cyclone3d wrote:

You can take the back off and turn the sub-brightness up via the flyback. You can also adjust the "focus" on the flyback as well […]
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Kittan wrote:

I rescued, or "was donated to", this Philips 107E 17" CRT monitor from my friend's mother's business. It's been used mostly to do billing etc. Unfortunately it is either badly calibrated or it is slowly going out, as it is a bit dark in games even with brightness on high and I have to boost gamma a bit in 3DFX control panel for games (D3D, OpenGL). Welp, CRT monitors are so impossible to find here that I have to deal with it but the picture is very good otherwise.

You can take the back off and turn the sub-brightness up via the flyback. You can also adjust the "focus" on the flyback as well.

I used to drill holes in the side of the case so I could just stick a long screwdriver in there to adjust those if I needed to later.

There are probably also going to be a bunch of other variable resistors that you can adjust as well. Some will be on the main board and there will probably be some on the board that attaches to the tube itself.

They are usually labeled pretty clearly.

That might be a good thing to try, I'm just a bit hesitant to do it as I know there's a deadly amount of electricity roaming around in there but maybe I'll toughen myself up and get a friend to help me out!

Kittan wrote:

That might be a good thing to try, I'm just a bit hesitant to do it as I know there's a deadly amount of electricity roaming around in there but maybe I'll toughen myself up and get a friend to help me out!

I'm in the same boat, i'd like to adjust the screen/focus pots on an old monitor but keep putting it off because of the high voltages involved. Was looking for some sort of long plastic screwdriver but i don't think they make such a thing.

Nprod wrote:

Kittan wrote:

That might be a good thing to try, I'm just a bit hesitant to do it as I know there's a deadly amount of electricity roaming around in there but maybe I'll toughen myself up and get a friend to help me out!

I'm in the same boat, i'd like to adjust the screen/focus pots on an old monitor but keep putting it off because of the high voltages involved. Was looking for some sort of long plastic screwdriver but i don't think they make such a thing.

Having plastic handle in the screwdriver isn't enough?

You should be able to get electrician screwdrivers with most of the shaft plastic covered from your local hardware store.

I adjusted mine with a regular Phillips head. Everything you need to touch with the screwdriver for adjustment is made of plastic so if you have a steady hand I think you'll be fine. Most of the power is lost when you pull the cord anyhow (I think). I've got a 21 inch ctx monitor and it used to have spots where text was hardly legible and now it looks great.

detritus olentus wrote:

I adjusted mine with a regular Phillips head. Everything you need to touch with the screwdriver for adjustment is made of plastic so if you have a steady hand I think you'll be fine. Most of the power is lost when you pull the cord anyhow (I think). I've got a 21 inch ctx monitor and it used to have spots where text was hardly legible and now it looks great.

I'm pretty sure there's some bigass capacitors in there that are potentially fatal even after you turn the power off. On youtube i've seen people hook up the metal end of a screwdriver to ground and then sticking it under the CRT nipple to discharge the tube but it doesn't look very elegant.

thicc caps

Nprod wrote:

detritus olentus wrote:

I adjusted mine with a regular Phillips head. Everything you need to touch with the screwdriver for adjustment is made of plastic so if you have a steady hand I think you'll be fine. Most of the power is lost when you pull the cord anyhow (I think). I've got a 21 inch ctx monitor and it used to have spots where text was hardly legible and now it looks great.

I'm pretty sure there's some bigass capacitors in there that are potentially fatal even after you turn the power off. On youtube i've seen people hook up the metal end of a screwdriver to ground and then sticking it under the CRT nipple to discharge the tube but it doesn't look very elegant.

I usually just unplug the power from the wall and then turn on the power switch to the monitor to drain the capacitors. Same goes for power supplies. The little bit of power left in the capacitors is going to get used up by the unit itself in a couple milliseconds.

Been doing this for over 20 years and haven't been shocked yet.

cyclone3d wrote:

Nprod wrote:

detritus olentus wrote:

I adjusted mine with a regular Phillips head. Everything you need to touch with the screwdriver for adjustment is made of plastic so if you have a steady hand I think you'll be fine. Most of the power is lost when you pull the cord anyhow (I think). I've got a 21 inch ctx monitor and it used to have spots where text was hardly legible and now it looks great.

I'm pretty sure there's some bigass capacitors in there that are potentially fatal even after you turn the power off. On youtube i've seen people hook up the metal end of a screwdriver to ground and then sticking it under the CRT nipple to discharge the tube but it doesn't look very elegant.

I usually just unplug the power from the wall and then turn on the power switch to the monitor to drain the capacitors. Same goes for power supplies. The little bit of power left in the capacitors is going to get used up by the unit itself in a couple milliseconds.

Been doing this for over 20 years and haven't been shocked yet.

Unplugging the power and turning on the power switch does not drain the capacitors unfortunately. You might have been lucky, but I don't think it is good idea to recommend it here because thinking that the capacitors are drained when doing that can kill someone.
I asked about this from someone who has been repairing crt monitors and TVs for 30 years.

So...not exactly a dumpster find, but they were slated to be dumped if they weren't taken. Found out about these just being in the right place at the right time while at work. 😎 😎 😎 😎 😎

Top server is Compaq Proliant PL1600 6/550 - Dual Pentium III 550MHz, 768MB RAM ECC PC100, 4x Ultra2 SCSI 18.2GB 7.2k RPM drives, 32x IDE CDROM, and 20/40GB DAT

Middle server is a Compaq Proliant PL1600R 6/450 - Single Pentium II 450MHz, uknown RAM, 2x Wide Ultra SCSI 9.1GB 10k RPM drives, 32x IDE CDROM

Bottom server is a Compaq Proliant 3000 - Dual Pentium II 300MHz, unknown RAM, 6x Wide Ultra SCSI-3 18.2GB RPM with Pluggable Option Kit interface, unknown slot-load CDROM, and what looks like a tape drive?

Oh man, I just feel how heavy those beasts are from Denver.

Glorious.

Baoran wrote:

cyclone3d wrote:

I usually just unplug the power from the wall and then turn on the power switch to the monitor to drain the capacitors. Same goes for power supplies. The little bit of power left in the capacitors is going to get used up by the unit itself in a couple milliseconds.

Been doing this for over 20 years and haven't been shocked yet.

Unplugging the power and turning on the power switch does not drain the capacitors unfortunately. You might have been lucky, but I don't think it is good idea to recommend it here because thinking that the capacitors are drained when doing that can kill someone.
I asked about this from someone who has been repairing crt monitors and TVs for 30 years.

Well, always seemed to work for me. How does it not drain the caps of power? I really would like a clear explanation of how turning on the circuit that uses the power doesn't drain the capacitors.. especially since it sure sounds like it does.

cyclone3d wrote:

Baoran wrote:

cyclone3d wrote:

I usually just unplug the power from the wall and then turn on the power switch to the monitor to drain the capacitors. Same goes for power supplies. The little bit of power left in the capacitors is going to get used up by the unit itself in a couple milliseconds.

Been doing this for over 20 years and haven't been shocked yet.

Unplugging the power and turning on the power switch does not drain the capacitors unfortunately. You might have been lucky, but I don't think it is good idea to recommend it here because thinking that the capacitors are drained when doing that can kill someone.
I asked about this from someone who has been repairing crt monitors and TVs for 30 years.

Well, always seemed to work for me. How does it not drain the caps of power? I really would like a clear explanation of how turning on the circuit that uses the power doesn't drain the capacitors.. especially since it sure sounds like it does.

The cathode ray tube and the electron gun won't turn on if there is no power plugged in which means there is no load even if the switch would be just a dumb switch. The cathode ray tube is the only load the high voltage power supply has inside a crt.
There are instructions online how to drain capacitors of a crt before trying to repair one. Do you think those instructions would be necessary if it would be that simple to drain them by just pressing the power button?

Brickpad wrote:

So...not exactly a dumpster find, but they were slated to be dumped if they weren't taken. Found out about these just being in t […]
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So...not exactly a dumpster find, but they were slated to be dumped if they weren't taken. Found out about these just being in the right place at the right time while at work. 😎 😎 😎 😎 😎

Top server is Compaq Proliant PL1600 6/550 - Dual Pentium III 550MHz, 768MB RAM ECC PC100, 4x Ultra2 SCSI 18.2GB 7.2k RPM drives, 32x IDE CDROM, and 20/40GB DAT

Middle server is a Compaq Proliant PL1600R 6/450 - Single Pentium II 450MHz, uknown RAM, 2x Wide Ultra SCSI 9.1GB 10k RPM drives, 32x IDE CDROM

Bottom server is a Compaq Proliant 3000 - Dual Pentium II 300MHz, unknown RAM, 6x Wide Ultra SCSI-3 18.2GB RPM with Pluggable Option Kit interface, unknown slot-load CDROM, and what looks like a tape drive?

Very nice find, the bottom one has indeed al DLT III drive while the top one has a DAT drive. The slotdrive is Compaq OEM probably made by Pioneer, being the only known manufacturer doing slot drives. Funny is the display of the bottom unit rotated by 90 degree. You will need a Compaq SMARTstart CD to set up these machines correctly and version 5.5 might be the last one to suppotrt these older ones. Let me know if you cannot find an image online or fail diggin for the manuals at the hp website. Are there any SMART-RAID-controllers installed?
eisapc

Brickpad wrote:

So...not exactly a dumpster find, but they were slated to be dumped if they weren't taken. Found out about these just being in t […]
Show full quote

So...not exactly a dumpster find, but they were slated to be dumped if they weren't taken. Found out about these just being in the right place at the right time while at work. 😎 😎 😎 😎 😎

Top server is Compaq Proliant PL1600 6/550 - Dual Pentium III 550MHz, 768MB RAM ECC PC100, 4x Ultra2 SCSI 18.2GB 7.2k RPM drives, 32x IDE CDROM, and 20/40GB DAT

Middle server is a Compaq Proliant PL1600R 6/450 - Single Pentium II 450MHz, uknown RAM, 2x Wide Ultra SCSI 9.1GB 10k RPM drives, 32x IDE CDROM

Bottom server is a Compaq Proliant 3000 - Dual Pentium II 300MHz, unknown RAM, 6x Wide Ultra SCSI-3 18.2GB RPM with Pluggable Option Kit interface, unknown slot-load CDROM, and what looks like a tape drive?

The data center I worked in the early 00s had hundreds of these and they were all eventually auctioned off. Never in a million years would I have thought people would find these heavy, noisy ass beasts desirable. After racking and unracking these for years I can thank some of these models for my lower back problems I have today. We replaced them all with Dell rack servers. Out of all the Proliant rack models of the time I found the 1U DL360 G1 my favorite. Small, lightweight and reliable with decent specs and we would setup rows of them in load balancing scenarios.

I was offered a huge compaq Pentium 2 server last year for free, but there is no chance I would have room for such things, so it went to e-waste
I only have room for limited amount of PCs that I actually will be using for retro stuff.

Brickpad wrote:

So...not exactly a dumpster find, but they were slated to be dumped if they weren't taken. Found out about these just being in t […]
Show full quote

So...not exactly a dumpster find, but they were slated to be dumped if they weren't taken. Found out about these just being in the right place at the right time while at work. 😎 😎 😎 😎 😎

Top server is Compaq Proliant PL1600 6/550 - Dual Pentium III 550MHz, 768MB RAM ECC PC100, 4x Ultra2 SCSI 18.2GB 7.2k RPM drives, 32x IDE CDROM, and 20/40GB DAT

Middle server is a Compaq Proliant PL1600R 6/450 - Single Pentium II 450MHz, uknown RAM, 2x Wide Ultra SCSI 9.1GB 10k RPM drives, 32x IDE CDROM

Bottom server is a Compaq Proliant 3000 - Dual Pentium II 300MHz, unknown RAM, 6x Wide Ultra SCSI-3 18.2GB RPM with Pluggable Option Kit interface, unknown slot-load CDROM, and what looks like a tape drive?

Awesome!
Here's my 16oo tower.
Proliant 1600 Barn (well shop office) Find
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SmDx2ZM44JU

I've upgraded mine a fair bit, pretty much maxed out now. I'll have to update the post, but you can mount the LCD the correct way, it just clips in.

@oeuvre: How'd you get the Facebook reaction emoji?

Back in 2012, I trash picked a Dell PowerEdge 6300 Server that had 1GB Server grade SD-RAM PC-133, 2x Pentium II Xeon 400MHz CPUs, SCSI CD-ROM, 2x Fujitsu 18.6GB 10K RPM Ultra2 SCSI, 3x Seagate 73.4GB 15K RPM Ultra3 SCSI, 3x PSUs (kept 1 in and took the other 2 out), 1.44MB FDD, Intel Pro 10/100 FastEthernet, Adaptec AHA PCI SCSI controller card (had 2 of them), and it ran Windows Server 2003 R2 with RAID 5 on all 5 drives. I also ran pfSense firewall on the system using a 60GB SATA HDD, SATA DVD burner, and a PCI SATA controller card (I have 2 of the same cards, and the one that I had before getting another one worked very well in my Socket 7 desktop running MS-DOS 7.10 and XP Pro SP3).

My neighbor threw this out a few years ago. It's a Dell XPS 720. It was missing the hdd and video card and showing an error for the cpu fan. It had 2 gb ddr2 installed. It now has a gtx 460, 8gb ddr2, and a 500gb hdd. It's missing the side panels and I haven't been able to find a reasonable replacement for them.