I've had this XL2546K for a bit less than 4 years and lately I started noticing some faint horizontal stripes on the bottom 40% of the monitor in ALL apps/games, faint enough to be hard to get on a photo. I randomly decided to go from 240Hz to 60Hz and to my surprise it made the problem much, much more noticeable, as you can see in the image below:
At 144 Hz there's a white line perfectly splitting the good area from the distorted part:
Am I out of luck here?
Unfortunately, I don't have another monitor, cable or PC to test right now.
Is my Zowie XL2546K dying?
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Re: Is my Zowie XL2546K dying?
Pixel row/column scrambling can be caused by a hardware defect, especially if it affects only half a panel. It typically changes distortions at different refresh rates. So it is quite possible that this requires replacement.
Try a Factory Reset, and see what happens first -- in case some monitor memory (scaler registers, etc) got corrupt.
And try a different video source too (e.g. Amazon FireTV, laptop, iPad Pro USB-C DisplayPort output, etc).
If you still get problems, then the monitor is now considered on its last legs -- go shopping for a new monitor!
Bonus Extra Information:
-- Some aspiring electronics engineer students can try solder reflow tricks on the scaler motherboard and panel ribbon connectors, but that's not for the faint of heart. This is often worth it for repairing expensive GPUs ($1000+) but may not be worth it on $300 monitors. But if you have some basic skills, you may attempt to see if it's a removable ribbon cable connector; then try to reseat that if you have experience reseating fragile ribbon connectors (like DIY replacing a phone screen from ebay). Do this only when you've got a backup monitor, and you're willing to risk it. Some of them are not easily removable connectors (i.e. reflow soldering).
-- You may also want to doublecheck the resale value of a defective monitor. Sometimes repair companies buy up defective monitors knowing they can fix them for a profit. This is more common on more expensive panels of popular luxury items (e.g. MacBooks) than inexpensive screens that cost only a dollar or two per Hz.
Try a Factory Reset, and see what happens first -- in case some monitor memory (scaler registers, etc) got corrupt.
And try a different video source too (e.g. Amazon FireTV, laptop, iPad Pro USB-C DisplayPort output, etc).
If you still get problems, then the monitor is now considered on its last legs -- go shopping for a new monitor!
Bonus Extra Information:
-- Some aspiring electronics engineer students can try solder reflow tricks on the scaler motherboard and panel ribbon connectors, but that's not for the faint of heart. This is often worth it for repairing expensive GPUs ($1000+) but may not be worth it on $300 monitors. But if you have some basic skills, you may attempt to see if it's a removable ribbon cable connector; then try to reseat that if you have experience reseating fragile ribbon connectors (like DIY replacing a phone screen from ebay). Do this only when you've got a backup monitor, and you're willing to risk it. Some of them are not easily removable connectors (i.e. reflow soldering).
-- You may also want to doublecheck the resale value of a defective monitor. Sometimes repair companies buy up defective monitors knowing they can fix them for a profit. This is more common on more expensive panels of popular luxury items (e.g. MacBooks) than inexpensive screens that cost only a dollar or two per Hz.
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Re: Is my Zowie XL2546K dying?
You mean this, right?Chief Blur Buster wrote: ↑07 Aug 2023, 17:26Try a Factory Reset, and see what happens first -- in case some monitor memory (scaler registers, etc) got corrupt.
No luck there, unfortunately. Will try other sources later when I can. Thanks.
Re: Is my Zowie XL2546K dying?
So, I tried other sources with no luck. Since the screen looked mostly fine on 240 Hz, I just decided to stop paying attention and more or less got used to it. Then at some point the issue... just went away on its own? Scared to check other refresh rates just in case but I cannot see any of the horizontal lines anymore.