replacements of of Ebay for around $10.
Old, failing capacitor on the right, new capacitor on the left.

After I removed the old capacitors, I inserted the new ones.
And soldered them in place
And cut the leads.