Question for the PC tech guys

[lonewolf]

Hi guys.

I bought a new cable a month ago that goes from my PC to my monitor ( TV).
The is the large 15 pin cable with male pins on both ends.
Today I unplugged one end at the TV when moving TV.

After plugging it back in I lost the blue gamma on my display . The TV colour and picture is perfect but in PC mode the colour is off and adjusting the blue gamma has no effect.the other gamma colours adjust fine.drivers are updated. I did an ohm test on the cable and found one pin on the top row and one pin on the middle row with no continuity from one end to the other.

My question is .
Does anyone know if there should be continuity between every pin. Could that be the cause of my problem? Are these cables that fragile.

thanks in advance
Bruce

[Bill Douglas]

Hi Bruce. I'm a bit out of date with VGA if this is what it is. I'm suspecting the TV doesn't know about the low resolution output from the computer which is probably about 640 lines. Can you change your TVs resolution. Just an idea, I hope it helps.

[lonewolf]

It is a VGA cable Bill
The res is 1360/768
It's been fine untill today when I undid the cable to move TV. I plugged it back in and turned PC back on and right away I noticed the lettering was yellow and the blue XP screen is green not blue.
After trying a bunch of adjustments I found that the blue gamma was not working .
The cable is the only thing I touched so checked it and found the no continuity issue between two pins.

[slodave]

Wiggle the connector at each end.. They can go bad. Watch the TV while wiggling and pushing..

[lonewolf]

slodave thanks. I wiggled ,removed switched around the ends today but when you said wiggle I tried again. wiggling the plug does nothing but bend the cable a little where it goes into the plug and bingo back to normal.
You know when I bought the cable the guy said there is a one year replacement warrenty on the cable and i thought what can go wrong with a cable .I touched it once and a problem happens.obviously a break or something where it goes into the plug so back it goes.
Thanks again guys for chiming in so quik.It was p...ing me off and now i can go to bed knowing prob is fixed.
thanks again
Bruce..

[slodave]

You're welcome.

[slodave]

A little side story... I used to think that power cables for PC's never went bad. Plug them in, tuck the pc away and the cable never moves, should not have issues. Took me probably two occasions that were far apart to realize that the power cable can fail too. Some of the older cables are a bit heavier duty than the newer cables - thought the old ones would be the best. Wrong! I now change out the cables with what comes in the box with a new PC/power supply, regardless of the age/how it looks.

[asphaltgambler]

My experience: where was the last place you had your hands? Then check for the obvious human fault factor, then replace the cable.

[stomachmonkey]

How old is this monitor / TV?

Does the VGA cable plug in and stick of the back horizontal or does it hang vertical?

Horizontal ones can put strain on the connector and if a solder point cracks you'll get that.

Back in the day we had a bunch of Radius 21 in monitors, real expensive mothers. They all started failing around the same time. VP of IT was going to dump them. Told him I thought they could be fixed, he didn't care, told me to take them if I wanted them. 5 minutes with a soldering iron and they were good to go. Sold them for $250 a piece.

[sammyg2]

Glad you got it figured out.
Now you have a good 'scuse to spend $$$ on one of them gold plated HDMI cables ..... assuming the monitor's new enuff.

[gacook]

Don't need gold-plated for the HDMI...that's more of a marketing gimmick than anything. Aside from that, I'm with Sammy--go HDMI if your monitor/PC supports it.

[sammyg2]

Originally Posted by gacook

Don't need gold-plated for the HDMI...that's more of a marketing gimmick than anything. Aside from that, I'm with Sammy--go HDMI if your monitor/PC supports it.

LOL, agreed on the gold bling.
Remember when those cables first came out? Big bux, crazy money.
They've come down quite a bit and are almost reasonable now.

[gr8fl4porsche]

As a general note, cables are cheap on Amazon, Blue Jean and Monoprice.

[stomachmonkey]

Originally Posted by lonewolf

.....I did an ohm test on the cable and found one pin on the top row and one pin on the middle row with no continuity from one end to the other....

With the cable end facing you, large side on top, pinouts are 1-5 from left to right.

Top row, 1 = Red, 2 = Green, 3= Blue, 4 = ground or unused, 5= Ground

Middle row, 1, 2, 3, and 5 = ground, 4= unused

Bottom row, 1 = unused, 2 = DAT or unused , 3 = H Sync, 4= V Sync, 5 = Clock or unused

[lonewolf]

TV is a new Samsung Even with just a VGA cable the res is incredible.
I agree with the thinking what did I touch which was nothing except the cable and only at one end but I wiggled both plugs a couple times ,removed the cable twice and switch the ends around and still nothing but like I said I just moved the actual cable a tad ,not the plug and pic came back normal so the issue is where the cable goes into the plug.
Of course that was at the end of the day after updating drivers and trying other things for hours.

[Rednine11]

Originally Posted by slodave

A little side story... I used to think that power cables for PC's never went bad. Plug them in, tuck the pc away and the cable never moves, should not have issues. Took me probably two occasions that were far apart to realize that the power cable can fail too. Some of the older cables are a bit heavier duty than the newer cables - thought the old ones would be the best. Wrong! I now change out the cables with what comes in the box with a new PC/power supply, regardless of the age/how it looks.

I am an IT tech in a very large factory. I have seen this a few times myself and I too change them out regardless of condition or age

[stomachmonkey]

Originally Posted by slodave

A little side story... I used to think that power cables for PC's never went bad. Plug them in, tuck the pc away and the cable never moves, should not have issues. Took me probably two occasions that were far apart to realize that the power cable can fail too. Some of the older cables are a bit heavier duty than the newer cables - thought the old ones would be the best. Wrong! I now change out the cables with what comes in the box with a new PC/power supply, regardless of the age/how it looks.

Originally Posted by Rednine11

I am an IT tech in a very large factory. I have seen this a few times myself and I too change them out regardless of condition or age

I recall being in one of our work/storage rooms one day staring at drawers full of power cables, literally hundreds and hundreds of them.

One of my guys asks if there was a problem?

I said, "every new device comes with a power cord"

He said, yeah pretty much, and?

"Where are all the devices that these power cords came with?"

Of course the answer was obvious but it really makes an impression on how much hardware even a building of 500 goes through over the years.